It’s a fair question to ask how many guns, what kinds of guns, and how many guns in the hands of how many people are necessary to keep a community like ours in Jefferson County safe. Could there be too many guns or too many hands? Our Republican legislators think there are not enough of either and want to expand gun ownership universally to 18-20 year-olds and to permit ownership of automatic weapons. Emily Asaf argues the case, focusing on safety.
Keeping our youth in West Virginia is proving a more and more elusive goal. Our Republican dominated government seems to be putting its hope in data centers, though these will not produce resilient jobs . At the same time, it’s cutting or weakening social programs that make living here affordable and attractive to young people. They leave and we’re left with a declining population.
Affordability is increasingly a daily concern for working families in West Virginia, including in the Eastern Panhandle, It’s especially a concern for teachers and other government officials who have their health insurance paid through PEIA. Premium increases and eroding provider services are outpacing the higher cost of living in the EP. Those high costs are forcing many to leave the state and they’re jeopardizing the health of our educational and community services. Emily Asif makes the argument for actual PEIA reform, not just promises from our representatives that they’ll look into the problem.