Clean Elections HB 2805 and Energy Efficiency HB 2210

West Virginia Environmental Council Action Alert
March 25, 2013

WVEC supporters – We need you to place calls and e-mails regarding two very important pieces of legislation that need to move this week if they have a chance of passing this session.

Please take a look at the two ACTION ALERTS below:

Clean Elections HB 2805

Energy Efficiency HB 2210

Clean Elections HB 2805

West Virginia Needs Clean Elections and Fair Courts Now!

In response to scandals involving the state Supreme Court and former Massey Energy CEO, Don Blankenship, the West Virginia Legislature established a public financing program to help restore confidence in our judiciary — making us an example for the rest of the county. We can’t go back.

Public financing is a key element in the fight for clean elections and fair and impartial courts. Based on the pilot project’s success, it’s time to make public financing a permanent part of West Virginia Supreme Court elections.

HB 2805, making the Supreme Court Public Campaign Financing Program permanent, is now awaiting action by the House Finance Committee. We are facing a deadline of Friday, March 29 for the committee to consider and send the bill to the full House for consideration. 

Please contact committee members and ask them to support HB 2805 (see sample message below).  A list of committee members and their contact information can be found here:http://www.legis.state.wv.us/committees/house/HouseCommittee.cfm?Chart=fin

Thank you for making your voice heard on this important issue.

Sample Message: 

Dear Delegate ___________,

Please support of HB 2805, which would make permanent the successful program for public financing of state Supreme Court elections.

In response to scandals involving the state Supreme Court and former Massey Energy CEO, Don Blankenship, the legislature established the public financing program to help restore confidence in our judiciary — making us an example for the rest of the country. We need fair and impartial courts.  Making this program permanent will help ensure outside money is not corrupting our judiciary.

Thank you for your consideration.

Energy Efficiency HB 2210

PUT ENERGY EFFICIENCY ON THE HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE’S AGENDA!
Help us put Energy Efficiency on the House Judiciary Committee’s agenda!
Contact House Judiciary Committee in support of HB 2210!
Please take two simple steps to make sure HB 2210 is passed this week:

1. Email members of the House Judiciary Committee. Follow these simple instructions to do so.
2. Email or call Judiciary Committee Chairman Tim Miley and ask him to put a strong version of HB 2210 before his committee for a vote.

Del. Miley can be reached at tim.miley@wvhouse.gov or 304-340-3252.

Sample script you can use when you call:

“I support HB 2210, the West Virginia Energy Efficiency Act, which would lower electric bills by requiring our utilities to invest in energy efficiency. Please put this bill on the Judiciary Committee’s agenda.”

More Info: The legislature has the opportunity to protect residents and businesses from rising electric bills. West Virginia’s residential electric rates have risen more than 50% in the past five years. Yet, as electric rates continue to go up, our power companies are largely overlooking the cheapest resource: energy efficiency. Just as utilities can invest in new power plants, they can also invest in reducing electricity use. Utility efficiency programs are paid for through electric rates, just as investments in power plants are – but energy efficiency investments cost customers less than half the cost of producing the same new electricity in a power plant.

HB 2210 would require the Public Service Commission to establish long-term energy savings goals for utilities to meet by investing in energy efficiency programs. Such programs might include home energy audits by local businesses with rebates for efficiency improvements, incentives for the purchase of EnergyStar appliances, custom incentives for energy efficiency projects undertaken by industrial customers, etc. West Virginia’s electric utilities already offer far more of these types of programs in other states where they operate than they do in West Virginia.

Stacy Gloss,
Project Manager,
Energy Efficient West Virginia
Ph. 304-346-5891
www.eewv.org
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