Lawmakers in the House of Delegates are trying to reverse a 2023 law that created a transfer portal in high school sports.
Prior to the 2023 legislation, whenever a student athlete transferred schools without moving into the district, they would have to sit out of playing sports for a year; however, the 2023 legislation mandated that students could start playing immediately.
State Senators slipped the rule into a bill that allowed homeschool and Hope Scholarship students to play sports at a public school. At the time, many delegates argued on the House floor that they didn’t like the idea of a transfer portal opening, but they voted for it to allow homeschooled kids to play at public schools.
Del. Marty Gearheart, R-Mercer, is the majority whip for the House of Delegates and argued against the bill three years ago.
This year, he introduced a bill to repeal the law, leaving it up to the West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commissions to set the policy, as they had done in the past.
Gearheart, when not at the Legislature or running his sign business, moonlights as a referee. He said the rule has damaged fair competition on the gridiron, the basketball court and the baseball field.
“Competition has been compromised,” he said. “Kids are not learning the values that they ought to be learning about teamwork and having to struggle, work their way through problems and how to be gracious in victory and learn to lose, which I think are the main reason we have sports attached to education.”
Mountain State Spotlight found in an analysis of football scores during the 2023 season — the first with the rule active — that 70 point-plus victories tripled and 45% of all games triggered a running clock, called the mercy rule.
Gearheart’s bill isn’t the first time lawmakers have attempted to repeal the law. But it is the first time lawmakers passed the bill out of committee and to the floor for a vote.
Del. Jeff Stephens, R-Marshall, presented the bill to the House Education Committee. As a teacher, Stephens has coached girl’s basketball and football in middle school.
He said repealing the rule isn’t just about leveling the playing field – it’s about building community.
“West Virginia is so homey,” he said. “If you had one really good basketball player in a small high school, you always go out and see that kid and pack the gym and get to see your neighbor that you don’t always get to see. But then if that kid transfers, or a couple kids transfer, then usually the community doesn’t follow that kid to the next school.”
But if the lawmakers in the House pass the bill, it’s hard to say whether the Senate will support it.
“I think it will have a reception, but whether it has enough reception to make it through, I don’t know,” Gearheart said.