By MICHAEL MARTZ,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
The fate of one of Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s main campaign promises — eliminating the state sales tax on groceries — hangs in the balance after a Senate committee killed a legislative compromise Tuesday and then revived it for further debate.
Prompted by unresolved concerns over the effect on education funding for local governments, the Democratic-led Senate Finance Committee initially killed a bill that would eliminate most of the grocery tax and exempt menstrual and other personal hygiene products from sales tax. The vote was 9-7.
By JACKIE DEFUSCO,
WRIC-TV
A push to repeal a portion of the grocery tax is in jeopardy after a must-pass Senate panel rejected a bipartisan deal.
On Tuesday, the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee failed to advance legislation that sought to slash the state’s component of the 2.5 percent grocery tax, which goes towards K-12 schools and transportation. This version would’ve maintained the one percent local component, rather than eliminate the tax entirely as Governor Glenn Youngkin and House Republicans have called for.
By SARAH RANKIN,
Associated Press
Democrats who narrowly control the Virginia Senate stuck together Tuesday and voted unanimously against approving former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator Andrew Wheeler to Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s Cabinet.
On a 21-19 party-line vote, the chamber agreed to an earlier committee amendment that had stripped Wheeler from a resolution containing Youngkin’s Cabinet appointees requiring legislative approval.
By ANDREW CAIN,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
The Virginia Senate on Tuesday voted to reject Gov. Glenn Youngkin's nomination of Andrew Wheeler as secretary of natural resources.
The Senate voted 21-19 along party lines to back a committee amendment removing Wheeler, who served as EPA administrator under President Donald Trump, from a list of appointments working its way through the Senate. The Cabinet list comes up for a final Senate vote on Wednesday.
Wheeler would be the first Cabinet nominee in 16 years to be rejected by the legislature.
By SARAH VOGELSONG,
Virginia Mercury
Senate Democrats blocked the appointment of Andrew Wheeler as Virginia’s next secretary of natural and historic resources in a floor vote Tuesday, ending a drawn-out fight between the caucus and Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who nominated the former head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency under President Donald Trump for the position. . . . In a party-line vote, 21 Democrats overrode 19 Republicans to strip Wheeler’s name from a resolution confirming Youngkin’s cabinet appointments. The final resolution must be voted on a third time before officially passing the Senate.
By GRAHAM MOOMAW,
Virginia Mercury
In a surprise move, an education bill was amended on the floor of the Democratic-led Virginia Senate Tuesday to include a provision allowing families to opt out of mask rules in their local schools, legislation senators from both parties said is expected to win final passage Wednesday.
The amendment was proposed by Sen. Chap Petersen, D-Fairfax, who recently described school mask mandates as an “unscientific and inhumane” in a letter urging Fairfax County Public Schools to end the policy soon as possible.
Though Petersen said his proposal arose on its own, it closely mirrors Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s executive order meant to allow parents to opt their children out of school mask mandates.
By MEL LEONOR,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
Opponents of mask mandates in schools are using the power of the legislature to make it optional for parents to send their child to school with a mask.
The Virginia Senate on Tuesday overwhelmingly approved a bill that would prevent local school boards from levying mask mandates, and from punishing students whose parents opt to send their child to school without a mask.
The bill is the latest development in a push by Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, to do away with mask mandates in schools - which top Democrats in the state have heavily criticized. On Wednesday, it was a coalition of Democrats that cleared the way for the end of such mandates.
By MATTHEW BARAKAT,
Associated Press
A bipartisan majority in the Virginia Senate voted Tuesday to advance legislation that would ban public school systems from imposing mask requirements on students.
The move comes as Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s efforts to end mask mandates by executive order are bogged down in legal challenges.
Democratic Sen. Chap Petersen, a moderate who has played a key role on education issues, sponsored the amendment on the Senate floor Tuesday. It passed on a 29-9 vote, with Republicans fully in support and Democrats about evenly divided.
By GRAHAM MOOMAW,
Virginia Mercury
A Republican-led House of Delegates committee voted Tuesday to block a pending constitutional amendment that would automatically restore voting rights to felons once they regain their freedom.
If it holds, the decision will prevent Virginia voters from weighing in on the issue in a ballot referendum this fall, a major setback for voting-rights advocates who have spent years pushing to end Virginia’s lifetime disenfranchisement policy for people convicted of felonies, which falls disproportionately on Black communities.
By ANDREW CAIN,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
A House subcommittee on Tuesday voted 5-4 to reject a proposed constitutional amendment to automatically restore rights to felons who have completed their sentences.
The panel also voted 6-4 to reject a proposed constitutional amendment to remove from the state constitution defunct wording to bar same-sex marriage.
The votes mean the measures will not go to voters in statewide referendums in November.
By KARINA ELWOOD , TEO ARMUS AND GREGORY S. SCHNEIDER,
Washington Post
(Metered Paywall - 3 articles a month)
A Virginia House subcommittee struck down legislation Tuesday that would have given voters a chance to decide if the state should remove a now-defunct provision in the state constitution banning same-sex marriage.
In 2006, Virginians passed a measure, known as the Marshall-Newman Amendment, that banned same-sex marriage by defining marriage in the constitution as “only a union between one man and one woman.” That language remains, even after the U.S. Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage in 2015 and struck down state laws banning it.
By GRAHAM MOOMAW,
Virginia Mercury
Virginia voters probably won’t get a chance to take the now-defunct gay marriage ban out of the state’s Constitution after a GOP-led House of Delegates panel voted Tuesday to block an effort to give the state a do-over with marriage equality now widely accepted by the public.
An early-morning subcommittee hearing on the issue grew tense after a representative from the socially conservative Family Foundation suggested enshrining a fundamental right to marry in the Virginia Constitution could open the door to legally sanctioned polygamy, inter-family marriage and child marriage.
By SARAH VOGELSONG,
Virginia Mercury
A Democrat-controlled Senate panel advanced a Republican proposal Tuesday to strip two Virginia citizen environmental boards of their permitting power, although the committee chair called the decision “a very close call.” . . . The proposal, which folded together Senate Bill 81 from Sen. Bill Stanley, R-Franklin, and Senate Bill 657 from Sen. Richard Stuart, R-Stafford, would alter the current structure of Virginia’s environmental review system by vesting all permitting power with the director of the Department of Environmental Quality.
By MICHAEL MARTZ,
Richmond Times-Dispatch
(Metered Paywall - 7 articles a month)
Richmond may be required to finish a nearly $1.3 billion project to end combined sewer overflows in the James River by 2030, five years earlier than the previous deadline. But a Senate panel has provided the city with an "off ramp" for delays if the money isn't there to pay for it without hurting utility ratepayers.
The Senate Finance Committee voted 9-7 on Tuesday to approve Senate Bill 354, proposed by Sen. Richard Stuart, R-King George, to require Richmond to speed up its plans to eliminate periodic overflows into the river from its combined sewer system.
By KATE MASTERS,
Virginia Mercury
A push to expand state health insurance to undocumented children in Virginia ended Tuesday after House and Senate panels blocked bills aimed at adding to the state’s coverage.
The legislation, filed by Sen. Jennifer McClellan, D-Richmond, and Del. Kathy Tran, D-Fairfax, would have directed the state’s Medicaid program to develop an insurance option for Virginians under the age of 19 regardless of immigration status. The benefits would have included medical, dental and behavioral health treatment and covered an estimated 13,000 low-income children whose legal status makes them ineligible for any form of publicly subsidized insurance.
By MARKUS SCHMIDT,
Cardinal News
Roanoke’s 59-year old Virginia Transportation Museum will have to continue operating as a non-profit organization on its own at least for another year after legislation that would have designated the museum a full-fledged state agency failed in a Senate money committee on Tuesday.
The Democratic-led Senate Finance and Appropriations K-12 Subcommittee unanimously voted to carry over the measure, sponsored by Sen. John Edwards, D-Roanoke, to next year, allowing for either the Virginia Department of Transportation or the Joint Legislative Audit & Review Commission more time to study its fiscal impact that is estimated to be between $1 million and $3.5 million annually, based on the size and scope of the museum.
