West Virginia's Senate Finance Committee chairman said all previously proposed cuts to education programs in the state's 20 adult jails and state prisons were removed from the budget bill Thursday before the Legislature passed it that night.
That meant the employees who received notices of possible layoffs from the state Department of Education could have breathed easier had Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin said he was going to sign the 2016-17 fiscal year budget bill. The education department said the originally proposed $4 million cut would result in layoffs for all 53 teachers and principals and eight support workers that staff the programs.
Department policy requires 30 days notification before layoffs.
The governor has instead pledged to veto the bill largely over the amount of money it takes from Rainy Day funds, but Senate Finance Chairman Mike Hall, R-Putnam, said he wants to keep the adult inmate education programs fully funded in any new budget lawmakers may have to create.
"This is one that at this point I believe should stay in place," Hall said. "Until some other information is brought forward to prove otherwise."
Hall said there are likely not enough senators in favor of providing the two-thirds majority vote needed to override a budget bill veto, which requires a higher threshold to override than other bills.
When asked about House of Delegates leaders' position on preserving the adult inmate education programs, House Speaker Tim Armstead, R-Kanawha, wrote in an email that the "only plan that would provide certainty in this program and many others is the budget the Legislature is sending to the Governor's desk."
"If the Governor chooses to veto the plan the majority of the people's elected representatives have sent him, I think it is difficult to rule out particular cuts," Armstead wrote.
"It will be up to the Governor to come forward with an alternative plan, and I suggest the question of what programs or jobs might be subject to cuts should first be posed to him. By signing the budget we have passed, the Governor can provide peace of mind to these employees, as well as PEIA recipients, PROMISE Scholarship recipients and thousands of other West Virginians."
Tomblin's proposed budget - which already contained $86 million in cuts, an amount lawmakers increased to $122 million in their bill - didn't suggest cuts to the adult inmate education programs.
If he does sign a future budget bill that lawmakers send him - a state government shutdown looms after July 1 if he doesn't - he could do so after using line-item vetoes to reduce spending in certain areas. But he couldn't choose to add funding before signing off.
"The governor thinks it's an important program," spokesman Chris Stadelman said when asked about the possibility Tomblin could line-item veto spending for adult inmate education out of future budgets. "It's not something we've ever considered cutting."
The planned prison educator "reductions in force," to be effective at the June 30 end of this fiscal year, appear as an informational item on Wednesday's state Board of Education agenda. They include secretaries making annual salaries like $28,000, $33,300 and $47,200, teachers making salaries like $44,100, $52,700, $64,900 and $78,300 and principals making salaries like $70,900, $85,700 and $99,000.
"We certainly won't execute any [reductions in force] if funding is available," said Sarah Stewart, the education department's director of policy and government relations.
Hall said the department's impending layoff notices were sent when it looked like lawmakers were going to cut all $4 million from the programs. He said department officials - he said he didn't recall who - met with him and Senate Education Committee Chairman Dave Sypolt, R-Preston.
"People from the administration basically had come to us and said, 'This is a program you might want to consider [cutting] if you need revenue,'" Hall said. "It's not like anything where I scoured around and said, 'Let's just cut that.'"
He said he thinks a department official said the programs had not decreased the prisoner recidivism rate.
But Hall said he began getting calls from people at Mason County's Lakin Correctional Center - in his district - saying the programs were effective. He said he changed his mind, and lawmakers first decreased the cut to $1 million and then eliminated it entirely.
Stewart said the department sent out the impending layoff notices because the funding was cut in some proposed versions of the budget bill. She recalled herself, department Chief of Staff Jill Newman and department Chief Operations Officer Joe Panetta meeting with Hall and Sypolt, but said she didn't know of any department officials suggesting that the programs should be cut if cuts had to be made.
She said the conversation concerned items that the House had already targeted for cuts.
At least two inmates have written to the Gazette-Mail advocating for the programs.
"While at [Huttonsville Correctional Center] due to the education dep. I have had a chance to learn a lot," Wilber Hess, 56, wrote in a hand-written letter. "I have earned my GED. I dropped out of high school around 1976, [and] being outside this prison I had no time to study for any classes."
Reach Ryan Quinn at ryan.quinn@wvgazettemail.com, facebook.com/ryanedwinquinn, 304-348-1254 or follow @RyanEQuinn on Twitter.