With West Virginia’s May 11 primary rapidly approaching, the Republicans seeking the 1st District nomination against Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.V.) are lighting each other up over tax hikes and legislative pay raises. The problem? With two former legislators in the crowded GOP race, there’s plenty of exposure.

Former state Sen. Sarah Minear is taking aim at former state GOP Chair David McKinley’s voting record during his tenure in the state House of Delegates and accusing him of supporting a 1985 bill that would raise taxes and a 1994 amendment that would boost legislative pay from $6,500 to $12,000.

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“McKinley should stop accusations and explain his voting record,” blared a recent Minear campaign press release.

But Minear, who served three terms from 1994 to 2006, voted in 2001 to extend a 21.5-cent-per-gallon sales tax on gasoline through August 2007 though the tax was set to drop to 16.5 cents at the time. In 2004, Minear co-sponsored a bill that aimed to close the state’s budget deficit by increasing the income tax on nursing homes. A month later, Minear backed a bill to allow the municipality with the lowest-funding for police and fire department pension plans to impose new taxes.

In each of the cases, Minear’s campaign makes the distinction that that she never actually supported a tax hike.

In an e-mail, Jane Clark, a Minear spokeswoman, argued that the gas tax extension did not constitute a tax hike and that Minear only backed legislation giving municipalities more options to raise revenue. Clark also said that Minear backed a bill that only amounted to raising a fees on nursing homes.

“The Nursing Home Bill was a fee increase, and we know that David McKinley doesn’t want to get into a battle of who voted for higher fees since he has a record of increasing fees on dentists, funeral directors, hunters, bingo games, processing fees for Sheriffs, homeowners, insurance agents, chiropractors, libraries, and pharmacists. McKinley even supported charging a students a fees to pay college professors higher salaries,” said Clark.

Then there’s the pay hike issue.

In 2006, Minear co-sponsored a bill that would raise the pay of state legislators from $15,000 a year to $20,000 a year.