Elevating Women in Politics, from Galax to Gainesville

IT'S PRIMARY SEASON

Early voting for the 2022 Congressional Midterm Elections is underway. Check the timeline below for key dates. Access voter registration information here.

REDISTRICTING UPDATES

In 2020 the U.S. Census took place. In 2021, Virginia got new electoral maps, drawn by two special masters appointed by the Supreme Court of Virginia, after proceedings at the new redistricting commission stalled. Do you know how your district and/or reps might have changed? Check out this resource from VPAP: https://www.vpap.org/redistricting. Or find a sample ballot at https://ballotpedia.org/Sample_Ballot_Lookup. 

CALLS FOR NOMINATIONS FOR 2023 BOARD

The following positions on the Board of Directors are open for nominations: President, VP of Communications, VP of Records, and VP of Finance.  The elections will be held at our September meeting, with each 2 year term beginning in 2023. Please contact us with nominations. 

Candy Graham, founding member of NWPC-VA and 2020-2021 Vice President of the Endorsements Committee, has been everywhere when it comes to women and Virginia politics. She got her start with the Chesterfield County Democratic Committee. As she became more involved, her dedication to women's issues grew. In 2013, Candy–with Eileen Davis–launched Women Matter. Together they lobbied the legislature to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. Their efforts laid the groundwork for Virginia’s ratification as the 38th and final state in January 2020.  

Today, Candy's calm but unrelenting rallying cry can be heard on the ground and in the digital sphere. "Candy doesn't just want to have a seat at the table, she wants to make sure that women are recognized for building the table and bringing everyone to it,"  notes Jess Kujala, co-founder Vote Equality US. Thank you, Candy, for your lifetime of advocacy!

NWPC-VA LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES’ UPDATES

–GA22 Recap

Criminal justice reform did not make as many dramatic advances in GA22 as it did in previous years. For example, SB296, sponsored by Sen. Creigh Deeds (D/Charlottesville) was killed in the House. It would have applied where a defendant, found guilty in a felony or Class 1 misdemeanor case, had requested sentencing by jury. The proposed bill would have allowed relevant mitigating evidence to be presented to the jury, including whether the offense was committed while the defendant suffered from mental illness or an intellectual disability. In addition, SB137, designed to promote fair sentencing and sponsored by Sen. John S. Edwards (D/Roanoke), was killed in the House. This proposed bill would have applied to any felony case, other than Class 1 felonies, in which the court imposed a sentence that was either greater or less than that indicated by the discretionary sentencing guidelines. It would have required the court to provide a written explanation of such departure. The bill stated that the failure to provide a written explanation that adequately explains the sentence imposed is an error that may constitute a basis for resentencing by the trial judge.

SB741, sponsored by Sen. Scott Surovell (D/Fairfax & Prince William), became law and reverses the ban on the use of facial recognition technology by local and campus police that was passed last year. The new law allows limited use of the technology and requires it be evaluated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, with an accuracy score of at least 98% true positives across all demographic groups. One of the key reasons for the previous ban was because it frequently matched photos of African Americans incorrectly. There was bipartisan support for this bill. However, Democrats were divided in part over concerns regarding the misuse of the technology. Sen. Surovell was quoted by 8News as saying that the bill explicitly prohibits surveillance and monitoring or any type of live use of the technology. In the House, the vote was 49-49. The final Senate vote was 28-12.

Several other criminal justice reforms found more common ground and became law. Sen. Deeds’ SB295 adds to the duties of pretrial service officers, stating that they must screen defendants for participation in a behavioral health docket if one is available. Behavioral health dockets employ evidence-based practices to diagnose mental illness and provide appropriate treatment. Not every community has an established behavioral health docket, but Virginia law allows every community to do so. In addition, Del. Jeion Ward (D/Hampton) sponsored HB731, a small but important measure that allows juveniles or their parents or guardians to review juvenile law enforcement records unless there is an order forbidding it. Formerly this could only be done by order of the court. And finally, HB1282, sponsored by Delegate Jackie Glass (D/Norfolk), allows part of the proceeds of forfeited property to be used to strengthen ties between community groups and local police and promote goodwill between the two.

–Gov. Youngkin’s Education Report

in January, Virginians stated education as a priority in a poll by VCU, citing concerns about the impact of remote learning during the pandemic as well as funding and charter school access.

This past week, the Youngkin administration issued a report, “Our Commitment to Virginians,” on the state of K-12 public education. The report stated the administration’s goals are to “restore excellence and close K-12 achievement gaps” due to Virginia’s supposed loss of its national standing in education in recent years. The report cited “troubling trends” in assessment gaps in math scores, and wider gaps in both math and reading for Black, Hispanic and low-income students. 

Democratic leadership responded that the report criticized the Board of Education, public school administrators, and teachers in the midst of a pandemic and was marked by a number of “dog-whistle talking points” rather than policy–like the higher pay for educators and dedicating more funding to school construction that Senate Democrats have proposed. They also noted high rankings for Virginia schools by Forbes and US News and World Report, which contradicted the administration’s findings. 

The Washington Post did a deep dive into the data as well as both Republican and Democratic positions. You can read that here. It is also worth noting that most studies of standardized test scores measure student performance on standardized testing, rather than how well students are learning.

Beyond test scores, one issue which seems to remain consistent is that, despite Virginia being one of the wealthier states in the country, our allocation of resources to public education is consistently low. A VPM story cited the 2021 Making the Grade report, “Not only did Virginia receive a D for education funding level last year, but also funding effort.” Virginia was in the bottom 15 states for per pupil spending, below not only Northeastern states like Vermont and New Jersey, but also neighboring states like West Virginia and Kentucky. National studies have shown that additional school funding pays for itself, yielding  improvements in educational attainment, wages, and family income.

–Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative Rollback

The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) is a cooperative, market-based effort among 11 Eastern states to cap carbon pollution from power plants and compel generators to buy carbon allowances. The program began in 2005, and power sector carbon emissions in RGGI states have declined by over 50%. Virginia joined in 2020, and our emissions last year declined by 13%. The proceeds of our allowance auctions are invested in community flood preparedness, coastal resilience, and energy efficiency programs in low income homes. While other options, such as carbon taxes, could be used to mitigate emissions, this cap-and-trade program is the preference of many environmental groups as well as 67% of Virginians, according to a February 2022 poll by CNU.

The Youngkin administration wants to pull Virginia out of RGGI and this month announced appointments to the commonwealth’s citizen environmental boards, including the air board which will be charged with approving the administration’s efforts. Changes to regulation will most likely happen this summer. Appointing new regulators to environmental boards is part of a multi-pronged effort to roll back environmental regulations (e.g. Clean Energy and Community Flood Preparedness Act) passed in recent years. Other means include through contract, the budget, and legislation, such as the bills proposed this past session by Republican legislators House Majority Leader Terry Kilgore (R/Southwestern), HB 892 and HB 1301; Sen. Richard Stuart (R/Westmoreland Co.), SB 532; and Sen. Ryan McDougle (R/Mechanicsville), SB 398. All bills failed in the Senate. Details on the rollback strategies can be found in this Virginia Mercury article.

See the Calls to Action section on how to advocate for the RGGI and environmental priorities in the state budget.

–Mountain Valley Pipeline 

The Mountain Valley Pipeline is a 300-mile, 42-inch pipeline which would carry fracked gas from shale fields in West Virginia through Virginia to intersect with the existing Transco Pipeline, a major means of transporting gas to Mid-Atlantic markets and markets overseas. Construction began in 2018, with the intent to drill beneath the Appalachian Trail. The pipeline’s path runs through communities that are traditionally overburdened by environmental violations (e.g. Pittsylvania County) and land with native burial mounds, the latter violating requirements of the National Historic Preservation Act. It threatens the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachian region streams (including Roanoke Valley’s drinking water supply), endangered species, and the Chesapeake Bay watershed. To date, the project has violated both federal and Virginia’s environmental laws and regulations. 

Two air and water pollution bills that appear to have been crafted to help the Mountain Valley Pipeline, HB 1261 and SB 657, were proposed this past session by Del. Richard Bloxom (R/Eastern Shore) and Sen. Richard Stuart (R/Westmoreland Co.) respectively. Stuart’s bill--passed with bipartisan support and signed into law by the governor last month--transfers regulatory authority from Virginia’s environmental citizen boards to the Department of Environmental Quality in July. Those boards formerly had final decisions on permits with significant public interest, and the air board had denied the MVP a permit in the fall.

Currently, the MVP is at least $3 billion over budget and behind schedule. It is on hold because it is missing essential federal permits. If completed, it would be the single largest source of greenhouse gasses in Virginia, producing annual emissions of over 89 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent. Virginia needs clean energy options, not new fossil fuel infrastructure.

See the Calls to Action section for how to advocate for environmental justice.

CALLS TO ACTION