WEST VIRGINIA LAW INSTITUTE
GOVERNING COUNCIL MINUTES
Meeting, September 19, 2014
College of Law
Morgantown, WV
1. The Governing Council of the West Virginia Law Institute met on September 19, 2014, at the West Virginia College of Law in Morgantown. The meeting was called to order and chaired by President Scott Curnutte. Also in attendance or participating by phone were Council members Vince Cardi, John Homburg, Judge Gary Johnson, Brendan Leary, Chad Love, Patricia Proctor, Will Rhee, Delegate John Shott, David Stone, John Wallace, William Wooton, and Director/Secretary Robert Bastress, and Council Assistant Anna Dewitt.
2. The Council considered and accepted the minutes of its March 31, 2014, meeting.
3. The Council received reports on the Institute’s current projects. Researcher Nicholas Parker described what he had learned to date about other states’ approaches to legislative redistricting. Researcher Ken Bannon reported on his work regarding surrogate decision-making. A state-by-state research was under way and he was also in the process of completing a survey of state judges and officials who deal with the State’s surrogate decision-making processes. Researcher Devon Unger then updated the Council on his work reviewing and breaking down the states’ various approaches to administrative rule-making. All of the researchers anticipated completing or nearly completing their work by the end of the year. There was nothing to report on the project to address the laws dealing with the administration of estates because that work had not yet gotten under way.
4. Director Bastress delivered his report. In response to the Institute’s report on alternatives to setting local government officials’ salaries, there had been a legislative interim meeting on the subject and a bill had been introduced. There was no action taken on it during the session, however. The Legislature also failed to take up the Institute’s report on coal mine safety, which was done in cooperation with the Office of Coal Miners’ Health, Safety and Training and submitted to the Legislature and the Governor on December 31, 2013. Director Bastress stated his intent to work with the OCMHST to lay the groundwork for consideration of the report during the next legislative session. Budget-wise, $26,910 remained from the legislative grant provided to underwrite students’ research on the Institute’s projects.
5. In terms of new projects, Director Bastress proposed studying the State’s landlord and tenant laws to simplify and streamline them to facilitate pro se litigants who cannot afford an attorney. President Curnutte informed the Council that it had already done work on these laws around 2003 or 2004, but the Council’s efforts had gone for naught because the various constituencies could not reach agreement. Judge Johnson moved that the researchers undertake to retrieve the work that had then been done, to study what happened to thwart its proposal, and to report back at the next meeting. Vince Cardi seconded the motion, and it passed.
6. Elections of officers were held. Director Bastress was nominated and re-elected as Secretary. President Curnutte was nominated and re-elected as President. 7. There was no new business.
8. The Council set the date for its next meeting, which will be Tuesday, March 17, 2015, at noon at the State Bar Offices in Charleston.
9. The meeting was adjourned.
