Category: General Assembly
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Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics in the Virginia Department of Education – Average Teacher Salaries Edition
by James C. Sherlock I was in the early stages of researching a column on school salaries in Virginia when I came upon yet another bad report. In 2021 Special Session I, the General Assembly directed the Superintendent of Public Instruction to provide a report on the status of staff salaries, by local school division, to…
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Paying for Miscarriages of Justice
by Dick Hall-Sizemore The 2022 General Assembly appropriated $6.5 million to compensate seven individuals who had been wrongly incarcerated. The men had been convicted of crimes which it was later determined they did not commit. They were: Eugene Stevens–$1.7 million. (HB 394) Stevens was convicted of murder in 1986 in Lancaster County and sentenced to…
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Building Systems to Use Methane Not From Wells
by Steve Haner Methane (CH4) is money. It is also known as natural gas, one of the most efficient fossil fuels we use, and allowing it to leak into the atmosphere when it could be used wastes energy and money. Methane is also a greenhouse gas (GHG). But the story gets more interesting here, because…
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Virginia Slides Lower in ALEC Economic Rankings
by Steve Haner First published earlier today by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. As measured by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), Virginia’s economic outlook has continued its precipitous drop and now barely ranks in the top half among the American states, 24th out of 50. A decade ago it was in the top five,…
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More on Vetoes
by Dick Hall-Sizemore At least one reader has requested that I post a list of all the bills that Governor Youngkin vetoed, along with summaries of the bills and the Governor’s explanation for his veto. Such a list is at the end of this post. I agree with some of the Governor’s vetoes, particularly of…
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SCC Asked for Hearing on Secret Renewables Costs
by Steve Haner Appalachian Power Company has asked the State Corporation Commission to schedule a separate hearing on Attorney General Jason Miyares’ motion to break the seal on exhibits in its application for new renewable energy sources. Miyares’ April 6 motion was first reported by Bacon’s Rebellion, in a story on Appalachian’s pending application for…
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Youngkin Signs Donor-Privacy Bill
In recent years, “cancel culture” has targeted many individuals, businesses, and organizations with the intention of silencing them into submission. In one tactic, political activists target or hack donor lists of groups they disagree with and publicly shame or intimidate donors and/or their businesses who expected that their gifts would be kept private. For example,…
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Play Stupid Games, Win Stupid Prizes
by Kerry Dougherty Look who’s crying now. Virginia Democrats, who launched ugly attacks on Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s religious beliefs in his second week in office and who spent the entire session bragging about how they were a “brick wall” blocking most of his initiatives, are suddenly bawling because the governor vetoed 26 bills. Never mind…
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Things Are Not Always As Intuitive As They May Seem
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Sometimes, public policy proposals can be counterintuitive. Virginia law authorizes health insurance companies to charge smokers up to 50% greater than the premium that would otherwise be effective. The 2022 General Assembly passed legislation that would have repealed this authorization. The bills, HB 675 (Hope, D-Arlington) and SB 422 (Edwards, D-Roanoke), passed…
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Youngkin Vetoes Bill Because It Weakened SCC
by Steve Haner Reliance on the controlling phrase “in the public interest” helped get an energy bill vetoed by Governor Glenn Youngkin (R), bringing a rare call from a governor to maintain the independent oversight of the State Corporation Commission. Recent governors of both parties happily signed bills with the phrase into law over and…
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VCEA Could Raise APCo Power Bills by Half
by Steve Haner Compliance with the 2020 Virginia Clean Economy Act will result in a 49% increase in monthly costs by 2035 for residential customers of the Appalachian Power Company, according to a State Corporation Commission staff analysis. That’s a $57 increase on a typical 2020 residential bill of $117. Rates on the largest industrial…
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What Is It About Adam Ebbin?
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Governor Youngkin seems to have it in for state Senator Adam Ebbin, D-Alexandria. Of the 26 bills from the 2022 Session that the Governor vetoed, nine (35 percent) were bills sponsored by Ebbin. (Midnight yesterday was the deadline for the Governor to take action on bills passed in the last session.) From…
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SCC Staff: Dominion May Exceed Wind Cost Cap
by Steve Haner A similar article was published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. Testimony filed by the State Corporation Commission staff on April 8 opened a slight possibility that the Commission could reject Dominion Energy Virginia’s proposed $10 billion Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project off Virginia Beach. It all depends…
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The General Assembly Adds New Requirements for Teachers that Virginia Schools Do Not Have and Cannot Hire
by James C. Sherlock A tip of the hat to Dick Hall-Sizemore for pointing out the following bills. I have written often on how Virginia is constantly loading up teachers and schools with additional reports and requirements. This General Assembly is trying to add new requirements for teachers that we do not have and have…
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A Bag Of Oranges and Gas Tax Posturing
by Steve Haner The bag of mandarin oranges that was $4.99 last week was $5.99 this morning. Fruit trees aren’t getting raises – that is the impact of fuel prices, the cost to ship them to Virginia. As I’m fuming and pushing my cart to the next inflated item, the phone pings to announce an…