As a military retiree, I understand the importance of automatic Cost of Living Adjustments (COLAs) for retirees. The $1 in retirement that I earned in 1999 would be worth only about half of that today in 2026 without regular COLAs.
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In the past I have advocated for COLAs for our WV state retirees through my co-sponsorship of 2023 House Bills (HB) 2139 (To provide a 5% cost of living increase for state retirees who make under $60,000 per year) and HB 3070 (Increasing Retirement Benefits for Public Employees) and I will continue to do so. In the meantime, until such time that we are able to put in place automatic COLAs I will continue to support one time retirement benefit increases for our state retirees.
COLA
It’s just not right that our retirees, some retired for decades, are still getting the same amount of retirement income as the day they retired. If you retired in 2000, the purchasing power of your retirement check in 2022 would be less than 61 cents on every dollar. State retirees deserve Automatic Cost of Living Adjustments (COLAs) to their retirement check. This needs to be fixed, and I will work to make that happen.
COLA's for WV State Retirees
2023 Update
COLAs remain something that I think our retirees deserve. With several other higher priority bills in 2023 such as HB2526, the largest Personal Income Tax Cut in WV history (which I supported), and pay raises for state employees, the only bill that we passed that which would increase retiree benefits was SB237 (which again I supported) and it was limited to those who retired under PERS or the State Teacher Retirement System.
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Here are the two COLA bills that I co-sponsored in 2023, but they did not get out of committee. Perhaps in 2024.