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2005 SESSION

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Senate Committee on Commerce and Labor

Chairman: William C. Wampler, Jr.

Clerk: Jocelyn R. Lance
Date of Meeting: January 24, 2005
Time and Place: Monday, 1/2 Hr after adjournment, SR B, GAB

S.B. 705 Minimum wage; qualification for overtime pay.

Patron: Miller

Qualification for payment of overtime compensation.  Provides that employers subject to the Fair Labor Standards Act shall pay wages for overtime in accordance with the regulations governing overtime pay that were in effect prior to August 23, 2004, except that the minimum qualifying salary for an exempt employee (i.e., an employee not entitled to overtime) shall be that set forth at 29 C.F.R. § 541.600, effective August 23, 2004.

Regulations effective prior to August 23, 2004 required payment of overtime wages to employees earning wages at or below $8,060 per year. Employees earning more than $8,060 could qualify for overtime based on a further evaluation of their duties and responsibilities.

Under the regulations effective August 23, 2004, employees earning less than $23,660 annually must be paid overtime compensation without consideration of their duties and responsibilities. Employees earning more than $23,660 may qualify for overtime compensation, depending on further evaluation of their duties and responsibilities. The regulations also distinguish between white collar and blue collar employees and direct that the latter can never be deemed exempt, and require that certain specific groups of employees (such as police officers, correctional officers and emergency medical technicians) are never to be considered exempt. See 29 C.F.R. § 541.3.

At the same time, the regulations effective August 23, 2004 provide that an employee can spend unspecified amounts of time performing nonexempt tasks, yet be found exempt if his "primary duty" is management or supervision of other employees. Under the regulations in effect prior to August 23, 2004, an employee who spent more than 80 percent of his time performing nonexempt tasks was entitled to overtime, regardless of whether his work also involved management or supervision of other employees. See former 29 C.F.R. § 541.112 (providing that "An employee will not qualify for exemption as an executive if he devotes more than 20 percent...of his hours worked in the workweek to nonexempt work").

The bill retains the threshold wage of $23,660 established in the regulations in effect on August 23, 2004, and requires the application of the regulations in effect prior to August 23, 2004, for the purposes of evaluating whether an employee earning more than that threshold wage is entitled to overtime compensation.

S.B. 733 Enterprise zones; extends designations and authority.

Patron: Reynolds

Enterprise zones; extension of authority.  Extends the expiration date for the statutes governing enterprise zones and extends the 20-year time limitation for selected enterprise zones by two years. The provisions extending the 20-year time limitation are made retroactive to January 1, 2005.

S.B. 735 Enterprise zones; extends designations and authority.

Patron: Reynolds

Enterprise zone designations. Allows one enterprise zone in any county, city, or town to consist of three noncontiguous zone areas. Currently, one enterprise zone may consist of two noncontiguous zone areas. The bill also extends the expiration of the Enterprise Zone Act from July 1, 2005, to July 1, 2010.

S.B. 772 Unemployment compensation; base period for benefits.

Patron: Bell

Unemployment compensation; base period; minimum earnings.  Provides that an individual earning at least $2,500 but less than $3,500.01 in his base period shall be eligible to qualify for unemployment compensation benefits only if he had earnings of at least $1,250 in each of two quarters in his base period.

S.B. 783 Electrical transmission lines; location underground in certain localities.

Patron: Mims

Electrical transmission lines; location underground.  Requires the State Corporation Commission, when considering a request for approval of the construction of an underground transmission line in a city or county with a population of over 225,000, to consider imposing a condition that the line be located underground, if requested by the governing board of the locality.  If the Commission approves the facility without such a condition, its reason or reasons for declining to do so shall be stated in its order.

S.B. 848 Enterprise zones; extension of authority.

Patron: Quayle

Enterprise zones; extension of authority.  Extends the expiration date for the statutes governing enterprise zones and extends the 20-year time limitation for selected enterprise zones by two years. The provisions extending the 20-year time limitation are made retroactive to January 1, 2005.

EMERGENCY

S.B. 860 Health insurance; mandated coverage for prescription contraceptives.

Patron: Howell

Health insurance; mandated coverage for prescription contraceptives. Requires health insurers, corporations providing accident and sickness subscription contracts, and health maintenance organizations, whose policies, contracts, or plans include prescription drugs on an outpatient basis, to include coverage for any prescribed drug or device approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration for use as a contraceptive.

S.B. 975 Pay-Per-Call Services Act. 

Patron: O'Brien

Pay-Per-Call Services Act.  Prohibits the provider of a pay-per-call service, through which material harmful to juveniles is provided or is accessible, from accepting telephone calls from a telephone number, assessing pay-per-call charges to a telephone number, or initiating calls to a telephone number, if the individual with that telephone number requests the provider not to accept telephone calls from that telephone number.

S.B. 987 Gas pipeline safety; regulation by State Corporation Commission.

Patron: Watkins

Gas pipeline safety.  Authorizes the State Corporation Commission to act for the U.S. Secretary of Transportation to implement federal pipeline safety laws with respect to municipal gas systems. The Commission is not authorized to impose civil penalties or fines on any locality, or to regulate the rates, terms, and conditions of service of any locality providing gas service, except as otherwise provided. As the Commission's pipeline safety program currently covers investor-owned and master-metered systems and intrastate hazardous liquid pipelines, this measure gives the Commission safety jurisdiction over all intrastate gas and hazardous liquid pipeline facilities. The measure also relocates provisions currently located in other Code sections, that address violations of pipeline safety codes and pipelines that transport landfill gas, into one Code section.

S.B. 1047 Unemployment compensation; independent contractor.

Patron: Wagner

Unemployment compensation; independent contractor.  Requires the Commission to use the 20-factor test the Internal Revenue Service uses to determine whether an individual is an independent contractor for purposes of the Federal Unemployment Tax Act.

S.B. 1055 Unemployment compensation; minimum earnings.

Patron: Wagner

Unemployment compensation; minimum earnings.  Increases from $2,500 to $3,500 the wages an employee must have earned in the two highest earnings quarters of his base period (the first four of the five calendar quarters preceding application for benefits) in order to be eligible for unemployment compensation benefits.

 

S.B. 1097 Health savings accounts. 

Patron: Martin

Health savings accounts.  Requires the Department of Taxation and the State Corporation Commission to amend the Virginia Medical Savings Account Plan to address the provisions of federal law that permit eligible individuals to establish health savings accounts. The revised plan, to be called the Virginia Health Savings Account Plan, shall set forth the requirements for establishing health savings accounts. Existing medical savings accounts may be converted to health savings accounts. Health carriers are expressly authorized to offer high deductible health plans that qualify for and may be offered in conjunction with health savings accounts. The 2003 federal Medicare legislation authorizes eligible individuals who purchase a high deductible health plan to make tax-deductible contributions into a health savings account, generally up to the amount of the health plan's deductible, and to make tax-free withdrawals from the health savings account to pay for qualified medical expenses. The measure also repeals provisions relating to the establishment of the Virginia Medical Savings Account Plan and to the role of the Joint Commission on Health Care in monitoring the development of the Plan.

S.B. 1106 Health insurance carriers; ethics and fairness in business practices. 

Patron: Saslaw

Health insurance carriers; ethics and fairness in business practices.  Prohibits health insurance carriers from automatically changing or bundling the code submitted by a physician or osteopath who utilizes the appropriate Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) or similar code, unless there are clear directions in the CPT to do so. Other provisions require carriers to use independent, binding external mechanisms to resolve billing and claims disputes, prohibit explanations of benefits that suggest that amounts paid by the carrier should be considered appropriate and full compensation for the services provided, and redefine what constitutes a retroactive denial of a previously paid claim. The measure also provides that an amendment to a contract shall not be effective unless the proposed amendment is delivered to the provider at least 90 days prior to its effective date.

S.B. 1112 Unemployment compensation; benefits charges resulting from a temporary closure forced by disaster.

Patron: Blevins

Unemployment compensation; benefits charging; disasters.  Strikes the requirement, for the purposes of assigning to the pool the charges associated with a claimant who qualifies for unemployment compensation due to a disaster-related business closure, that the claimant have returned to his job once the business reopened.

S.B. 1172 Employer and employee; covenants restricting competition.

Patron: Stolle

Covenants not to compete.  Establishes that a covenant between an employer and employee that restricts the employee's ability to compete with his employer following the termination of employment is enforceable if the restrictions are reasonable in duration, geographic area, and scope, the agreement is signed by the individual, the covenant is justified by the former employer's legitimate business interest, and the individual's agreement to the covenant is supported by consideration. The measure does not apply in actions to enforce a covenant entered into prior to July 1, 2005.

S.B. 1182 Enterprise zones; extension of authority.

Patron: Rerras

Enterprise zones; extension of authority.  Extends the expiration deadline for enterprise zones by two years, from July 1, 2005, to July 1, 2007.

 

S.B. 1201 Unemployment tax rate; penalties for transfering any trade or business for a lower tax rate.

Patron: Miller

Unemployment compensation; state unemployment tax dumping; penalties.  Establishes the civil and criminal penalties that shall be assessed against, and the unemployment compensation tax rates that shall apply to, persons who transfer any trade or business to another where at the time of transfer there is substantially common ownership, management, or control of the trade or business and the sole or primary purpose of the transfer is to obtain a lower unemployment tax rate.

 

S.B. 1215 Workers' compensation; definition of injury for use of a dealer motor vehicle.

Patron: Williams

Workers' compensation; demonstrator cars; noncompensable injury, disease, or condition. Provides that any injury, disease or condition resulting from the use by an employee of a dealer motor vehicle for commuting to or from work or any other non-work activity is not compensable under workers' compensation.

S.B. 1228 Stock Corporation Act; changes in provisions.

Patron: Stosch

Stock Corporation Act.  Updates the Virginia Stock Corporation Act to incorporate refinements to the Revised Model Business Corporation Act that have been adopted by the Business Law Section of the American Bar Association since its Model Act was enacted by Virginia.  Substantive changes include permitting several corporate actions to be taken electronically; confirming that provisions in corporate documents filed with the State Corporation Commission may be made dependent on statistical or market indices or other objectively ascertainable facts; making the process for amending articles of incorporation more flexible; streamlining the process for combining corporations with other types of business entities; expanding situations where a shareholder can exercise appraisal rights; revising the test for determining whether a sale of corporate assets requires shareholder approval; establishing a shareholder buy-out alternative to court-ordered dissolution; and establishing a process for resolving contingent liabilities of a dissolving corporation.

S.B. 1260 Motor vehicle, aircraft, and watercraft liability insurance policies. 

Patron: Norment

Motor vehicle, aircraft, and watercraft liability insurance policies.  Authorizes a liability insurer to limit its liability, under an insurance policy covering bodily injury or property damage, to liability limits for such coverage set forth in the policy for each person using or responsible for the operation or use a motor vehicle, watercraft, or aircraft, for each accident or occurrence, or for both.

S.B. 1265 Communication of health insurance documents.

Patron: Wagner

Communication of health insurance documents.  Authorizes health insurers to provide explanations of benefits, individual certificates, and evidence of coverage by means other than a printed document, if the person entitled to the document may request and receive a printed copy.

S.B. 1276 Disclosure of wage information to consumer reporting agencies. 

Patron: Watkins

Disclosure of wage information to consumer reporting agencies.  Authorizes the Virginia Employment Commission to release individual wage information, provided in employers' quarterly wage reports, to consumer reporting agencies if the individual consents in writing. The released information is to be used only to verify the accuracy of wage or employment information provided by the individual in connection with a specific transaction.