As this legislative session came to a close, obviously the last few weeks were dealt with adopting a state balanced biennial budget for 2011 and 2012. Unfortunately, it was a budget that I could not support.
Along with the budget, we viewed almost 3,000 pieces of legislation. As for myself, I had 15 fairly substantive bills that passed the General Assembly this year from legislation to help special needs children, to public safety measures, to bills to help veterans get property tax relief and ensuring the stability of our menhaden fishery.
The most notable of all my bills was the bill to increase the fee for civil litigation. Many of you have heard much about this and it was a sticking point in the budget negotiations. The bill increases the filing fee for people who want to sue each other for personal injury or other civil litigation, but it also raised the money necessary to fund the sheriffs’ offices and the commonwealth attorneys.
This has been the busiest session of the Senate that I have observed since being elected to serve you in the Virginia Senate. That is largely due to the fact that we are in a budgetary crisis. The budget process looms over everything that we are doing and people are trying to come up with ways to fill the gaps or make the cuts that will be necessary to balance our budget this year.
Aside from that, I have had 12 substantive bills pass the Senate and are now headed for consideration by the House of Delegates. These bills encompass many public safety issues, natural resource issues and property matters.
One of the most difficult bills that I have worked on was the menhaden fisheries cap. That cap to protect the fishery was negotiated a few years ago and is designed to ensure we have a healthy and sustainable population of menhaden for both sport fishermen and the menhaden industry, which
Greetings from the Capitol from Sen. Stuart - August 27, 2009
As promised, this report deals
exclusively with the results of the special session on Wednesday, August, 19,
2009, to deal with the United States Supreme Court in Melendez-Diaz vs. Massachusetts.
The bill that was presented to
the legislature had two major components.
The first is that the bill now conforms Virginia’s law Notice and Demand
statute more closely to the laws which were specifically approved in Melendez-Diaz vs. Massachusetts.
Under the bill, a Commonwealth’s
Attorney will now send a copy of a certificate of analysis to the defense
counsel or defendant at least 28 days prior to trial. This notice will apprise the defendant that he has 14 days
to object to the introduction of the certificate and effectively demand that
the Commonwealth produce at trial the person who conducted the analysis. If the defendant does not object, his
or her right to confront this witness at trial is waived and the certificate is
admissible so long as it meets all other statutory requirements.
The second major component is the
addition of a tolling provision to Virginia’s speedy trial requirement. Compared to other states’ laws and to
the Constitutional requirement of speedy trial, Virginia law requires that the
accused be tried in a very short time frame – 5 months for an incarcerated
person and 9 months for a person out on bond.
CBHS Visits with Senator Stuart and Delegate Pollard
February 11, 2009, the National Honor Society and the Academic Team from Colonial Beach High School met with Senator Stuart and Delegate Pollard at the General Assembly Building.
Greetings from the Capitol from Sen. Stuart - Feb. 6, 2009
As we approach crossover, time is getting tight and everybody is working hard to get various pieces of legislation through. I have had many of my bills pass the full Senate, including quite a few bills that I am co-sponsoring with other Senators.
I thought I would highlight a few of my bills that have passed the Senate this past week. First is Senate Bill 907 which gives the authority to fiduciaries or executors of someone’s estate under a will the ability to place an open space easement on property passing under the will. This, of course, would require consent of the beneficiary, but could allow the estate to receive the beneficial tax advantages from an open space easement. We all know the benefits that open space easements give us.
Second, Senate Bill 952 is a bill that makes it a class 1 misdemeanor for school children to sell any over-the-counter medicine containing dextromethorphan on school grounds. This has become a very serious matter with school children. Many are now purchasing this anti-tussive medication and using it for its hallucinogenic affect. Some are developing complications and even death as a result of that. I was very pleased that this measure passed the full Senate and look forward to its full passage in the House.
