Last week, I asked Gov. Jim Justice about when we could see the state of emergency still in place after two years for the COVID-19 pandemic go away. The answer wasn’t really heartening.

We’ve now been under a state of emergency since March 16, 2020, one day before the state officially saw its first COVID case. I’m sure some will disagree, but I believe that most thinking people understand that the state of emergency early in the pandemic was an appropriate move.

I’ll even grant you that being under a state of emergency during the fall/winter 2020 wave, the delta wave last summer and fall, and the omicron wave, at least until hospitalizations became manageable, was probably appropriate. However, Justice could have always issued new states of emergency during those waves to ensure resources could easily flow to where they were needed.

Instead, we’ve been under a constant state of emergency. And really for no other reason than it gives Justice more flexibility when it comes to spending the various tranches of federal COVID-19 aid.

“There is one thing that is really, really important: We need to be able to draw down 100% of the federal government’s funding toward West Virginia,” Justice said. “I sure don’t want to lose those dollars, because those dollars are phenomenally important to our state. Our state has a great opportunity, as we’re already doing, to capitalize on those dollars and manage them the correct way and do good stuff with them.”

Look, I’m all for the $1.35 billion in direct funding West Virginia is getting from the American Rescue Plan Act. That’s not even counting specific ARPA funding going directly to education, higher education, and broadband. Believe it or not, we still have $15.3 million from the $1.25 million federal CARES Act (which has to be spent by Sept. 22).

But it seems to me that if the issue is State Code or rules and regulations that limit how the Governor can spend certain monies, the better way to fix those issues is through working with the Legislature than keeping the state in a state of emergency when COVID-19 cases are at their lowest.

What about variants or subvariants, one might ask. What about them? The omicron BA.2 subvariant that Dr. Clay Marsh has been raising alarm bells about for the last two weeks because of an increase of cases in Europe? Case numbers are already on the downward glidepath there because BA.2 is merely more contagious, not more deadly.

Even if West Virginia starts to see more cases and hospitalizations again, it’s apparent that new vaccinations and booster shots will continue to happen at a trickle. The hard of heart will remain so. The state will need to provide support for hospitals and maybe put the National Guard back in. That can be done though a state of preparedness or a new state of emergency.

We should be treating COVID-19 waves in this state the same way we treat floods. Or even better, we should be trying to better mitigate before the next flood or COVID wave (because honestly, we don’t do near enough to try to limit flood damage before it happens).

Right now, all of our surrounding states have dumped their states of emergency except Kentucky and theirs expires later this month. I haven’t heard about any issues with these states not being able to spend their federal COVID dollars. Simply saying that it’s not hurting anything to be under a state of emergency won’t cut it.

I can’t imagine the crafters of the laws that created the governor’s emergency powers imagined a need for a two-year state of emergency.

And while I’m on the subject again, it really is time to reduce Justice’s briefings, open them up for in-person press attendance, and allow for follow-up questions. I know we press probably care about this issue more than the public does, but we really are unable to fully do our jobs.

I’ve seen now several photos from bill signing events where the Governor’s Reception Room is packed full of lawmakers, supporters, and kids. If the Governor feels comfortable enough to allow between 15-30 people to surround him as he signs bills, I think he can handle the handful of statehouse reporters and TV news folks into briefings.