eNews – February 28, 2025
General Assembly round up: The bills that passed, those that failed, budget items to watch...and more!
Friday, February 28, 2025/Categories: eNews
This edition of eNews is sponsored by the National League of Cities, whose mission is to relentlessly advocate for, and protect the interests of, cities, towns and villages by influencing federal policy, strengthening local leadership and driving innovative solutions. Learn more >.
In this issue:
Budget
Finance
Land Use
General Laws
Fire / Emergency Response
Health & Human Services
Natural Resources
Transportation
Cannabis
Education
Elections
Technology
Eminent Domain
Labor
Public Safety
Opportunities
Budget
Now it’s the Governor’s turn: The General Assembly’s agreed-upon budget awaits amendments
A week ago, as the General Assembly prepared to vote on the budget agreement reflected in HB1600, the state budget, we promised that VML staff would provide a more comprehensive overview of budget amendments of importance to cities, counties, and towns. You will find those additional details under each topic area in this issue of eNews.
Now the budget is in Governor Youngkin’s court. The Governor and his staff are likely reviewing the General Assembly’s agreed-upon budget with an eye toward possible amendments. The Governor has 30 days from adjournment to submit any modifications. The House and Senate will consider any proposed changes to the budget at the Reconvened Session on Wednesday, April 2. Subsequently, Governor Youngkin will need to decide whether he signs the budget bill.
Even as the state budget proceeds on a relatively predictable pathway, the fiscal impact of federal budget cuts, funding freezes, and layoffs on the Commonwealth’s economy and budget, is making lawmakers nervous. That explains why the House created the bi-partisan Emergency Committee on Impacts of the Federal Workforce and Funding Reductions that held its first meeting last Saturday (see article below).
At the meeting, Del. David Bulova (D–Fairfax), who chairs the new committee, asserted that “We are here today because federal workforce reduction and cuts in spending not only affect the ability of individual families to support themselves, they are also going to have a ripple effect on our economy and affect our state budget.”
That also explains why Speaker of the House, Don Scott (D-Portsmouth) and Senate Majority Leader Scott Surovell (D-District 34), indicated that the General Assembly may need to return to Richmond to address federal decisions that jeopardize the Commonwealth’s priorities, as reflected in the budget agreement.
It’s important to remember that it was only five years ago that the Commonwealth was in a similar situation. On March 12, 2020, state lawmakers agreed to a new biennial budget. Within days, however, that budget was put on ice as a global pandemic was announced and uncertainty about what to do next became the question of the day.
Thankfully, we are not currently facing a global pandemic. But we are confronted with considerable uncertainty because of unprecedented federal actions. And there are enough questions among lawmakers to signal that a pause in the state’s fiscal plans may be necessary.
VML Contact: Joe Flores, jflores@vml.org
Finance
VML highlights local impacts of the federal workforce and funding reductions to House emergency committee
On the same day that the General Assembly concluded the work of the 2025 Session of the General Assembly, a special House committee convened to begin to assess the potential impact of recent decisions to reduce the federal workforce and funding. VML was one of five groups asked to address the committee; our presentation specifically focused on the potential impact of these decisions on local governments.
VML emphasized that there is considerable uncertainty about federal funding decisions and what it means for local employees, their families, and our economies, including local budgets. Localities that responded to our request for additional information suggested that it’s difficult to develop a plan to respond to potential federal actions unless there is timely access to clear and concise information. Heretofore that clarity has been lacking, adding to confusion and anxiety at the state and local levels.
VML’s presentation highlighted the fact that several regions of the Commonwealth are more vulnerable to potential federal layoffs, including northern Virginia but also Hampton Roads. The percentage of federal funding that localities relied upon in FY 2023 was also pointed out with the understanding that federal pandemic relief funds have increased the reliance upon federal funding in recent years. But as those temporary federal dollars recede, additional potential funding reductions come at a challenging time for some communities.
The chair of the Committee, Del. Bulova, indicated that tentative meetings will be held in northern Virginia, Hampton Roads, southwest/western Virginia (to focus on rural issues), and Richmond. As specific issues or concerns emerge at the local level, please share them with us, and we will convey them to the members and staff of the special committee.
A link to the video and presentations from the initial meeting held on Saturday, February 22, 2025, can be found here >.
VML Contact: Joe Flores, jflores@vml.org
APA’s Comparative Report of Local Government Revenues and Expenditures lacks responses from 49 localities
Comprehensive fiscal information provided by cities, counties, and towns to the Auditor of Public Accounts (APA) each year by December 15 is a valuable tool VML is beginning to use more often to report local revenues and expenditures when critical funding decisions are being considered.
For example, we’ve used the APA’s Comparative Report of Local Government Revenues and Expenditures to explain to law makers how revenues from the car tax flow to local governments, provide context for potential federal funding reductions by noting how much federal funding localities received in FY 2023 (see above article), and highlight the importance of local meals tax revenues to our communities in response to a bill designed to roll-back how much localities could collect from meals taxes.
As of February 15, 2025, the APA reports that 49 counties, cities, and towns have yet to submit this statutorily required information to the auditor’s office. The information, including the list of missing localities, that the APA reported to the General Assembly is available here >.
Because the APA intends to publish a final report in April 2025, there is still time for localities to report their revenues and expenditures. Reporting this information will not only keep you in the good graces of the Commonwealth, but will assist VML in making our collective case to policymakers on issues of importance to local governments.
VML Contact: Joe Flores, jflores@vml.org
Budget items
Item 255 #1c Redirect Funding to General Assembly Tax Relief Package. Directs $1.1 billion from the general fund for the Governor's proposal to provide an income tax credit for car tax payments to support the General Assembly’s tax reduction package that includes a one-time tax rebate, an expansion in the earned income tax credit and an adjustment in the standard deduction.
Item 258 #1c Provide Income Tax Rebate. Provides $977.8 million from the general fund in the first year for an income tax rebate of $200 for single files and $400 for married filers. The rebates are required to be issued no later than October 15, 2025 for taxpayers that file their returns before July 1, 2025.
Central Appropriations
Item 469 #1c State Employee and State-Supported Local Employees Bonus. Includes $83.1 million in FY 2025 to provide a 1.5% one-time bonus payment to state employees and state-supported local employees. The local employee bonus is equivalent to 1.5% of the employees base salary on July 1, 2025 and includes:
- Locally-elected constitutional officers;
- General Registrars and members of local electoral boards;
- Full-time employees of locally-elected constitutional officers; and,
- Full-time employees of Community Services Boards, Centers for Independent Living, secure detention centers supported by Juvenile Block Grants, juvenile delinquency prevention and local court service units, local social services boards, local pretrial services act and Comprehensive Community Corrections Act employees, and local health departments where a memorandum of understanding exists with the Virginia Department of Health.
Item 471 #1c HB 1928: Minimum Wage. Allocates $2.0 million from the general fund and $2.0 million from the nongeneral fund to support increases to the state's minimum wage to $13.50 an hour starting January 1, 2026 that affect state employees and state-supported constitutional officers.
General Provisions
Item 4-1.02 #1c Direct Tax Dept. to Provide Estimates of Federal Tax Law Changes. Budget language requires the Department of Taxation to estimate the revenue impact of federal income tax law changes that affect the general fund and communicate the estimates within 30 business days to the Governor and General Assembly. Within 20 days after receiving the estimates from the Tax Department, the Governor is required to submit a budget bill if the cumulative impact of federal amendments, excluding any federal tax extenders (i.e., temporary tax provisions that are subject to expiration), would decrease general fund revenue by more than $100 million in the fiscal year in which the amendments were enacted or the succeeding fiscal year.
Item 4-1.02 #2c Process for Federal Grant Reductions. Requires the Department of Planning and Budget (DPB) to report to the Governor and Money Committees if changes result in a reduction in federal grant revenue to the Commonwealth of at least $100 million in a fiscal year. DPB is required to report within 30 days of the enactment of these changes whether by an Act of Congress or by executive action,
Budget language authorizes the Governor to reduce allotments for federal grants by the amount necessary to ensure that state agency expenditures do not exceed available federal funding.
Finaly, in the event that federal grant reductions result in additional general fund expenditures for mandatory programming exceeding one percent of the general fund operating budget in the fiscal year in which the federal changes occur or the succeeding fiscal year, the Governor is required to consult with the leadership of the General Assembly regarding the need to call the General Assembly into special session for budgetary purposes to respond to the impact from reductions in federal grant revenue.
Major non-general fund sources as defined as Highway Maintenance and Operating Fund and Transportation Trust Fund are not subject to the provisions above.
VML Contact: Joe Flores, jflores@vml.org
Land Use
Bills that passed
HB2330 (Hodges) Notice of certain land use actions; first-class mail to last known address, etc., or property owner. When there is a proposed change in the zoning map classification of 25 or fewer parcels of land, notice is currently sent by registered or certified mail. This legislation changes that to be one notice sent by registered, certified OR first-class mail to the last known address of certain property owners impacted by a proposed change in the zoning map classification of 25 or fewer parcels of land provided that a representative of the local planning commission shall make affidavit that such mailings have been made and file such affidavit in the file.
HB1996 (Bennett-Parker) Planning and zoning; second hearing public notice. This legislation came at the request of VML members; it changes the second public hearing notice that a planning commission or governing body publishes for planning and zoning actions to be published 5 days before the date of the meeting instead of 7 days.
HB1973 (Bennett-Parker). Affordable housing; preservation, definitions, civil penalty. Allows localities to preserve affordable housing by exercising a right of first refusal offer by a locality or qualified designee of publicly supported housing in an ordinance.
SB1210 / HB1706 (Pekarsky/Bulova) Virginia Residential Property Disclosure Act; required disclosures for buyer to beware; aircraft noise. The Department of Aviation shall create a general public access website showing noise exposure maps. Also, in the disclosures regarding the sale of residential property there will be a provision that suggests buyers review the maps and local ordinances that deal with noise and airports.
SB1254 (Bagby) Comprehensive plan; environmental strategy. Would add to the comprehensive plan consideration of being an “environmental justice community” as defined in d2.2-234 if you are a city with a population greater than 20,000 and each county with a population greater than 100,000.
HB1827 (Simonds) Comprehensive plan; social determinants of health. Encourages a locality when reviewing the comprehensive plan to utilize relevant and available data and research related to social determinants of health as defined in the Virginia Code to consider how the adopted plan will impact public health and access to health care.
HB2153 (Carr) Faith and Housing; comprehensive plan; zoning; Department of Housing and Community Development. This bill requires a locality in its comprehensive plan to obtain input on strategies to support affordable housing on religious organization property and other tax exempt nonprofit organizations property.
Note – SB1178 (Hashmi), which was the same as HB2153, failed.
SB1313 (McPike) Affordable housing; local zoning ordinance authority; comprehensive plan. Amends Virginia Code Section d15.2-2304 to include all localities. It also adds implementation tools that can be included in an affordable dwelling unit ordinance.
SB974 (VanValkenburg) Subdivision ordinance; plan review by designated agent. Requires the review of a subdivision plat, site plan and plan of development to be completed administratively by the designated agent except that if you are a locality with a population of 5,000 or less, then the Planning Commission may act as the designated agent.
Note – HB2293 (Coyner), which was the same as SB974, failed.
SB1263 (Bagby) Water and sewer connection fees; new residential development. Allows a locality to provide for the full or partial reimbursement of water and sewer connection fees, capital recovery charges, and availability fees remitted by an applicant in connection with any new residential development.
SB1449 (Ebbin) / HB1601 (Thomas) Siting of data centers; site assessment; high energy use facility. Defines “high energy use facility” and allows a locality to require a site assessment before approving any new high energy use facilities.
HB2660 (Simon) Subdivision ordinance; shortens timeframe for local approvals. Shortens the timeframes for various local government approvals of subdivision plats and site plans. It also calls on the Virginia Code Commission to convene a work group consisting of various stakeholders to review existing provisions related to the submission, review, and approval of subdivision plats and site plans. The work group shall develop recommendations to (i) organize procedural steps in a clear, logical, and sequential order to enhance ease of reference; (ii) clarify the processes, requirements, and timelines applicable to each type of plat or plan; (iii) standardize terminology to ensure consistency, reduce ambiguity, and minimize misinterpretation; and (iv) identify and eliminate redundant or duplicative provisions to streamline the Code and improve its usability.
HB1718 (Price) Virginia Residential Landlord and Tenant Act; enforcement by localities. A locality may create an ordinance that provides that if a condition exists in a rental dwelling unit that constitutes a material noncompliance by the landlord with the rental agreement or with any provision of law that, if not promptly corrected, constitutes a fire hazard or serious threat to the life, health, or safety of tenants or occupants of the premises, a locality may institute an action for injunction and damages to enforce the landlord's duty to maintain the rental dwelling unit in a fit and habitable condition, provided that (i) the property where the violation occurred is within the jurisdictional boundaries of the locality and (ii) the locality has notified the landlord who owns the property, either directly or through the managing agent, of the nature of the violation and the landlord has failed to remedy the violation to the satisfaction of the locality within a reasonable time after receiving such notice.
SB1476 (Pillion) Vacant and blighted or derelict property; locality allowed to sell. A locality which has a vacant property for 5 years or more and is declared blighted or derelict and also has delinquent taxes may petition the circuit court to appoint a special commissioner to convey the real estate to the locality, the locality’s land bank entity or an existing nonprofit designated by the locality in lieu of a public auction. The bill includes technical steps and options for the locality to sell the property including requiring that repairs and renovations are made and that within 2 years the building be compliant with the building code.
Note – HB2745 (O’Quinn), which was the same as SB1476, failed.
SB992 (Williams Graves) Civil penalties for certain repeat zoning violations in Planning District 23; appeals. *Please note that changes to Board of Zoning Appeals code section of this bill apply to all localities. Provides an enhanced level of civil penalties in Planning District 23 (Hampton Roads) for repeat violations involving nonpermitted commercial uses as defined in the bill. The bill also clarifies (i) that when a board of zoning appeals hears appeals from the decision of an administrative officer and alters the statutorily required order of evidence, it is a reversible error if the appellant lodges an objection citing this section and the board refuses to reorder the hearing and (ii) that the required statement of a right to appeal an administrative officer's decision must be sent to the aggrieved person by certified mail with proof of delivery.
HB2128 (Walker) Derelict buildings; expands authority of localities to impose civil penalties. Acts to include industrial properties as derelict buildings for the purpose of imposing a penalty.
SB1422 (Reeves) Zoning violations; appeals; fines. Deals with the conviction of the storage or disposal of nonagricultural excavation material, waste, and debris being punishable by a fine of $2000 but if the problem is not abated within the specified time period the fine shall rise to $5000 and $7500 as outlined in the regulation.
SB1267 (Aird) Zoning; enhanced civil penalties; certain residential violations. Makes repeat violations of a zoning ordinance for multifamily residential purposes to be not more than $1000 for a second violation and subsequent violations also are more with a cap of $6000 for all violations within a 12-month period.
HB2037 (Bulova) Land development; solar canopies in parking areas. Allows a locality to adopt an ordinance that requires an applicant to install a solar canopy over designated parking areas. Such provisions shall apply only to non-residential parking areas with 100 parking spaces or more and may require coverage of up to 50 percent of the parking area. Localities are authorized to provide development density bonuses for properties that are subject to such provisions.
HB2054 (Reaser) Affordable housing; application for special use permit for assisted living facilities. Allows localities that have adopted an affordable housing program to negotiate that in an application for a special exception or special use permit affordable rental units be included for any proposed development of an assisted living facility. Such ordinance shall apply to applications approved on or after January 1, 2026.
SB838 (VanValkenburg) Recovery residences; certification required, penalty, report. Amends the existing civil penalty for a violation of law related to the operation of recovery residences to a Class 1 misdemeanor. The bill also directs the Secretary of Health and Human Resources to convene a work group to (i) make recommendations related to oversight and transparency for recovery residences and (ii) develop credentialing guidelines for recovery residences.
SB1128 (Lucas) / HB1638 (Hayes) Va. Residential Landlord and Tenant Act; affordable housing, criminal record screening model policy. Requires the Department of Housing and Community Development to create a model policy that ensures that a criminal record is not the reason for denying a person housing unless the policy is followed. It also creates a workgroup. This law is not effective until January 1, 2026.
HB2533 (Sewell) Zoning, development and use of accessory dwelling unit. Allows a locality to consider in the comprehensive plan tiny homes or accessory dwelling units. Tiny homes are defined as a dwelling of 400 square feet or less in floor area and accessory dwelling unit means an independent or attached dwelling unit as defined in the legislation. SB932 (Salim / Stanley) failed.
HB2396 (Simon) / SB1270 (Hackworth) Deed fraud; VHDA to evaluate prevalence, develop recommendations for prevention, etc. Directs the Virginia Housing Development Authority to create a technical advisory group to evaluate the prevalence of deed fraud to include notary fraud, seller impersonation, owner impersonation and fraudulent lien filing. The group is to provide recommendations to prevent these types of fraud. VML is part of the technical advisory work group.
HB2203 (Kilgore) / SB787 (McDougle) Housing and Community Development, Dept. of, consolidation of varying due dates for certain reports. The Department of Housing and Community Development submits many reports to the General Assembly and the timelines vary; so this legislation would put all of those reports on the same timeline. It also creates a requirement for (i) an annual report on the outcomes associated with closed projects that received a grant from the Virginia Growth and Opportunity Fund and requires the Department to use such report to create and maintain a public facing performance dashboard with such information to be updated annually and (ii) a comprehensive annual report on the state's homeless programs. The bill has a delayed effective date of January 1, 2026.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
Bills that failed
SB985 (Williams Graves) / HB1654 (Helmer) Short-term rental properties; human trafficking awareness training. Requires an accommodations provider to complete an approved training course on recognizing and reporting instances of suspected human trafficking. The course shall be approved by the Department of Criminal Justice Services. Given the fact that human trafficking training is required for hotel/motel employees, it is appropriate for accommodation providers to be subject to training as well.
SB1305 (McPike) Local taxes; zoning assessments; injunctions; ordinances. Any zoning ordinance or amendment to a zoning ordinance and map that has been enacted after December 1, 2023, shall not be effective until there is a final determination or the appropriate time period for an appeal has expired.
HB2438 (Mundon King) Solar facilities; local regulation, special exceptions. Ground-mounted solar energy generation facilities located on property zoned agricultural, commercial, industrial, or institutional shall be permitted pursuant to various criteria to be included in a local ordinance, such as specifications for setbacks, fencing, solar panel height, visual impacts, and grading, and a decommissioning plan for solar energy equipment and facilities.
HB2641 (Helmer) / SB975 (Van Valkenburg) Statewide housing targets; requires localities to increase their total housing stock. Requires localities to increase their total housing stock every year and also creates a “Housing Approval Board” that can overturn a local governing bodies decision on a residential project. The Board can provide a locality with a reprieve from the growth if they adopt prescriptive housing growth strategies as outlined in the bill and has not rejected more than 25% of new housing development over the past 5 years.
HB2577 (Leftwich) Uniform Statewide Building Code; unsafe structures. Any structure deemed unsafe under the Uniform Statewide Building Code, and therefore eligible for demolition upon the unsafe notice process being completed, the owner or his agent may temporarily overcome the unsafe structure designation by vacating and securing the structure by board up of all access points. The bill further provides that after six months have elapsed from the time the board up was first learned of and internally recorded by the locality, if the structure would still otherwise be considered an unsafe structure, the locality may issue and send a written notice to the owner that if the other conditions specified in the notice are not adequately improved, or an appeal.
HB1758 (Gardner) Surplus real property; prioritization of disposition for affordable housing. Requires the Department of General Services and the governing body of each locality to prepare an inventory list of all real property within its jurisdiction to which the locality holds fee simple title that is suitable for the development of affordable housing. If the governing body of a locality chooses to dispose of such a property, such property shall be offered for at least 180 days exclusively to eligible organizations, as defined by the bill, for the purpose of developing affordable housing, through purchase, lease, exchange, or donation in return for a recorded covenant to provide affordable housing for at least 30 years.
SB839 (VanValkenburg) Zoning; by-right multifamily development in areas zoned for commercial use. Requires localities to allow for by-right development of multifamily residential uses on all land contained in commercial or business zoning districts.
HB2289 (Coyner/Seibold) Zoning; recovery residences. Provides that zoning ordinances for all purposes shall consider a certified recovery residence in which no more than eight individuals with substance use disorder reside, either with or without one or more resident or nonresident staff persons, as residential occupancy by a single family. The bill provides that no clinical treatment shall take place in such recovery residence and that the recovery residence shall submit the individual name and contact information for the person responsible for the residence to the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services.
SB899 (Stuart) Data centers; water use. A locality may include in its zoning ordinance provisions for (i) requiring proposed data center developments to submit water use estimates and (ii) considering water use when making rezoning and special use permit decisions related to data center development.
HB1310 (Clark and Henson) Zoning; enhanced civil penalties; certain residential violations. For any violation involving nonpermitted commercial uses, the penalty shall be not more than $500 for the first violation, $1000 for a second and $1500 for the third violation not to exceed $4500 within a 12-month period.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
Studies that failed
HJ64 (Webert) Localities hosting data center infrastructure; DHCD to study revenue sharing program. This was a proposed study to look at revenue sharing between localities for data center revenue.
HJ442 (Orrock) Affordable housing; study on tax policies enacted by the Commonwealth and political subdivisions. The Virginia Housing Commission was to examine and gain an understanding of all available tax policies concerning affordable housing.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
General Laws
Bills that passed
HB1820 (Reid) Public safety communications; evaluation of need for infrastructure updates & hardware replacements. The Secretary of Public Safety and Homeland Security with the Secretary of Finance and the Statewide Interoperability Executive Committee shall evaluate the need for public safety communications infrastructure updates and hardware replacement. The evaluation shall include: a review of the current state of public safety communication infrastructure, whether updates to such are needed to assist with redundancy and enhanced resiliency, the cost of attaining such necessary updates and the current availability of state funding sources, including grant and local programs.
HB2150 (Carr) Virginia Public Procurement Act; contract terms inconsistent with Virginia law. No contracts for information technology goods and services may contain terms in conflict with Virginia law; but it only applies to localities if the locality has adopted this policy.
SB1118 (Roem) Registration by localities of cemeteries on private property. Requires localities to adopt an ordinance creating a register of identified cemeteries, graveyards, or other places of burial on private property. This bill has been amended to only apply to Planning District 8.
HB2152 (Carr) Virginia Freedom of Information Act; public body’s officer training. States that if the designated Freedom of Information Officer for a locality is their local government attorney; the attorney must attend training by the Freedom of Information Advisory Council.
HB2628 (Glass) / SB997 (Williams Graves) Local officers; oath of office. States that local officers must take the oath of office and give bond if appropriate on or before the day on which the term of office begins.
HB1659 (Henson) Local Foundation and Soil Management Fund. Give localities the authority to create a local foundation and soil management fund out of local money for granting funds to citizens for foundation management and soil settlement repairs on previously developed lands.
HB1764 (Martinez) Disposable plastic bag tax; distribution to towns. States that any town in a county with a plastic bag tax shall receive a distribution of the total tax collected by the county based on the local sales tax distribution formula.
SB1052 (Ebbin) Virginia Human Rights Act; definition of “employer”. Reduces from 15 to 5 the number of employees for each working day in each of 20 or more weeks for purposes of the definition of “employer.”
SB1165 (Salim) /HB2024 (Seibold) Virginia Public Procurement Act; national environmental protection and product safety standards. Prohibits local governments from excluding materials contained in solar products if the products meet the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Recommendations of Specifications, Standards, and Ecolabels.
SB1489 (Bagby) /HB2559 (Lopez) Authority of local government; service employees. Any locality may require by local ordinance compliance various provisions that assist service employees as defined in the bill transition to a new service company or retain their job when the locality moves to a new service company.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
Bills that failed
HB2175 (Clark) / SB1136 (Boysko) Local anti-rent gouging authority; civil penalty. Localities may by ordinance adopt anti-rent gouging measures after proper notice and public hearings.
SB876 (Ebbin) Virginia Freedom of Information Act; notice of public meetings; proposed agenda required. Requires public bodies subject to the Virginia Freedom of Information Act to include a proposed agenda listing all items expected to be considered by the public body at its meeting and those items shall be sufficiently descriptive to give the public reasonable notice of matters to be considered. The bill allows for amendments to be made to any such proposed agenda but provides that the public body shall not take any final action on those amended or additional agenda items.
SB1029 (Roem) Virginia Freedom of Information Act, procedure for responding to requests; charges; posting of notice of rights and responsibilities. Limits the fees that can be charged for producing public records to the median hourly rate of pay of employees or the actual hourly rate for the person performing the work whichever is less. It also amends the notice of rights and responsibilities on the website and makes some other technical amendments.
SB1170 (Salim) Virginia Conflict of Interest and Ethics Advisory Council; disclosure of digital assets. Requires the conflict of interest and ethics advisory council to amend the statement of disclosure to include the disclosure of digital assets.
SB1357 (Ebbin) / HB1745 (Watts) Conflict of Interests Act, State and Local Government, personal interest in a transaction. Adds to the definition of “personal interest in a transaction” for the purposes of State, Local and the General Assembly Conflict of Interests act includes when the subject of the transaction is the spouse.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
Budget items
Item 12#1c FOIA Council staffing. Provides additional funding in the second year to augment operational support and provide two additional staff positions for the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Advisory Council to address increased workloads.
Item 13#1c Virginia housing commission support. Provides $75,000 additional funding in the second year for operational support for this commission.
Item 67#3c Study of constitutional officer salary methodology. Directs the Compensation Board, in consultation with state agencies and House and Senate budget committees, to assess any state roles with dues similar to those performed by employees in each constitutional office and state salaries for any similar roles; and information available on local salary supplements provided to give a more complete understanding of constitutional officer salaries, including geographic differences. Report due Oct. 1, 2026, with interim report due Nov. 1, 2025.
Item 64#1c Commonwealth’s attorneys. Provides additional funding in the second year to allocate 70 entry-level assistant commonwealth’s attorney positions to assist with anticipated workload increases from implementation of HB 2723/SB 1466 (expungement and sealing of criminal records); directs localities that funding for new positions may not supplant local funds provided for salaries.
Item 65#1c Circuit court clerks. Provides additional funding in the second year to allocate 117 entry-level deputy clerk IV positions to assist with an anticipated workload increases from implementation of HB 2723/SB 1466 (expungement and sealing of criminal records); directs localities that funding for new positions may not supplant local funds provided for salaries.
VML Contact: Janet Areson, jareson@vml.org
Fire / Emergency Response
Bills that passed
HB2065 (Thomas)/ SB1282 (Durant) Fire Programs Fund; aid to localities, requirement for emergency incidents reporting. For localities to remain eligible for funding from the Fire Programs Fund, they must report all emergency incidents through the National Emergency Response Information System while sharing such emergency incident data with the Department of Fire Programs. The bill has a delayed effective date of July 1, 2026.
SB1248 (Hackworth) Fire Prevention Code; prohibition on permit fees for fire departments, etc. for certain localities. Prohibits the State Fire Marshal from charging a fee for the approval and administration of a permit for explosives, blasting agents, theatrical flame effects and fireworks issued to fire departments and emergency medical services of a locality with a total population of less than 10,000.
SB934 (Craig) Certain unclaimed property presumed abandoned; Volunteer Firefighters’ and Rescue Squad Workers’ Service Award Fund. If funds or property in the Volunteer Firefighters’ and Rescue Squad Workers’ Service Award Fund (Fund) are unclaimed for more than five years after a member’s forfeiture of his membership or dissolution of a volunteer emergency services or fire department they shall be presumed abandoned for purposes of the Virginia Disposition of Unclaimed Property Act.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
Bills that failed
SB972 (Rouse) / HB2494 (Askew) Emergency Response Exposure Grant Fund and Program. This fund will award grants to localities to support certain emergency responders who were exposed to a qualifying emergency, defined in the bill. The bill requires funding to be used for annual cancer screenings and health care expenses incurred by eligible emergency responders, defined in the bill, in the event such emergency responders are diagnosed with cancer from toxic material exposure. The bill permits funding to be used for out-of-pocket medical expenses not otherwise covered by insurance, workers' compensation, or other available funding. The Department of Fire Programs shall administer the Fund and Program. The enactment clause states that the 2012 airplane crash in Virginia Beach is a qualifying emergency.
SB1246 (Stanley) Va. Emergency Management Preparedness and Capabilities Grant Program and Fund. Establishes the Virginia Emergency Management Preparedness and Capabilities Grant Program and Fund for the purpose of awarding grants to political subdivisions to assist with the cost of emergency management and preparedness.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
Studies that failed
HB1992 (Askew) / SB1374 (Suetterlein) Emergency Management; Secretary of Public Safety and Homeland Security to evaluate needs. Directed the Secretary to create a workgroup to study existing emergency management needs and to analyze the sustainability of funding.
HB2504 (Runion) Emergency Vehicles and Housing for Emergency Services Volunteers; grant program, established; reports. The Department of Fire Programs in this proposed legislation would establish a Emergency Services Volunteers Grant Program to assist certain localities in providing volunteers with living quarters at no charge to the volunteers.
SB1326 (Russet Perry) Department of Emergency management; DEM to study reliance on federal grants. This proposed legislation would have directed the Department of Emergency Management to convene a workgroup to study the reliance of the Commonwealth and localities on federal grant programs and to develop a legal and regulatory strategy during disasters along with ensuring technology continuity during disasters.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
Budget item
Item 60#1c E-911 sheriff dispatch positions. Reduces the amount in the introduced budget to increase sheriff’s dispatch salaries (from $1.355 m to $874,195); language revised to reflect six percent instead of 9.3 percent increase. These positions will also receive the three percent across the board salary increase for state-supported and state employees in the current biennial budget effective July 1, 2025.
VML Contact: Janet Areson, jareson@vml.org
Health & Human Services
Bills that passed
SB838 (VanValkenburg) Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services; recovery residences; certification required; penalty; work group. Addresses licensure and oversight of recovery residences, including creation of a workgroup to look at oversight and credentialing of such residences. The bill addresses civil penalties for violations related to operation of recovery residences; gives the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services the authority to issue provisional, time-limited certification to certain recovery residences; and directs the creation of a work group to (i) make recommendations related to oversight and transparency issues for recovery residences and (ii) develop credentialing guidelines for recovery residences. VML and VACo will make recommendations for the local representatives to the workgroup, which is directed to report its findings and recommendations to the General Assembly by Nov. 1, 2025.
HB1760 (Gardner) Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Act; report. Directs the Department of Health, with the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services and the Department of Education, to convene a work group to develop a plan to (i) create a mental health screening and assessment tool for children in early childhood care and (ii) provide mental health consultation resources and training to early childhood education providers, pediatric health providers, and families. Findings are due to the House and Senate budget committees by Nov. 1, 2025.
HB2105 (Kent) Regional correctional facilities; investigation of acts of violence; designated local law-enforcement agency. Requires regional jail superintendents to promptly report to the primary local law-enforcement agency in the jurisdiction in which the facility is located or to the Department of State Police any act of violence, as defined in § 19.2-297.1 (includes malicious wounding and assault), that occurs within such correctional facility. Requires regional jails to adopt a policy with procedures for investigation of such acts of violence and the roles/responsibilities of the jail superintendent and law enforcement agency to which a report is made. A copy of the policy must be provided to the state board of regional jails prior to January 1 each year, beginning on Jan. 1, 2026.
HB2309 (Hodges) Department of Health; local health districts and local health departments; guidance for onsite sewage system and private well permits. Directs the Department of Health to develop guidance for local health districts and local health departments so their staff evaluate and recommend solutions to problems with a valid onsite sewage system or private well permit prior to issuing a revocation for such valid onsite sewage system or private well permit.
HB2457 (Glass) State Board of Social Services; regulations; application for and use of foster care benefits. Addresses federal benefits for youth in foster care. It directs the State Board of Social Services to amend its regulations by Jan. 1, 2026, to (i) require local departments of social services to apply for federal benefits on behalf of children in foster care for which that they may be eligible, (ii) prohibit the state from using military survivor benefits to pay for services for children in foster care that the Commonwealth is otherwise obligated to pay for, and (iii) require local departments of social services that are representative payees for children in foster care to conserve such military survivor benefits in an appropriate trust instrument or protected account that is exempt from federal asset and resource limits.
HB2749 (LeVere Bolling) / SB1408 (Reeves) Department of Health; waterworks; mandatory reporting. Require owners of waterworks to report any critical equipment failure or malfunction or contaminant release to the Virginia Department of Health's Office of Drinking Water as soon as practicable but no more than six hours after discovery. Owners of waterworks that are required to submit a monthly operating report to the Office must include in reports any noncritical equipment failure or malfunction that could adversely affect water quality, public health, or service continuity. This bill incorporates HB 2407 (Scott, P.A).
HB2754 (Singh) / SB870 (Favola) Behavioral health services; exchange of medical and mental health information and records; correctional facilities. Address sharing of medical/mental health records of incarcerated individuals by allowing the Department of Medical Assistance Services (DMAS), the Department of Social Services, and any local department of social services to access medical and mental health information and records of individuals committed to a correctional facility for the purposes of providing pre-release services, reentry planning, and post-incarceration placement and services The bills authorize DMAS to access a juvenile's social, medical, and behavioral health reports and records during pre-release and for up to 30 days following such juvenile's release from commitment for the purposes of providing pre-release services, reentry planning, and post-incarceration placement and services.
SB801 (Favola) Children's Services Act; state pool of funds. Updates statutes regarding the Children’s Services Act (CSA) program, including removal of language from initial establishment of the program in the 1990s regarding state funding consolidation establishing community responsibility for service planning/provision. Adds reference to youth who are determined to be a child in need of services, as defined in law, and modifies the eligibility criteria for funding for such through CSA. Changes were a recommendation of the Virginia Commission on Youth.
SB819 (Favola) Referrals to community-based outpatient stabilization programs for voluntary treatment. Addresses community-based outpatient stabilization by requiring health care professionals and evaluators to consider, prior to a patient’s release from an emergency custody order or temporary detention order, if a referral to a community-based outpatient stabilization program for voluntary treatment is appropriate for that patient.
VML Contact: Janet Areson, jareson@vml.org
Bills that failed
HB1710 (Gardner) Department of Medical Assistance Services; reimbursement rates for Early Intervention Program for Infants and Toddlers with Disabilities; work group; report. Would direct the Department of Medical Assistance Services to convene a work group to assess and make recommendations related to reimbursement rates for the federal Early Intervention Program for Infants and Toddlers with Disabilities (the Part C program) and report back by November 1, 2025. Tabled in House Appropriations.
HB1964 (Tata) Future in Focus Program. Would establish the Future in Focus program for young adults (21 through 23 years of age) who participated in the Fostering Futures program immediately prior to attaining 21 years of age. Services would assist and support participants in transitioning to adulthood, becoming self-sufficient, and creating permanent, positive relationships. Passed by indefinitely in Senate Finance and Appropriations.
SB1432 (Marsden) Juvenile secure detention facilities; closure or consolidation; funding contributions; education programs. Would force the closure/consolidation of eight local/regional juvenile detention facilities; if a locality/region did not cooperate, it would lose all state funding for that facility. Would have required other facilities to take in youth from closed facilities or else lose their state funding. Passed by indefinitely in Senate Rehabilitation and Social Services Committee.
VML Contact: Janet Areson, jareson@vml.org
Budget items
Item 61#1c Virtual court hearings impact on jails. Directs the Compensation Board, with assistance of the Board of Local and Regional Jails and Office of the Executive Secretary of the Supreme Court, to survey local and regional jails to identify staffing and jail space impacts of making inmates available to appear in virtual court hearings within jail facilities and gather information regarding the prevalence of virtual court hearings for jail inmates. The report is due June 30, 2026.
Item 227#1c State aid to local libraries. Adds $632,142 in the second year to support state aid to local libraries.
Item 268#1c Cap on state reimbursement for special education day placements. Caps the state’s reimbursement if a special education day placement cost (a mandatory service if included in a child’s IEP) increases by more than 5.0 percent from the previous year. Localities would pay an additional estimated $5.0 million during FY2026 to pick up the state’s unmet obligation (average cost increases have been at least 10 percent year to year). The budget explanation says the state savings from this supposed one-time cap will be redirected to fund special education services in public schools, but none of that is in budget language.
Item 269#1c CSA reporting requirements. Language directs the Office of Children’s Services (mis-labeled in the budget language), in coordination with the VDOE Office of Special Education, to report annually to the General Assembly regarding local school divisions’ progress in serving special education students, including assessment of barriers to students returning to the community from a private day placement (e.g., a school division’s refusal to serve such students or its inability to provide a less restrictive environment due to lack of transition services); and trends in behavioral and emotional diagnoses including students on home-based instruction that may require private day placements.
Item 272#1c Regional EMS councils. Language directs the Board of Health to work with stakeholders when deciding to make changes to boundaries of existing regional emergency medical services (EMS) councils or otherwise modify the number thereof.
Item 277#1c Mobile maternal health clinics. Provides $2.5 million in the second year for Virginia Department of Health, in consultation with universities and private businesses, to create a pilot program for mobile clinic in maternal health deserts in Virginia, as well as funding for data collection to measure the effectiveness of the program.
Item 278#1c Community health workers and doulas. Removes the $1.0 million in the second year from the introduced budget for community health workers and doulas at local health districts. This program maintains $3.2 million each year from 2024 General Assembly budget actions to support community health workers in local health districts.
Item 279#5c Non-emergency medical transport in rural areas. Provides $1.0 million in the second year for a pilot program by the Virginia Community Healthcare Association for uninsured Virginians living in medically underserved or unserved areas in the catchment area of a federally-qualified health center. Priority will be given to individuals in rural areas.
Item 280#1c Drinking water grants. Provides $25.0 million in the first year for VDH to provide grants to localities for drinking water projects. To receive a grant, localities must provide proof of at least a 25 percent match for the cost of a project. No grant shall fully fund a drinking water project. Priority consideration will be given for grants to Greene County and the Town of Bowling Green, both of which have demonstrated outstanding critical drinking water needs.
Item 295#7c Recovery homes workgroup. Provides $115,846 in the second year and one staff position to support the workgroup, pursuant to SB 838, that requires the Secretary of Health and Human Resources to convene and make recommendations regarding an oversight process for residential recovery homes and transparency in the credentialing process.
Item 296#4c Dementia and geriatric pilot program. Provides $1.0 million in the second year to support pilot programs for individuals with dementia or geriatric individuals who may otherwise be admitted to a state mental health facility.
Item 296#5c Alternate security/special conservators of the peace. Reduces funding in the introduced budget by $31.06 million in the second year and prioritizes funding for contracts that provide coverage in DBDHS Region Three and Region One, and if funds are available, to expand the program to Region Five. This funding is for private hospitals to hire special conservators of the peace to give emergency departments the capacity to maintain custody of individuals under an emergency custody order or temporary detention order until they are ready for transport to an inpatient bed or released, thereby decreasing demand on local police and sheriffs’ deputies to remain in emergency departments.
Item 297#1c Additional CSB support coordinators. Adds $8.7 million in the second year to allow community services boards (CSBs) to hire 96 additional support coordinators to handle increased caseload due to significant addition of DD waiver slots in the 2024-2026 biennium. The funding would support coordinators from the point of hiring and when they can carry a full caseload and begin billing Medicaid.
Item 297#2c Expand Marcus Alert. Provides $4.8 million in the second year to support eight additional Marcus Alert sites to develop co-response programs between law enforcement and clinicians to respond to mental health crisis situations.
Item 297#3c Local government maintenance of effort. Language requires local governments to maintain local contributions to community services boards (CSBs) year-to-year and not use any additional state funding to supplant existing local funding even if they are more than meeting their statutory obligation for local match. If they do reduce local funding with new state funding, that state funding will be forfeited by the CSB/BHA in the amount of the reduced local funding. In any case, a locality must demonstrate hardship to receive a waiver from the 10 percent match requirement.
Item 329#1c MOUs for kinship care. Language directs Department of Social Services to work with stakeholders to develop a process for Virginia localities to enter into memorandums of understanding (MOUs) with localities in surrounding states for the purpose of kinship care.
Item 329#2c Study of federal benefits requirement for local DSS. Language directs the Department of Social Services to assess the feasibility of requiring local departments of social services to apply for federal benefits for foster children and conserve such benefits in appropriate trust instruments. Report is due to House and Senate budget and finance committees by Nov. 1, 2025.
Item 329#3c Kinship service expansion. Provides $300,000 in the second year to expand the existing kinship program to find relative and fictive kin for youth at the time of their entry into foster care or when an out-of-home placement is needed before entry into foster care. Current eligibility is for youth already in congregate care or who have been in foster care for 12 months or longer and not placed with kinship foster parents. This will allow for expansion of services to ensure children going into foster care are promptly assigned a kinship specialist to located relatives and fictive kin.
Item 331#7c Community action agencies. Provides $2.0 million in TANF balances (NGF) in the second year to increase support for community action agencies.
Item 334#1c Addiction treatment navigator. Provides $400,000 in the second year from the Commonwealth Opioid Abatement and Remediation Fund (NGF) to create an addiction treatment navigator to help people seeking care to determine the proper level of care, access providers in their area, determine insurance coverage, and view provider quality metrics.
VML Contact: Janet Areson, jareson@vml.org
Natural Resources
Bills that passed
SB1319 (McPike) Self-reporting of PFAS manufacture and use for PFAS assessment; Department of Environmental Quality; industrial wastewater; publicly owned treatment works. Requires industrial customers of a publicly owned wastewater treatment facility to self report the use of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances to the facility and requires that the wastewater facilities report this information to the Department of Environmental Quality within 90 days
SB851 (Diggs) Local ordinances for the use of certain rainwater harvesting systems. Pre-empts local ordinances requiring connections to a municipal water supply when the most stringent permit is issued for a rainwater harvesting system has been issued by state board of health.
HB2630 (Willett) Replacement of trees during development process in localities; tree canopy fund. Provides permissive ordinance authority for localities to establish a tree canopy fund using fees from developers unable to meet tree canopy requirements. Funds may then be used to plant and maintain trees and to support non-profit organizations that plant and maintain trees.
HB2313 (Lopez) Grooming and boarding establishments; inspections by animal control officers. Expands authority for animal control officers to inspect animal grooming establishments based on complaints or twice per year for facilities not already regulated by the Board of Veterinary Medicine. Establishes a work group to consider establishing regulations and a licensing process for animal boarding facilities to report back to the General Assembly by December 1, 2026.
HB2008 (Martinez) / SB1093 (Perry) Virginia Erosion and Stormwater Management Program authority; right of entry. Authorizes localities that operate a municipal separate storm sewer system (MS4) to enter properties where a discharge enters the MS4 using properties other than those owned by the locality.
HB2749 (Levere Bolling) / SB1408 (Reeves) Department of Health; waterworks; mandatory reporting. Establishes new reporting criteria for waterworks owner to report critical equipment failure, malfunction, or contaminant release to the Virginia Department of Health Office of Drinking Water within six hours of discovery and report noncritical equipment failure or malfunction that could affect water quality or public health that is not resolved in a monthly report to the Office of Drinking Water. Contaminant release, critical equipment failure or malfunction, equipment failure or equipment malfunction are defined in the legislation. This legislation passed the House and Senate unanimously.
HB2000 (Laufer) / SB857 (French) Dam Safety, Flood Prevention and Protection Assistance; Dam Safety Act; powers and duties of the Department of Conservation and Recreation; rights and requirements of dam owners; civil penalty. Provides permissive authority for a locality to agree to act on behalf of the State to mitigate unsafe dams that present an imminent hazard and directs the Secretary of Natural Resources to set out the actions the state is requesting a locality to take on behalf of the state to mitigate imminent dangers. Creates new safety inspection requirements for improving dam safety and establishes new criteria for private dam owners to identify and mitigate unsafe dams and establishes new fines and fees for dams that continue to remain out of compliance.
VML Contact: Mitchell Smiley@vml.org
Bills that failed
SB923 (Stuart) Virginia Institute of Marine Science; study of the cumulative impacts of surface water intakes on aquatic fauna and water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and its major Virginia tributaries; report. Prohibits the issuance of interbasin water transfers exceeding 5% of the non-consumptive volume for two years.
SB930 (Stuart) Virginia Institute of Marine Science; study of the cumulative impacts of surface water intakes on aquatic fauna and water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and its major Virginia tributaries; report. Directed the Virginia Institute of Marine Sciences to study the impact of surface water withdrawal intakes on aquatic flora and fauna.
SB1190 (Deeds) Virginia Energy Facility Review Board established; localities; comprehensive plan and local ordinances related to siting of critical interconnection projects; planning district commissions; regional energy plans; Virginia Clean Energy Technical Assistance Center established. Pre-empted local zoning authority for clean energy projects via a state-wide review board and provided technical assistance to localities.
SB1365 (Pillion) Stormwater management regulations; localities outside Chesapeake Bay watershed. Repeals stormwater management regulations for localities outside the Chesapeake Bay Watershed and reverts regulations to those in effect prior to 2014.
VML Contact: Mitchell Smiley, msmiley@vml.org
Budget items
Item C-53.80 #1c Local Water Quality and Supply Projects. Stormwater Local Assistance Fund $40 Million of Non-General Funds from Bond Proceeds– VML Legislative Program Item
Item C-53.50 #1c Wastewater Treatment Plant Upgrade Cost Overruns. Water Quality Improvement Fund increased biennial appropriation by $31.2 million for a total appropriation of $431.2 million for water treatment plant upgrades and converts the appropriation from general funds to non-general fund bond proceeds. This appropriation recognizes project cost increases initiated under prior WQIF appropriations, eligible projects include those funded through the Enhanced Nutrient Certainty Removal Program and nutrient point source reduction projects in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed.
Studies
Item 148 #2c VIMS - Water Quality Study. Directs $880,000 to the Virginia Institute of Marine Science to study the cumulative impacts of surface water intakes on aquatic life and on water quality in the Chesapeake Bay and related tributaries.
VML Contact: Mitchell Smiley, msmiley@vml.org
Transportation
Bills that passed
SB852 (New Craig) Photo speed monitoring devices; proof of violation; retired law-enforcement officials. Expands the criteria for who is allowed to swear or affirm a violation has occurred that was captured by a photo speed enforcement camera. Permits retired sworn law enforcement officers as well in addition to sworn law enforcement officers currently permitted to review violations under a photo speed enforcement program.
HB2718 (Leftwich) Photo speed monitoring devices; school crossing zones. Requires that a photo speed enforcement camera operating in a school zone demonstrate through images or documentation that the school zone lights were activated and blinking at the time a violation occurred.
SB1233 (Williams Graves) Pedestrian crossing violation monitoring systems and stop sign violation monitoring systems; violation enforcement; civil penalty. Authorizes law enforcement to use pedestrian and stop sign monitoring devices in school and work zones as well as at high-risk intersections. The bill restricts how civil penalties collected under a photo speed or pedestrian/stop sign monitoring program can be used by a locality, with penalties limited to covering the costs of installing, operating, and maintain photo speed equipment and contractual costs for the operation of a program with any remaining funds to be placed in a separate fund only to be used for road and pedestrian safety improvements with projects prioritized by the zones where photo speed/pedestrian & stop sign monitoring programs are in operation. The bill also expands reporting requirements for photo speed monitoring devices, creates new requirement for tests of accuracy for photo speed monitoring devices and requires vendors to provide information on device calibration history on request when a driver receives a summons under a photo speed program and establishes penalties for vendors operating a photo speed program who do not comply.
SB1233 does not expand where photo speed cameras may operate in existing localities and does not expand the types of localities that may operate photo speed enforcement devices.
VML Contact: Mitchell Smiley, msmiley@vml.org
Bills that failed
HB1664 (Jones) Photo speed monitoring devices; placement and operation by certain localities. Authorized towns without law enforcement agencies to operate photo speed enforcement devices. Failed in House Transportation Committee.
SB1445 (Diggs) Photo speed monitoring devices; photo-monitoring system for traffic signals; proof of violation; certain persons swearing to or affirming certificates; training. Authorized training for local employees certifying violations under a photo speed enforcement program and allows non-law enforcement employees to affirm violations under a photo speed enforcement program. Failed in House Transportation Committee.
SB1491 (Bagby) School crossing zones; institutions of higher education. Allowed higher education institutions to establish school zones with capital costs covered by the institution. Failed in House Transportation Committee.
HB1801 (Cohen) School crossing zones; increases maximum boundaries of a zone from limits of school property. Expanded boundary of school crossing zones to 1,500 feet from 750 feet. Failed in House Transportation Committee.
HB2159 (Carr) School crossing zones; institutions of higher education. Allowed higher education institutions to establish school zones with capital costs covered by the institution. Failed in House Transportation Committee.
HB2080 (Austin) / SB1061 (Diggs) Registration decals; discontinued. Discontinues vehicle registration decals that display the expiration month and year of motor vehicle registration on license plates. Tabled in the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee. Failed in Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee
VML Contact: Mitchell Smiley, msmiley@vml.org
Cannabis
Bills that passed
HB2485 (Krizek) / SB970 (Rouse) Cannabis control; retail market; penalties. Establishes regulatory framework including fines, fees, penalties and taxes for a recreational cannabis market. This legislation includes referendum authority for Cities, Towns, and Counties to hold a referendum prior to December 31, 2025 to prohibit cannabis retailers from operating. This legislation also includes local authority to levy a 2.5% tax authority on cannabis retail sales and maintains local land use authority for cannabis retailers in addition to including local ordinance authority to regulate the hours of cannabis retailers. This legislation also expands local ordinance authority to regulate the use of cannabis on school grounds and public property.
Cannabis retail sales would not be allowed prior to May 1, 2026 under the bill. HB2485 and SB970 passed the House and Senate. Identical legislation was vetoed by the Governor in 2024.
VML Contact: Mitchell Smiley, msmiley@vml.org
Education
Bill that passed
SB1307 (McPike) Additional local sales and use tax to support schools; referendum. If approved by a voter referendum, SB1307 would allow any county or city to impose a sales and use tax of up to one percent dedicated solely to school construction, renovation, and debt services. This version also stipulates that funds cannot be subsidized. This legislation was on the 2025 VML Legislative Program to support.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Bills that failed
HB1954 (Rasoul) Equity in public school funding and staffing; special education students; at-risk students; English language learner students; report. Would establish the At-Risk Program to support programs and services for educationally at-risk students including prevention, intervention, or remediation. Services would include teacher recruitment efforts, English language learner programs, and hiring additional support staff. This bill also outlines certain funding requirements for the program.
Note – HB1954 was passed by indefinitely in the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee with the understanding that portions of this bill would be included in the budget.
HB2032 (Reaser) Department of Education; English language learner students; data collection on expenditures. Would require state-funded add-ons to be provided to support English language learner students. The bill would require local funds to be obligated for add-ons determined by the local ability to pay. Lastly, the bill would require the DOE to develop and implement a data collection process related to English language learners.
Note – HB2032 was passed by indefinitely in the Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee with the understanding that portions of this bill would be included in the budget.
SB977 (Hashmi) Public schools; Standards of Quality; certain calculations; support services. Would require the Department of Education (DOE) to make changes to the Standards of Quality (SOQ) funding formula when calculating nonpersonal costs. One funding formula change comes from the deduction of federal funds resulting in the examination of actual support costs versus current spending. Also, the bills would include an estimate of the cost of compensation for facilities staff.
HB1831 (Simonds) Public schools; Standards of Quality; certain calculations; support services. Would require the Department of Education (DOE) to examine actual school division spending on support costs. The bill would also require support positions to be funded based on a calculation of prevailing costs by eliminating the support cap.
Note – HB1831 was incorporated into HB1954 which also failed but with the understanding that portions of this bill would be included in the budget.
SB1236 (Aird) Public schools; Standards of Quality; certain calculations; support services. Would require the Department of Education (DOE) to examine actual school division spending on support costs. The bill would also require support positions to be funded based on a calculation of prevailing costs by eliminating the support cap.
HB1594 (Clark) Average teacher salary in the Commonwealth; national average. Would require the Governor’s budget to include funding to ensure that teachers are paid at the national average for the 2026-2028 biennium budget.
HB2164 (Cole) / SB1149 (French) Public school funding; certain funding calculations. Would require the DOE to exclude the true value of real property eligible for certain disabled veterans and surviving spouse property exemptions in the locality when calculating the local composite index (LCI) for each school division.
HB2231 (Cherry) / SB1346 (Jordan) Public schools; Virginia Opportunity Scholarship Grant Program established. Would establish the Virginia Opportunity Scholarship Grant Program. This bill would provide grants for $5,000 per eligible student up to 10,000 students per year to be used exclusively for private education needs such as textbooks and uniforms. Eligible students are listed in the bill and will be managed by the Department of Treasury.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Budget items
Item 125 #2c Direct Aid - Teacher Bonus. Allocates $134.4 million from the general fund in the first year of the biennium to fund a one-time bonus of up to $1,000 per funded SOQ instructional and support position. No local match is required to access funds or additional stipulations placed on the funds.
Item 125 #6c Special Education Add-On. Allocates $52.8 million from the general fund in the second year of the biennium to fund a basic aid add-on of 4.75 percent for special education students (students) receiving Level 1 services and 5.25 percent for students receiving Level II services. This is a recommendation of the Joint Subcommittee on Elementary and Secondary Education Funding.
Item 125 #9 School Construction Assistance Program. Allocates $10 million from the non-general fund in the second year of the biennium for the School Construction Grant Fund. Currently, the Fund is funded by casino gaming revenues – the additional money reflects expected revenue increases from the 2025 casino gaming revenues.
Item 125 #11c Direct Aid - Raise Support Cap to Prevailing Ratio of 27.89 per 1,000 Students. Allocates $222.9 million from the general fund in the second year of the biennium to raise the funding cap placed on support positions from the current rate to 27.89 SOQ-funded positions per 1,000 students. The funding allocated is adequate to fully remove the cap, however, the budget significantly increases the cap as opposed to a full removal. This is a recommendation of the Joint Subcommittee on Elementary and Secondary Education Funding following the 2023 JLARC report recommendation for removal.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Elections
Bills that passed
SB1009 (Salim) Elections; conduct of election; ranked choice voting; locally elected offices; report. Would allow local elections to be conducted by rank-choice voting. The State Board of Elections would be required to create standards and approve tabulation software on existing systems conducting rank choice voting elections as well as provide voter education materials on ranked choice.
SJ253 (Surovell) Study; joint subcommittee to study the consolidation and scheduling of general elections in Virginia; report. Would create a two-year study on the feasibility of consolidating and scheduling general elections. A 13-member joint subcommittee would be tasked with studying the potential and probable effects of moving some or all of Virginia’s state or local elections to even-numbered years coinciding with the federal election schedule. This change would require a constitutional amendment.
HB1794 (Helmer) / SB1119 (VanValkenburg) Elections; primary dates; presidential year primaries. Would move all primary elections to be held on the presidential primary date. As the bill affects candidates for election in November of a presidential election year, the bill would lift the requirement that petition signatures must be collected after January 1.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Bills that failed
HB1938 (Reid) Elections; general provisions; prohibited area. Would maintain the 40-foot prohibited area around polling places, electoral board meetings, and recount locations with an additional requirement of a five-foot prohibition around vehicles.
HB2139 (Walker) Elections; form of ballot; party identification; option for candidates for local offices. Would allow candidates for local office who have been nominated by a political party or in a primary election to be identified by a political party at the discretion of the candidate.
HB1566 (Green) Elections; absentee ballot security measures; watermark. Would require any ballot mailed to an absentee voter to be printed on a secure paper that incorporates a visible watermark that identifies the ballot as an official ballot to preserve ballot secrecy. While VML does not have a position on this bill, the potential local fiscal impact was concerning.
SB1175 (Sutterlein) Elections; absentee voting in person; uniform availability. Would require in-person absentee voting to be available from 8:00 am to 5:00 pm Monday through Friday during early voting and from 8:00 am to 5:00 pm on the first and second Saturday and Sunday before all elections. This removes the flexibility that local governing bodies currently have to establish hours of satellite locations and adds Sunday hours.
SB1404 (Pekarsky) School boards; method of selection; election required. Would mandate that all school boards be elected. Current law requires all school boards to be appointed, but they may become elected if approved by referendum. This bill would have affected 12 localities.
HB2478 (Zehr) Elections; absentee voting; drop-off locations for return of absentee ballots; 24-hour video surveillance requirement. Would require 24-hour video surveillance of all absentee ballot drop-off locations, including polling locations such as schools, government buildings, shopping malls, etc.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Budget item
Item 77 #1c Plan for Upgrades to Elections Software. Reduces by $500,000 from the general fund in the first year of the biennium funding previously allocated to the Department of Elections to develop a plan for the replacement of election systems.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Technology
Bills that passed
HB2094 (Maldonado) High-risk artificial intelligence; development, deployment, and use; civil penalties. Would create requirements for vendors to develop, deploy, and use high-risk artificial intelligence systems, as defined in the bill, to be enforced by the Attorney General. This bill comes as a recommendation from JCOTS this summer. It does not include any public bodies; however, it does mandate developers that local governments will use.
HB2541 (Tran) Information Technology Access Act; digital accessibility. Would make several changes to the Virginia Information Technology Act to align the Virginia Code with Federal Standards all local bodies must comply with by 2026 or 2027. This bill would add small adjustments that are above the federal standards.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Bills that failed
HB2046 (Anthony) High-risk artificial intelligence; development, deployment, and use by public bodies; work group; report. Would create requirements for the development, deployment, and use of high-risk artificial intelligence systems, as defined in the bill, by state public bodies. The bill would direct the Chief Information Officer (CIO) to develop, publish, and maintain policies and procedures concerning the development, procurement, implementation, utilization, and ongoing assessment of systems. This bill does not include counties, cities, or towns but does include a work group to determine the feasibility of extending this requirement to local governing bodies.
SB1214 (Aird) High-risk artificial intelligence; development, deployment, and use by public bodies; work group; report. Would create requirements for the development, deployment, and use of high-risk artificial intelligence systems, as defined in the bill, by state public bodies. The bill would direct the Chief Information Officer (CIO) to develop, publish, and maintain policies and procedures concerning the development, procurement, implementation, utilization, and ongoing assessment of systems. This bill does not include counties, cities, or towns but does include a work group to determine the feasibility of extending this requirement to local governing bodies.
VML Contact: Josette Bulova, jbulova@vml.org
Eminent Domain
Bill that passed
SB1158 (Obenshain) Eminent domain; condemnation proceedings. Rewrites various laws of eminent domain matters. It was originally amended significantly when it was before the Senate Judiciary Committee. After that amendment, several large localities worked with the patron to eliminate a provision: “If property from which rights are being acquired is an improved property, the plat, drawing, or plan shall include the location of the existing structures, curbing, and pavement that are on the property and are within approximately 100 feet of the closest areas of the property taken for the public use project.” This last change further limited the difficulties for localities caused by the bill.
The overall result is that eminent domain cases will cost the government a bit more and will require additional procedural steps.
VML Contact: Mark Flynn, markkflynn@gmail.com
Labor
Bills that passed
SB894 (Russet Perry) / HB1730 (Delaney) Civil actions; liability of employer for personal injury or death by wrongful act. Provide that if an employee causes the death or injury to a “vulnerable victim”, the employer can be vicariously liable for the employee’s conduct.
The term “vulnerable victim” is defined in the bills as any person who “is at a substantial disadvantage relative to an employee due to circumstances, including such person’s physical or mental condition” or is 1. A health care patient, 2. A person under a disability, 3. A resident in a long-term care facility, or 4. A passenger on public transit.
For cities and towns, if the employee is carrying out a governmental function, the bills may have no effect. Case law from 2002 held that sovereign immunity shields a locality where the employee commits an intentional tort, if the employee’s work is a governmental function. For employees carrying out proprietary functions, there is no sovereign immunity.
Examples of proprietary functions:
- a water meter reader fights a person while on the job and injures the person;
- a bus driver intentionally harms a passenger;
- a trash truck worker intentionally injures someone;
- a maintenance worker intentionally harms someone.
The bills are a major change to the law on employers’ responsibility for intentional wrongful acts of their employees, in a way that is unfair to employers, both private and public.
VML is working with business groups to seek an amendment or veto by the Governor.
HB2764 (Tran) / SB917 (Surovell) r Collective bargaining by public employees; exclusive bargaining representatives. Repeal the prohibition on collective bargaining by all public employees. The bills create the Public Employee Relations Board, which shall determine appropriate bargaining units of state and local government employees.
VML Contact: Mark Flynn, markkflynn@gmail.com
Bills that failed
HB1619 (Clark) / HB2579 (Cordoza) / SB1083 (Perry) Virginia Retirement System; enhanced retirement benefits for 911 dispatchers. Would add emergency service dispatchers to enhanced retirement benefits for hazardous duty service.
SB1286 (Durant) Line of Duty Act; auxiliary police officers and volunteer deputy sheriffs. Would provide line of duty benefits to auxiliary police officers and volunteer deputy sheriffs.
SB1396 (Head) Virginia retirement system; enhanced retirement benefits; animal control officers. Would add full-time animal control officers to those eligible for enhanced retirement benefits.
HB2495 (Askew) / SB1401 (Lucas) Collective bargaining by firefighters and emergency medical services providers. Would authorize firefighters and EMT employees of local governments to engage in collective bargaining through labor organizations or other designated representatives. The bills establish the Fire Service Cooperation Board to administer it. While SB 1401 failed, its purpose was incorporated into SB 917, which passed.
VML Contact: Mark Flynn, markkflynn@gmail.com
Public Safety
Bill that passed
HB1914 (Sullivan) Compensation for wrongful incarceration; compensation for certain intentional acts. Deals with the right of persons who are wrongfully incarcerated to make claims against the Commonwealth and local law enforcement for such wrongful convictions. Today, if such a person seeks compensation from a state fund for the purpose, he must sign a release of everyone involved in his conviction, including police. The final version provides that if a local government’s personnel intentionally, willfully and continuously suppressed or withheld evidence that was used in obtaining a conviction and suppressed or withheld evidence establishing the innocence of the person, then the compensation to the wrongfully incarcerated person shall be paid by the locality. In this fiscal year, the total compensation can be $90,000.
VML Contact: Mark Flynn, markkflynn@gmail.com
Bill that failed
SB1431 (Marsden) Admission to bail; risk assessment. Requires magistrates to hold hearings before releasing persons on bail was passed by indefinitely by the Senate Courts Committee. The bill would have required hiring additional staff in many localities courts systems to deal with the requirements.
VML Contact: Mark Flynn, markkflynn@gmail.com
Budget items
Item 377#1c Withholding funding for local law enforcement. Removes language from the introduced budget that would authorize withholding of state funding for local law enforcement and jails if they did not cooperate with ICE.
Item 394 #2c Local drone replacement. Provides $1.0 million in the first year (one-time funding) for a grant program to assist local law enforcement and other first responders with replacing drones manufactured by “foreign adversaries” as defined in the Code of Virginia with drones that meet the criteria in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2024.
Item 394#3c Law enforcement reimbursement for mental health transports. Removes the $3.5 million in the second year as proposed in the introduced budget and adds $2.0 million in the first year as reimbursement to local law enforcement agencies for time spent transporting individuals under temporary detention orders and emergency custody orders.
Item 394#4c Redirect communication infrastructure grant funds. Removes the $2.5 million in the first year from the introduced budget for communication infrastructure grants to use in other priorities.
VML Contact: Janet Areson, jareson@vml.org
Opportunities
VML/VRSA Regional Briefing: South Boston April 23
Join VML and VRSA for this FREE event featuring conversations for local governments – from the smallest to the largest.
Topics will include:
- 2025 General Assembly Update
- Marijuana in the Workplace
- Cybersecurity
- …and more!
Breakfast and lunch will be provided
REGISTRATION:
Register by emailing Jackie Stauffer from VRSA at jstauffer@vrsa.us.
DATE/TIME/LOCATION
- April 23, 2025
- 9:00 am - 12:00 pm
- South Boston Town Hall (420 Main Street, 24592)
VML Contact: Rob Bullington, rbullington@vml.org
“If I Were Mayor” essay contest open to 7th and 8th graders
Deadline to submit entries is March 17
The Virginia Municipal League (VML) invites all eligible Virginia 7th and 8th Graders to join its “If I were Mayor” essay contest.
Regional winners selected from around the state will each receive a $150 gift card and a plaque. One statewide winner chosen from the regional winners will receive a $250 gift card and a plaque. The runner-up from the region that receives the statewide award will become that region’s winner.
Winning essays will be featured in the May/June issue of VML’s magazine Virginia Town & City.
Learn more about the contest and how to submit entries here >.
VML Contact: Manuel Timbreza, mtimbreza@vml.org
SCOTUS decides attorney's fee case in win for local governments
The following update was provided by the International Municipal Lawyers Association.
This week, in Lackey v. Stinnie, the Supreme Court held that a party does not “prevail” under 42 U.S.C. § 1988 for the purposes of attorney’s fees based on obtaining a preliminary injunction, even if the defendant’s conduct later moots the case. This case was a win for local governments as attorney’s fees awards can be significant and a contrary result would undermine the public fisc.
In this case, a group of Virginia drivers whose licenses were suspended due to their failure to pay certain fines sued the Virginia Commissioner of the Department of Motor Vehicle under §1983, claiming the law requiring the license suspension was unconstitutional. The district court preliminarily enjoined the Commissioner from enforcing the statute. The court based the injunction on the drivers’ likelihood of success on the merits as well as finding the other preliminary injunction factors weighed finding in their favor. The Commissioner did not appeal the grant of a preliminary injunction. However, before the case reached trial, the Virginia legislature repealed the challenged law. The parties agreed the case was moot at this point and stimulated its dismissal. The drivers thereafter sought attorney’s fees under §1988, claiming “prevailing party” status under the statute.
Under 42 U.S.C. § 1988(b), in certain civil rights cases, “the court, in its discretion, may allow the prevailing party . . . a reasonable attorney’s fee.” By way of background, in Buckhannon Bd. & Care Home, Inc. v. W. Virginia Dep’t of Health & Hum. Res., 532 U.S. 598 (2001), the Supreme Court held for a party to “prevail” under §1988 for the purposes of attorney’s fee awards, the relief must be “judicially sanctioned.” In other words, “[a] defendant's voluntary change in conduct, although perhaps accomplishing what the plaintiff sought to achieve by the lawsuit, lacks the necessary judicial imprimatur on the change” to have prevailed under the statute. Id. at 605. Then, in Sole v. Wyner, the Court held that a party has not “prevailed” under §1988 through the award of a preliminary injunction if that injunction is later reversed by a final decision in the case. Sole v. Wyner, 551 U.S. 74, 83, (2007).
The question presented in this case was left open by Buckhannon and Sole: whether a party that obtains preliminary relief, but never obtains judicially sanctioned relief because of the defendant’s voluntary change in conduct, may be the “prevailing party” who qualifies for an award of attorney’s fees under §1988(b).
The Fourth Circuit sitting en banc, found in favor of the drivers, concluding: “When a preliminary injunction provides the plaintiff concrete, irreversible relief on the merits of her claim and becomes moot before final judgment because no further court-ordered assistance proves necessary, the subsequent mootness of the case does not preclude an award of attorney’s fees.” Stinnie v. Holcomb, 77 F.4th 200, 210 (4th Cir. 2023). The Fourth Circuit then explained that “all preliminary injunctions” are “solidly merits-based” and will satisfy the “judicial imprimatur” necessary under Buckhannon.
In a 7-2 decision authored by Chief Justice Roberts, the Supreme Court reversed, holding that “[a] party ‘prevails’ when a court conclusively resolves his claim by granting enduring relief on the merits that alters the legal relationship between the parties.” The Court explained that “both the change in relationship and its permanence must result from a judicial order.” In coming to this conclusion, the Court reasoned that under the “American Rule,” a prevailing litigant is not ordinarily entitled to collect attorney’s fees unless there is express statutory authorization. Here, the question was what the term “prevailing party” meant at the time Congress enacted the Civil Rights Attorney’s Fee Awards Act in 1976.
The term “prevailing party” is a legal term of art, which means that courts presume that when Congress “borrows terms of art in which are accumulated the legal tradition and meaning of centuries of practice, it presumably knows and adopts the cluster of ideas that were attached to each borrowed word.’” And in this case, the Court concluded that “Black’s Law Dictionary [at the time the statute was enacted] defined ‘prevailing party’ as the party “who successfully prosecutes the action or successfully defends against it.” The term per Black’s Law Dictionary “does not depend upon the degree of success at different stages of the suit, but whether, at the end of the suit, or other proceeding, the party who has made a claim against the other, has successfully maintained it.”
The Court emphasized the transient nature of the preliminary injunctions and held that “[b]ecause preliminary injunctions do not conclusively resolve the rights of parties on the merits, they do not confer prevailing party status.” In terms of the voluntary change, which mooted the case, the Court explained that enduring change between the parties must be “judicially sanctioned.” The Court reasoned that its holding “flows naturally” from its prior precedents including Buckhannon and Sole. Finally, the Court noted that because this is a statutory interpretation case, if Congress believes parties should be entitled to an award of attorney’s fees based on a preliminary injunction, it may amend the statutory language.
The Local Government Legal Center (NACo, NLC, IMLA, and GFOA) filed an amicus brief in this case, which was authored by Joshua Skinner, Benjamin Gibbs, & Alexnader Lindwall with the City of Arlington, Texas. The amicus brief explained how interpreting “prevailing party” to allow for attorney’s fees for preliminary injunctions would harm local governments by discouraging local governments from voluntarily changing suspect policies, incentivizing expensive litigation, and draining public resources.
VML Contact: Michelle Gowdy, mgowdy@vml.org
VDEM Announces grant program for additional Next Generation 9-1-1 funding
On February 20, 2025, the Virginia 9-1-1 Services Board approved the Next Generation 9-1-1 (NG9-1-1) Additional Funding Grant Program. This grant program will provide $20.3 million in funding to the 9-1-1 community to address immediate operational needs. This funding will be used to increase Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) operational resiliency and help the 9-1-1 community be better prepared for future unplanned disruptions.
The deployment of NG9-1-1 across Virginia is a project that transforms the landscape of public safety for those that live, work, and visit Virginia. Virginia’s investment in connectivity, software, services, data, and training reduces the time between a 9-1-1 call and the dispatch of an appropriate response. Since 2018, the 9-1-1 Services Board has been singularly focused on the deployment of this new technology and providing funding to PSAPs to support these efforts. Recurring NG9-1-1 network costs are higher than legacy 9-1-1 recurring costs for most Virginia’s PSAPs.
In recent 9-1-1 town halls, PSAP community members shared that their centers have several immediate operational gaps that need to be addressed in addition to recurring NG9-1-1 network costs. This grant program has been expanded to provide funding for NG9-1-1 recurring costs and/or other immediate operational needs.
“As we near the completion of NG9-1-1 deployments across the commonwealth, I want to thank the members of the 9-1-1 Services Board and the PSAP Grant Committee for their continued support and ongoing efforts to create a more resilient Virginia 9-1-1 system,” said VDEM Deputy State Coordinator Dorothy Spears-Dean. “Our new grant program will help to ensure that this system continues to provide vital emergency services when needed and plan for a future that embraces state of the art technology for Virginia PSAPs.”
Each primary PSAP is eligible to receive a minimum of $150,000 for recurring NG9-1-1 network costs and/or other immediate operational needs. Eligible entities appear on the maps and lists on the Virginia Next Generation 9-1-1 Deployment Dashboard. The grant application cycle begins on March 1 and will remain open until June 30. PSAP grant guidelines are located HERE.
VDEM Contact: Please contact PSAPGrants@vdem.virginia.gov if you have any questions.