The West Virginia Senate has quietly killed a child labor bill eliminating teen work permits for 14 and 15-year-olds and replacing them with a certificate that requires less detailed information.
Sen. Charles Trump, R-Morgan, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee where the bill currently sits, said it would not run this session.
“We never had it on an agenda for consideration,” he said.
In February, the House passed the bill, HB 5159. The Senate Workforce Development Committee made some minor amendments and sent it to the floor of the state Senate earlier this week. However, shortly after the bill reached the floor on Monday, it was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee where it has sat ever since.
“Nobody asked me to schedule it or run it,” Trump said Friday.
While it is possible for the bill to be pulled out of the committee and onto the floor, and for rules to be suspended to pass it on the final day of the session, Trump said that seems incredibly unlikely.
The quiet death of the bill comes after it made waves earlier in the legislative session.
If passed, the bill would have eliminated work permits, documents that require several layers of approval from an employer, a parent or guardian, the teen’s school, and county school officials.
The permits would have been replaced with an age certificate, a less detailed document that confirms that a minor is at least 14 before they can start working.
Minors 16 and older currently use age certificates for employment in West Virginia. 14- and 15-year-olds are already allowed to work under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, so the bill would not create a new group of workers or violate existing federal law.