AFP-WV Key Vote Alert: Oppose HB 4574

Jan 20, 2026 by AFP

Dear Lawmaker,

On behalf of Americans for Prosperity-West Virginia and our activists across the state, I urge you to oppose HB 4574, Emergency Funding for Financially Distressed Counties. This vote may be recorded in our 2026 session legislative scorecard.

This misguided, fiscally irresponsible legislation removes the incentive for County Boards of Education to manage their finances properly or be held accountable for failing to do so. HB 4574 creates a permanent bailout mechanism for counties that have failed to meet their fiduciary responsibilities without requiring the structural reforms necessary to address the root causes of unbalanced budgets, such as administrative bloat and over-hiring relative to enrollment.

This legislation was sold as a remedy to a single instance, in which the Hancock County School system is currently unable to meet its obligations, but will quickly serve as a way for bad actors to engage in more bad behavior.

Hancock County used one-time COVID funds to base-budget build, hiring nearly 150 more employees than was allotted by the state funding formula. The system is now essentially bankrupt, leading to a take-over by the State Board of Education. The county blatantly ignored warnings from the State Board against its hiring practices.

This comes on the heels of nine other counties that are now operating under similarly punitive action from the State Board based on factors ranging from dangerous schools and poor performance to unbalanced budgets and even a multi-million-dollar criminal kickback scheme.

West Virginia has increased education spending in the government-run school system by over $1 billion since 2017. At the same time student enrollment has dropped by over 30,000 students, too many counties continue to create more bloated administrative costs at the expense of funding for classroom instruction, and our school buildings are operating at well below 50% occupancy on average. Taxpayers cannot afford perpetually increasing K12 spending as student enrollment continues to decline. The government-run school system, just like families, must learn to live within its means.

HB 4574 will only serve to exacerbate, now and into the future, wanton fiscal mismanagement in county schools by bailing out bad actors who continue to shirk their fiduciary responsibilities instead of reining in reckless spending. Instead of being held to account, HB 4574’s “no consequences” approach to fiscal mismanagement allows counties who fail to right-size their budgets, school buildings, and administrative costs to freely continue down the path of financial malfeasance with the promise that the state’s taxpayers will prop-up their disregard. HB 4574 entrenches the very dysfunction it claims to address with virtually no guardrails to protect taxpayers.

It is for these reasons that I ask you to oppose HB 4574, Emergency Funding for Financially Distressed Counties.

Sincerely,