Gov. Justice to give final State of the State address tonight
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CHARLESTON - When Gov. Jim Justice takes the podium in the West Virginia House of Delegates chamber tonight before lawmakers, justices, fellow statewide elected officials, congressional leaders, and invited guests, it will be his final State of the State address.
Justice will give his eighth State of the State address at 7 p.m. today, celebrating his successes over the last two terms of office and presenting his vision for his final year as governor of the State of West Virginia.
Few details have been given about what Justice plans to present to the public for his final State of the State speech. Justice has said he plans to propose a 5% pay increase for state employees, teachers, school service personnel, and state troopers - his fifth such pay raise proposal since 2018. He also plans to present lawmakers with another flat budget close to the $4.875 billion general revenue budget for the current fiscal year passed by lawmakers during the 2023 legislative session.
In many ways, Justice's speech will be vastly different from his first State of the State address. Winning the 2016 election as a Democrat and taking the reins from former governor Earl Ray Tomblin, Justice had not yet switched parties to the Republican Party. That would come in the summer of 2017 at a rally in Huntington with then-President Donald Trump by his side.
"The first year I jumped all around and put things on whiteboards and did everything and I sweated like a dog the entire time," Justice said in his 2023 State of the State speech, recounting his first State of the State speech in 2017.
Justice came into the Governor's Mansion in January 2017 dealing with the result of a couple of years of downturn in the coal industry, causing a decrease in severance tax revenue and mid-year budget cuts and causing budget fights between Tomblin and a Legislature that became a Republican majority in 2015 for the first time in more than 80 years. Justice had a more than $500 million hole to fill in the fiscal year 2018 general revenue budget.
"I am telling you, I can't possibly imagine that there is a time as dire and a time as important as tonight," Justice told State of the State attendees in February 2017. "Now, the truth is, it's time for gigantic decisions.
"We've got issues. We've got real problems," Justice continued. "I don't mean this in any bad way, because I'm the one that signed up to run for Governor. But we've got an 18 carat dog's mess, don't we? We do. I didn't create the dog's mess. I have inherited the dog's mess. And I am telling you, you have to have real direction and real ideas and real cooperation together to be able to get out of this."
That year's budget fight led to conflict between Justice, his own Democratic caucus in the Legislature, and the Republican majority, leading to a veto of the budget famously on a silver platter with cow dung, and a special session with a budget Justice allowed to go into effect without his signature making budget cuts.
But by his next State of the State speech in January 2018, Justice was feeling more optimistic. Tax revenue began to turn in the right direction. Voters approved the Governor's Roads to Prosperity road bond program. Justice, a girls high school basketball coach in Greenbrier County, went into coach mode with his own players surrounding him at the podium.
"If I was able to give you anything, it was just that. The ability to maybe be your coach," Justice said. "To maybe be what a governor is really supposed to be. A governor is supposed to be just that."
When Justice gave his 2020 State of the State address, COVID-19 was barely in the news. By the end of March of that same year, the state went into shutdown mode for nearly two months. During that time, Justice won the primary and later won re-election, this time as a Republican candidate. By the end of 2020, the state moved quickly to get COVID-19 vaccines to seniors and those in nursing homes, leading the nation at the time.
"Now, we all know that we've been first in COVID in the nursing homes and first in the vaccinations and we're on the nightly news everywhere under the sun," Justice said. "And we've got to be really proud because, in addition to all that, every single day that goes by more and more and more will come because they see West Virginia in a different light than they seen it before."
Since then, the state has seen major economic development announcements, such as Nucor Steel, Form Energy, Berkshire Hathaway, and more. The state has been ending its fiscal years with record-breaking surplus, including $1.8 billion at the end of June. Justice and lawmakers worked to pass sweeping changes and cuts to the state's personal income tax and other tangible personal income taxes.
West Virginia still has challenges, including a substance use disorder crisis driving overdose deaths, a high number of children in foster care, prison overcrowding and staff vacancies, health disparities, low reading and math achievement, a low labor force participation rate, poverty, and more. But governors often use the State of the State to focus on the good things in the state and to set an optimistic tone for the state's future.
"All of a sudden, we're the diamond in the rough they missed," Justice said during his 2023 State of the State. "Really be proud of who you are. Be proud that you may be a Republican or a Democrat or an Independent, for God's sake, live and work together and try to help one another for the betterment of all in this great state."
The public can watch Justice's final State of the State address through the governor.wv.gov, or through the Governor's social media accounts. West Virginia Public Broadcasting will also air the address live.