STATE LEGISLATION
2011 SESSION REPORT #6
The House of Delegates and the Senate often have different approaches to issues. The Castle doctrine, which places in the Code of Virginia the permission to use deadly force against an intruder in a dwelling, was treated differently in the House where HB 1573 [William H. Cleaveland] passed the house on February 8 with a vote of 75-23. The bill now goes to the Senate Courts of Justice Criminal subcommittee wherean identical bill, SB 876 [Richard H. Stuart] was defeated. The House also passed HB 2511, a bill introduced by Delegate William H. Cleaveland, that provides civil immunity for an occupant of a dwelling who uses deadly force in the defense of his dwelling.
Several members of the General Assembly on both sides of the aisle have attempted to make changes in the foreclosure process. SB 795 Introduced by: A. Donald McEachin, SB 836 Introduced by: J. Chapman Petersen, andHB 1506 Introduced by: Robert G. Marshall were bills that would have made the foreclosure process more difficult and give homeowners more advance warning. All were defeated in House and Senate committees before getting to the floor of either house.
The House has passed a bill HB2000 introduced by Delegate James LeMunyon that would require that one of the Virginia members of the Washington Area Transit authority be the Virginia Secretary of Transportation which provides a significant percentage of the funding for the subway system.
HB 2095, a bill introduced by Delegate S. Chris Jones, Provides that a member of any of the retirement programs administered by the Virginia Retirement System forfeits his retirement benefits if it is determined that he has been convicted of a felony that arose out of misconduct in any position covered under the retirement programs administered by the Virginia Retirement System.
Often bills are introduced is several sessions before they gain acceptance. During this session Senator George Barker introduced bill SB1049 which has successfully passed the Senate on 2-8-11 with a 40-0 vote. The bill titled “Public Procurement Act; verification of legal presence for employment in U.S.” requires that contractors for the Commonwealth of Virginia who have an average of 50 employees or more and receive greater than $50,000 in contracts must enroll in the Federal E-Verify program. During the 2010 session, Senator Barker introduced a similar bill, SB 225, which failed in the Senate Commerce and Labor committee. The failed bill did not have a contract minimum amount or an employee average number.
On Thursday the 10th of February the two houses considered budget amendment bills. The House bill HB1500 passed with a vote of 69-28. All of the committee amendments to the original bill, drafted by the governor’s office were approved and no floor amendments were accepted. In the Senate SB800 the senate version passed with a vote of 37-3. While several committee amendments were contested all were supported and no floor amendments were submitted. There are differences in the two bills which will be worked out in a conference committee before the end of the session on February 26th. The Senate bill included over $1 million to renovate the General Assembly Building as well as $1 million for the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame. Both houses chose to provide funding to fill judicial vacancies, addressing a problem that is rapidly becoming critical. The Senate budget begins to address the issue of Medicaid reimbursement rates, which have long been low here in Virginia.
Neither House chose to immediately restore funds to the state retirement programs that were taken last session to balance the budget. The House has passed a bill HB2410 to create a defined contribution retirement program which can be chosen by employees instead of the current defined benefit program. The state would place a 5% payment in the fund as well as match up to 3.5% of the employee’s salary. Currently employees hired before 2010 pay nothing in to their retirement program.