Tag: Dick Hall-Sizemore
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Neither Snow Nor Rain Nor Heat Nor Gloom of Night…
by Dick Hall-Sizemore One of the best services provided by the federal government that began before the United States was an independent country is the postal service. Americans have depended on it and taken it for granted for centuries. Until recently. In recent years, service has deteriorated markedly. For example, I put out bill payments…
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Governing by Edict
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Although the issue of school mask mandates is now behind us, it is instructive to examine the legal arguments advanced by Attorney General Jason Miyares in a court case seeking to overturn the mask mandates instituted by the Loudoun County School Board (“school board”). Not only does Miyares advocate judicial activism and…
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Cutting Off One’s Nose To Spite One’s Face
by Dick Hall-Sizemore The Virginia Senate Democrats have acted irrationally. They have refused to confirm four of the five appointments made by Governor Youngkin to the Parole Board. This action was in retaliation for the House refusing to confirm 11 appointments made by then-Governor Northam last year, including those to the Board of Education and…
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What? The General Assembly Is Still Meeting?
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Jeff Shapiro has a nice column in today’s Richmond Times-Dispatch praising the work of the Bob Brown, the long-time news photographer who is retiring, after 42 years at the RTD, at the end of this month. His photographs have captured many moments in the legislature over the years and he is a…
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More Burdens on Teachers
by Dick Hall-Sizemore The General Assembly has passed legislation (SB 656, Dunnavant, R-Henrico) that would require schools to notify parents of “any instructional material that includes sexually explicit content” and permit parents to review such instructional material. Furthermore, the instructor would be required to “provide, as an alternative, nonexplicit instructional material and related academic activities…
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We Need to Help That Poor Billionaire Out
by Dick Hall-Sizemore With all the huffing and puffing about CRT, face masks, and “wokeism” at UVa, Bacon’s Rebellion has ignored what could be the biggest scam in the General Assembly: the subsidization of an ultrarich guy and his plan to build a football stadium and surrounding “mini-city” in Northern Virginia. The General Assembly is…
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“But, It’s Not a Perfect Bill. I Can’t Support That”
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Once again, the General Assembly has killed legislation that would prohibit politicians from using campaign donations to cover personal expenses. It is easy to express outrage at this almost annual occurrence, but, in doing some background research on the subject, I encountered some details that, on the one hand, provide a fuller…
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Youngkin Largely Opts for Stability in State Government Management
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Virginia has a tradition of continuity in state government. Generally, incumbent agency heads are reappointed, even if the new governor is of a different party than the outgoing governor and new Cabinet members are put in place. There have been many agency heads who have served multiple governors, of both parties, over…
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The State Budget: The House Reductions to Cover Tax Cuts
Budget is policy. A budget reflects what an organization chooses to spend its money on. The differences between the versions of the 2022-2024 biennial budget passed by the House and Senate this year are starker than they have been in recent memory. There are major philosophical and policy differences that the conferees will need to…
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Two “Day One” Proposals Fail
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Glenn Youngkin is quickly learning that being governor is not like being CEO of a large corporation. Just because the guy at the top wants something done does not mean that it will be done. One of Youngkin’s campaign promises was to require local governments to have a referendum before they could…
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A Conservative Proposal
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Gov. Glenn Youngkin has reported to the General Assembly that the state can expect to bring in an additional $1.25 billion in general fund revenue in the current fiscal year. This is an astounding mid-session revenue projection. He is proposing that the state “give it back” to taxpayers. Of the projected $1.25…
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You Want to Raise Your Tax on Yourself? Forget It.
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Several years ago, officials in Halifax County were confronting the problem of what to do about the local high school. There was consensus that something needed to be done. The only question was whether to make extensive renovations or build a new one. Depending on the option selected, the price tag was…
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Should It Be OK For The Police To Lie?
by Dick Hall-Sizemore On at least five occasions over a four-year period, Virginia Beach police confronted suspects with fake documents that indicated the suspect had been connected to a crime through DNA evidence. The documents were forged certificates of analysis, complete with the letterhead of the Virginia Department of Forensic Sciences and the Seal of…
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Follow-up: Appointment War Called Off
by Dick Hall-Sizemore House Republicans backed off late yesterday afternoon from their threat to let over 1,000 appointments by former Governor Northam lapse. They did, however, single out and deny eleven appointments to a few regulatory boards that have recently been the subject of controversy: Board of Education — denied three appointments, but confirmed one,…
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War Clouds On the Horizon
by Dick Hall-Sizemore The potential warfare that is simmering near Crimea may pale in comparison to the war that is threatening to break out in the Virginia General Assembly. First, a little background. During the course of a year, a governor makes hundreds of appointments to various agency boards, boards of visitors, etc. These are…