People around Greenbrier Valley told us they want their lawmakers to make efforts to address health care, broadband and the transitioning economy in the state at a roundtable discussion in Ronceverte this month.
This is part of Mountain State Spotlight’s ongoing effort to talk with residents in all of West Virginia’s 55 counties in the run-up to the 2024 election. We’re asking a simple question: What do you want to hear candidates talking about as they ask for your vote?
Health care
Since moving from New York City in the late 1960s, Naomi and Harvey Cohen have a long history of serving the state. Naomi joined Appalachian Volunteers and the federal government’s VISTA program early in the existence of those programs, and Harvey followed his soon-to-be wife from the Northeast to Mercer County. Over the following five decades, the couple — both lawyers — provided legal services and developed small businesses throughout Southern West Virginia.
As they looked to improve life for West Virginians, the couple faced struggles themselves. Harvey, then 57 and self-employed, suffered a stroke in 2001. The couple’s health insurance policy was canceled soon afterward.
Until they aged into Medicare, the insurance program for Americans over 65, seven years later, the couple had no health insurance.
“I felt like if I had a heart attack, it better be a fatal one,” Harvey said.
It’s one reason why the Cohens hope political candidates asking for their votes properly fund state and federal social services, like Medicaid and Medicare.
Cindy Rowlands, a Lewisburg resident, agrees with them. She works at a local home remodeling store, and she has just over a year left before she’ll be eligible for Medicare.
Rowlands worries what might happen if safety net programs like it run out of money.
“I’ll be working until I die probably,” she said.
Rowlands and the Cohens also expressed concern about the lack of reproductive health care in Southeastern West Virginia — especially after the state Legislature banned abortion in 2022.
“You have the whole gambit going into women’s health care,” Harvey added. “Women are endangered even if they’re not pregnant when they have health care needs that involve their reproductive system, and it’s crazy.”
Making West Virginia a great place for families
Soon after lawmakers banned abortion, Gov. Jim Justice said he would like to see West Virginia become a state where it’s easy for parents to raise families.
To Sarah Umberger, a Lewisburg resident, taking care of families means providing paid maternity leave, making child care more accessible, addressing the foster care crisis and investing in the public education system.
“We’ve decimated the school system,” she said. “We’re not dealing with kids at all in any situation, whether they’re in foster care or in residential settings or just needing daycare.”
Still, some Greenbrier Valley residents told us they appreciated the state’s community atmosphere for children.
Fawn Valentine has been involved in the Alderson Main Street volunteer group for two decades. She said not much has changed. Kids still ride their bikes up and down the streets without supervision.
“This place is safe,” Valentine said. “We consider ourselves small-town America at its best. People are neighborly.”
Valentine and other attendees of the Greenbrier Valley community meeting value the small-town character of their communities, from Alderson at Greenbrier County’s southern border to Rainelle to the west. But they also acknowledge their communities need economic development to survive, and they want to know how candidates for office would balance this need to grow and develop communities while maintaining the small-town feel.
Sophie Pace, an Alderson artist, said businesses in town have limited hours because they typically see limited traffic.
“They’d like to be open more often,” Pace said.
Attendees offered ideas about how the state could draw people, especially young people, to the area: invest in agriculture and vocational schools, and capitalize on the area’s considerable natural beauty and resources. Valentine saw potential in attracting young people with computer jobs.
But a stumbling block to much of this economic development, they agreed, was poor infrastructure, particularly sketchy broadband. Many people said they were promised improved broadband that has yet to materialize.
Don Goddard, a physical therapist from Rainelle, said he has to go to the library to access online continuing education classes.
“I can’t get the bandwidth in my house,” he said.
The history and future of the state
Umberger said she wants lawmakers to help West Virginia transition to a renewable energy economy, rather than continuing to promote coal and natural gas.
“We need to have clean energy in our state,” Umberger said. “Our politicians are bowing down to an industry that is our history, not necessarily our future.”
Goddard said that timber companies find it cheaper to pay fines for not replanting trees in forests they clear-cut than to do the restoration work. He said the clear-cutting worsens water issues in Rainelle, which is already experiencing flood control issues.
Attendees want state legislators to improve oversight on large corporations and make it easier for small businesses to operate.
S. Marshall Wilson, the Constitution party candidate for Governor, drove down from Berkeley County to attend the event. He pointed to West Virginia’s business inventory tax as an example of regulations that are not friendly to small businesses.
“The smaller places could use a boost,” Valentine said.
Attendees said they don’t see lawmakers effectively addressing any of the economic or infrastructure issues that affect regular West Virginians.
“They fiddle fart around so much,” Valentine said.
Pace agreed. “If you keep doing the same thing, you get the same results.”