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ACROSS SESSIONS
- Subject Index: Since 1995
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2013 SESSION
Chairman: Walter A. Stosch
Clerk: Patty Lung, Cheryl Law
Staff: Nicole Brenner, L. Wallmeyer
Date of Meeting: January 23, 2013
Time and Place: 9:00 a.m. - Senate Room B
Revised to add bills Passed By for the Day on 1/22
Patron: Watkins
Individual accident and sickness insurance; open enrollment program. Repeals the requirement that a health insurer that is, or is successor to, a health services plan provide an open enrollment program for individual accident and sickness contracts. Under the open enrollment program, an individual may purchase a product at any time during the year, with the caveat that the individual serve a 12-month waiting period before services are covered for any preexisting condition. The requirement for such an open enrollment program is inconsistent with guaranteed issue provisions of the federal Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) that prohibit waiting periods for coverage for preexisting conditions and that provide for limited open enrollment periods. The measure also eliminates certain provisions that set a tax rate of 0.75 percent on premiums from policies sold under the open enrollment program. The measure will become effective January 1, 2014.
Patron: McEachin
Payment of wages to employees. Requires employers to maintain and preserve records regarding the rate of pay, hours worked, earnings due, wages paid, and related matters for each employee. The measure provides a standard for how an employee, in an action to collect unpaid wages, may meet his burden of establishing that he is entitled to the wages. The measure also amends an employee's existing private right of action for unpaid wages by requiring the court to award attorney fees and other costs to a prevailing employee. In such a proceeding, unless the employer shows good faith, the court shall award to the employee three times the amount of unpaid wages. An action for unpaid wages shall be commenced within two years after the action accrued, or within three years if the violation is willful.
Patron: Edwards
Tax credits for donations to organizations providing scholarships to certain students attending Virginia two-year colleges. Creates a 65 percent tax credit for donations to scholarship foundations to pay for qualified educational expenses for students enrolled in an associate degree program at a Virginia two-year college based on science, technology, engineering, math, education, or nursing. Scholarship foundations eligible to receive such donations would be preapproved by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia.
Patron: Carrico
Entitlement to certain sales and use tax revenues; City of Bristol. Provides that payments of sales and use tax revenue generated on the premises of a public facility located in the City of Bristol used to pay bonds issued to construct the public facility shall begin upon certification by the governing body of the municipality that a business license has been issued to an occupant of the public facility, even though the public facility has not been completed.
Patron: Watkins
State severance tax; uranium. Establishes a three percent state severance tax on the gross receipts of any uranium severed from the earth in the Commonwealth. One-half of the proceeds of the tax shall be deposited in the general fund of the Commonwealth. The other half of the proceeds shall be deposited into an Economic Development and Environmental Trust Fund established for each locality from which uranium is mined. Each locality's fund would be administered by a board appointed by the governing body of the locality.
Patron: Vogel
Department of State Police; variable housing allowance. Provides a housing allowance for full-time, sworn State Police officers, based upon pay grade and geographical location, from funds that are appropriated for such purpose. The rates of the variable allowance shall be based on suggested rates developed and annually updated by the Department of Human Resource Management. The allowance would not be considered taxable income for state income tax purposes.
Patron: Marsh
Tax credits for donations to scholarships foundations. Provides for the repeal of tax credits for donations to scholarship foundations for kindergarten through twelfth grade students attending nonpublic schools.
Patron: Hanger
Bond issuance for wastewater treatment facilities. Authorizes the Virginia Public Building Authority to issue an additional $150 million in bonds to continue installing nutrient removal technology in eligible wastewater treatment facilities to comply with the Chesapeake Bay TMDL and the Watershed Implementation Plan. These funds would complete projects at facilities under existing signed Water Quality Improvement Fund agreements and at additional eligible facilities that did not receive moneys from the original bonds issued in 2007.
Patron: McEachin
Claims; Bennett Barbour. Provides relief in the amount of $162,844 to Bennett Barbour, who was incarcerated twice for a total of five years and nine months after being convicted of crimes of rape, burglary, and grand larceny; 324 days of his time served is attributable to the rape conviction. Mr. Barbour has been issued a writ of actual innocence for the rape conviction. The relief will be paid as follows: (i) an initial lump sum of $32,569 to be paid within 60 business days immediately following the execution of a release by Mr. Barbour from any present or future claims he may have and (ii) the sum of $130,275 to purchase an annuity before September 30, 2013, for the primary benefit of Mr. Barbour with the terms of such annuity structured in Mr. Barbour's best interests based on consultation among Mr. Barbour or his representatives, the State Treasurer, and other necessary parties. The bill also contains an emergency clause and will become law upon its passage.
EMERGENCY
Patron: Stanley
Education Improvement Scholarships Tax Credits. Eliminates the requirement that schools with students who receive scholarships from tax-credit-derived sources report achievement test results to the Department of Education, and that the Department of Education publish aggregated data about such students and their test results on the Department's website. Instead, the schools will be required to report achievement test results to the foundation awarding the scholarship to the student. The bill also clarifies that a scholarship foundation meets the requirement that it was established to provide financial aid for the education of students residing in the Commonwealth if the foundation's articles of incorporation or bylaws so state.
Patron: Stanley
Tax credits for donations to nonprofits providing assistance to low-income families. Makes several changes to the Neighborhood Assistance Act Tax Credit and Education Improvement Scholarships Tax Credits program including (i) allowing tax credits for donations of marketable securities under the Education Improvement Scholarships Tax Credits program, (ii) changing reporting requirements to the Department of Education, changing the time frame for scholarship foundations to disburse moneys for scholarships, and changing the penalties for failing to make such reports and disbursements under the Education Improvement Scholarships Tax Credits program, (iii) for both programs, establishing $125,000 as the maximum annual amount of donations by an individual for which tax credits may be issued, and (iv) for both programs, extending the expiration date through the 2027 taxable year. The bill also makes several other technical changes.
Patron: Watkins
Personal property tax; advertising signs. Specifies that outdoor advertising signs are included in the class of tangible personal property used in a trade or business, and requires localities to tax such signs as personal property, not as real property. The bill also prohibits such signs or income generated by such signs to be considered in assessing the value of real property. The bill states that an emergency exists and it is in force from its passage. The bill applies to tax years beginning on or after January 1, 2013.
EMERGENCY
Patron: Lucas
Claims; Calvin Wayne Cunningham. Provides relief in the amount of $291,041 to Calvin Cunningham, who was incarcerated for a total of seven years after being convicted of crimes of rape and burglary. Mr. Cunningham has been issued a writ of actual innocence. The relief will be paid as follows: (i) an initial lump sum of $58,208 to be paid within 60 days immediately following the execution of a release by Mr. Cunningham from any present or future claims he may have and (ii) the sum of $232,833 to purchase an annuity before September 30, 2013, for the primary benefit of Mr. Cunningham with the terms of such annuity structured in Mr. Cunningham's best interests based on consultation among Mr. Cunningham or his representatives, the State Treasurer, and other necessary parties.
Patron: Ruff
Capital outlay plan. Establishes a revised six-year capital outlay plan for projects to be funded entirely or partially from general fund-supported resources.
Patron: Carrico
Entitlement to sales and use tax revenues; development of regional impact. Adds the County of Washington as a locality entitled to retain certain sales and use taxes generated on the premises of a development of regional impact located in the County, to pay bonds issued for the development. The bill also eliminates the requirement that the locality have an unemployment rate at least three percentage points higher than the statewide average.
Patron: Stanley
Virginia Economic Development Partnership Authority; export of Virginia products and services. Authorizes the Virginia Economic Development Partnership Authority to undertake whatever activities the Authority deems appropriate to provide bridge loans and shipment insurance for Virginia exporters. This bill may be known as the Virginia Export Assistance Act.
Patron: Wagner
Neighborhood Assistance Act tax credits; eligible neighborhood organizations. Provides that, in order to be eligible for an allocation of credits under the Neighborhood Assistance Act tax credit program from the Department of Social Services, at least 40 percent of the neighborhood organization's revenues must be used to provide services to low-income persons.
Patron: Edwards
Taxation of tangible personal property. Requires localities to tax campers and other recreational vehicles as real property if they are used as a primary residence and do not travel more than 250 miles per year. The bill provides for refunds for personal property taxes paid in 2012 on such campers and other recreational vehicles in the amount of the difference between the personal property tax and the real property tax. The bill also reduces past-due personal property tax amounts owed for such campers and other recreational vehicles to the amount owed under the real property tax rate for 2012.
Patron: McEachin
County food and beverage tax. Adds to the list of counties that may collect a food and beverage tax counties that have withdrawn from the secondary state highway system and therefore maintain their own roads and are adjacent to a city that also operates its own road system.