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By BRAD KUTNER,
WVTF-FM
Virginia’s legislature returns to Richmond Wednesday to review Governor Glenn Youngkin’s vetoes and amendments. While tension remains high, at least one bill with strong bipartisan support could see Youngkin rebuked.
The last Virginia governor to have a veto overridden was Bob McDonnell in 2011. McDonnell said a bill increasing payouts for medical malpractice cases would hurt businesses. Legislators disagreed and after a 2/3rds vote in both chambers, the law is still increasing maximum payouts in the Commonwealth to this day.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By MATTHEW DALY AND LEAH WILLINGHAM,
Associated Press
Coal miners will be better protected from poisonous silica dust that has contributed to the premature deaths of thousands of mine workers from a respiratory ailment commonly known as black lung disease, the Labor Department said Tuesday as it issued a new federal rule on miners’ safety.
The final rule, announced by Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su, cuts by half the permissible exposure limit for crystalline silica for an eight-hour shift.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By ANNE ADAMS,
The Recorder
(Subscription Required)
Passions were high. Voices were loud. The county attorney walked out after being insulted. Meeting protocol and rules for addressing the board were abandoned. After three and a half hours of debate, dialogue, demands and pleas, the Highland County Board of Supervisors passed its new EMS plan — one announced only this morning — with some minor changes.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By JOHN R. CRANE,
Danville Register & Bee
Danville Casino’s revenues went up in March by more than $2 million as the gaming facility brought in an increasing amount of money for the second month in a row.
Last month’s gambling activity generated about $21.08 million, a more than 10% increase over February’s $18.7 million, according to the latest figures from the Virginia Lottery.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By JOEY LOMONACO,
Fredericksburg Free Press
The General Assembly is likely headed for a special session before adopting its budget ahead of a statutory July 1 deadline, an outcome that could leave school districts — including Fredericksburg’s — in limbo as they look to finalize their own funding.
“Because of the conversation happening around Richmond… there is not agreement on the budget and the governor’s amendments on the budget,” Del. Joshua Cole (D-Fredericksburg) told the Free Press in a phone interview Tuesday afternoon.
Cole’s comments come on the eve of a pivotal veto session where legislators will also address more than 200 of Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s proposed amendments to the budget.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By NATHANIEL CLINE,
Virginia Mercury
In a state budget amendments, Gov. Glenn Youngkin pledged to support Metro with an additional $133.7 million amid a projected shortfall for the transit agency. The pledge came with a caveat: It would strip funding from a transit investment fund used by Northern Virginia jurisdictions.
Leaders from the Northern Virginia Transportation Commission, the regional body of jurisdictions responsible for funding Metro, urged lawmakers to reject the amendment.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By MARKUS SCHMIDT,
Cardinal News
Aaron Rouse was just about to sit down for a sushi dinner with his family in the late afternoon of Friday, April 5, when he received a call from Jeff Goettman, Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s chief of staff.
Goettman wanted to know if Rouse, a Democratic state senator from Virginia Beach, was available for a phone call the next day to discuss his SB 212 that was sitting on the governor’s desk, awaiting his action. The measure, which would establish a regulatory framework and tax structure for so-called skill games in Virginia, had passed in the Senate by a 32-8 bipartisan vote.
“When I got the call I was very surprised,” Rouse said in a phone interview. “In my mind I’m thinking, tomorrow is Saturday. OK, sure, I’m here. I was expecting they might want to discuss a couple of amendments, but it turns out they wanted a complete rewrite of the bill — and that’s when I was like, wait a minute, this isn’t how we do things.”
VaNews April 17, 2024
Virginian-Pilot
Editorial
(Metered Paywall - 2 articles a month)
State lawmakers have an opportunity today to protect vulnerable communities from destructive and recurrent flooding by voting to return Virginia to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. The proceeds from this market-based cap-and-trade program represent a lifeline for Hampton Roads, among other parts of the commonwealth. Gov. Glenn Youngkin has made it his mission to withdraw from this multistate program despite its success, but lawmakers need not be so short-sighted. RGGI membership is making a difference in Virginia and lawmakers can make certain it continues to do so by taking bold action during Wednesday’s veto session.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By NORMAN K. STYER,
Loudoun Now
After a three-year stalemate, the Kuhn family is hoping to get White’s Ferry running again by donating it to Montgomery County, MD.
Chuck and Stacy Kuhn bought the ferry in early 2021 after it closed following a Loudoun County Circuit Court ruling that the longtime owners did not hold legal authority to use the ferry’s Virginia landing at Rockland Farm. At the time, the Kuhns hoped to quickly restart the operation that provided an important economic and commuter link since 1786. Today it is the only Potomac River crossing between Point of Rocks and the American Legion Bridge.
VaNews April 17, 2024
By ANTONIO OLIVO,
Washington Post
(Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)
A helicopter hovers over the Gee family farm, the noisy rattle echoing inside their home in this rural part of West Virginia. It’s holding surveyors who are eyeing space for yet another power line next to the property — a line that will take electricity generated from coal plants in the state to address a drain on power driven by the world’s internet hub in Northern Virginia 35 miles away.
There, massive data centers with computers processing nearly 70 percent of global digital traffic are gobbling up electricity at a rate officials overseeing the power grid say is unsustainable unless two things happen: Several hundred miles of new transmission lines must be built, slicing through neighborhoods and farms in Virginia and three neighboring states. And antiquated coal-powered electricity plants that had been scheduled to go offline will need to keep running to fuel the increasing need for more power, undermining clean energy goals.
VaNews April 17, 2024
