Legislature 2008: Final Day

The Associated Press sets the stage for Day 60, reporting that "lawmakers appeared ready to close out this year’s session by sending Gov. Joe Manchin his proposals on business tax cuts and pay raises, but were balking at providing relief for teacher and municipal police and fire pension programs."

AP also provides a glance of some of the higher-profile bills of the session.

The House and Senate have sent Manchin 131 bills so far. The Legislature passed 273 bills last year, including 128 on the final day.

Friday's focus proved as much on bills that appeared doomed as on those expected to reach the governor's desk.

As cited by AP, Delegate Cliff Moore, D-McDowell, sought to shame his House colleagues for failing to take up a bill to add sexual orientation to the state's Human Rights and Fair Housing acts.

‘‘I want you all to think about what we didn’t do,’’ AP quoted Moore as saying. ‘‘We didn’t do the right thing.’’

The Charleston Gazette also noted Moore's floor speech, as did The Register-Herald. The Beckley paper had also previously reported comments from those on the other side of the debate.

Delegate Mel Kessler, D-Raleigh County and a candidate for governor, vented to The Register-Herald after being called out of order during a House Judiciary Committee meeting on the bill.

“I’m not going to discriminate against gays. I’m not going to line any of them up and shoot them," he told that paper. "I should have the right to exercise my religious beliefs, and my religious beliefs are that the Bible says it’s an abomination.”

Delegate Kelli Sobonya, R-Cabell, echoed Kessler's view, and "also took exception to the anti-age discrimination element of the bill," the Register-Herald reported.

“What if you have student housing, an apartment complex with young students, and you’ve got someone who’s 40 years old who likes to hang out with kids,” she told the paper.

"Eventually, she said, if the trend continues, no one could discriminate against anyone for any reason," the newspaper reported.