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2015 SESSION

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Senate Committee on Finance

Co-Chair: Walter A. Stosch - Co-Chair: Charles J. Colgan

Clerk: Patty Lung
Staff: Lisa Wallmeyer, Nicole Brenner
Date of Meeting: February 18, 2015
Time and Place: 9:00 a.m. - Senate Room B

H.B. 1386 Disaster relief; assistance by out-of-state businesses and employees.

Patron: Ware

Disaster relief assistance by out-of-state businesses and employees. Provides that out-of-state businesses and employees who come into the Commonwealth solely for the purpose of performing disaster-related or emergency-related work in response to a declared disaster or emergency shall not be subject to state or local taxes or registration requirements. Upon request, the State Corporation Commission may require such a business to provide certain information. The Commission is required to maintain a record of such information and to make the record available to the public. The bill contains an emergency clause.

EMERGENCY

H.B. 1427 Felony homicide; felony drug offenses, penalty.

Patron: Lingamfelter

Felony homicide; felony drug offenses; penalty. Provides that a person is guilty of felony homicide, which constitutes second degree murder and is punishable by confinement of not less than five nor more than 40 years, if the underlying felonious act that resulted in the killing of another involved the manufacture, sale, gift, or distribution of a Schedule I or II controlled substance to another and (i) such other person's death results from his use of the controlled substance and (ii) the controlled substance is the proximate cause of his death. The bill also provides that venue for a prosecution of this crime shall lie in the locality where the underlying felony occurred, where the use of the controlled substance occurred, or where death occurred. This bill overrules the Court of Appeals of Virginia decision in Woodard v. Commonwealth, 61 Va. App. 567, 739 S.E.2d 220 (2013), aff'd, 287 Va. 276, 754 S.E.2d 309 (2014). This bill incorporates HB 1638 and HB 1937.

H.B. 1493 Enticing another into a dwelling house; person who commits certain violations, Class 6 felony.

Patron: Miller

Enticing persons to dwelling house to commit certain crimes; penalty. Provides that a person who commits certain specified crimes including capital murder, first and second degree murder, murder of a pregnant woman, abduction with intent to extort money for immoral purposes, aggravated malicious wounding, robbery, rape, forcible sodomy, or object sexual penetration within a dwelling house, and who, with the intent to commit such crime, enticed, solicited, requested, or otherwise caused the victim to enter the dwelling house is guilty of a separate and distinct Class 6 felony.

H.B. 1533 Obscene sexual display in a public place; third offense, penalty.

Patron: Wright

Obscene sexual display; third offense; penalty. Adds engaging in an obscene sexual display, i.e., actual or explicitly simulated masturbation in a public place, to the list of misdemeanor sex offenses for which the penalty for a third offense of any of the listed offenses committed in a 10-year period is a Class 6 felony.

H.B. 1560 Electronic summons systems; fees assessed by towns.

Patron: Rust

Electronic summons systems; fees; towns. Allows towns to assess a fee not to exceed $5, as part of the costs in each criminal or traffic case in the district or circuit courts located where such cases are brought, to be used for the implementation and maintenance of an electronic summons system.

H.B. 1702 Firearms; transfer, etc., from licensed dealer.

Patron: DeSteph

Transfer, etc., of firearms from licensed dealer; criminal history record information. Provides that a licensed firearms dealer may perform a criminal history record information check before selling, renting, trading, or transferring any firearm owned by the dealer that is not in his inventory. Current law requires that a dealer perform such a check only if the firearm is from the dealer's inventory.

H.B. 1895 Higher educational institutions; additional financial and administrative authority.

Patron: Cox

Additional financial and administrative authority for certain public institutions of higher education. Permits the board of visitors or other governing body of any public institution of higher education that has entered into and successfully renewed a memorandum of understanding with the appropriate Cabinet Secretary or Secretaries to exercise, with some variation, (i) additional authority in the functional areas of information technology, procurement, and capital projects and (ii) the financial operational authority of covered institutions that have entered into management agreements. Under current law, such boards of visitors and governing bodies are limited to exercising authority in two of the three functional areas of information technology, procurement, and capital projects. The bill also describes the conditions for renewal and revocation of such authority and requires the accounts of each institution granted such authority to be audited by the Auditor of Public Accounts.

H.B. 1896 Virginia Guaranteed Assistance Program; grants.

Patron: Cox

Virginia Guaranteed Assistance Program; grants. Makes several changes to the Virginia Guaranteed Assistance Program (Program), including adding requirements that (i) each student eligible for the Program receive an award from the institution's appropriations for undergraduate student financial assistance before grants are awarded to students with equivalent remaining need, (ii) each eligible student receive an award in an amount greater than other grants awarded to students with equivalent remaining need, (iii) beginning with first-time students enrolled in the fall semester of 2016, each eligible student receive a Program award in an amount greater than the award of each eligible student with equivalent remaining need in the next-lowest class level, and (iv) each Program award be determined by a proportionate award schedule adopted by each institution and vary according to each student's remaining need and the total of tuition, fees, and other necessary charges, including books.

H.B. 1897 Intercollegiate athletics programs; format for each institution to report revenues and expenses.

Patron: Cox

Intercollegiate athletics programs. Prohibits the sum of school funds and student fees used to support intercollegiate athletics programs from exceeding a certain percentage of athletics revenues, as those terms are defined in the bill, at each four-year public institution of higher education in the Commonwealth. The bill requires any school that violates this prohibition to submit to the General Assembly a five-year plan for coming into compliance. The bill requires the Auditor of Public Accounts to monitor plan progress and provides that negative audits will trigger a reduction or elimination of existing operational authority. The bill also requires the board of visitors of any four-year public institution of higher education that seeks to add a major intercollegiate athletics program or change the division level of any of its existing intercollegiate athletics programs to first submit to the Intercollegiate Athletics Review Commission established in the bill a plan and recommendations for financing the addition or change and prohibits any such addition or change from being implemented without the approval of the General Assembly expressed in the general appropriation act.

H.B. 1898 Pulp, Paper, and Fertilizer Advanced Manufacturing Performance Grant Program; created.

Patron: Cox

Grants for pulp, paper, and fertilizer manufacturers. Creates the Pulp, Paper, and Fertilizer Advanced Manufacturing Performance Grant Program (Program), which would provide grants to any pulp, paper, and fertilizer manufacturer that invests at least $2 billion in real or personal property and creates at least 2,000 new full-time jobs pursuant to a memorandum of understanding with the Commonwealth. The total amount of grants paid under the Program would not exceed $20 million. Grants would be paid when the qualifying manufacturer attains capital investment and job creation requirements included in the memorandum of understanding. Grants would be paid from the Pulp, Paper, and Fertilizer Advanced Manufacturing Performance Grant Program Fund.

H.B. 2040 Prostitution, pandering, etc.; violation of certain provisions is punishable.

Patron: Bell, Robert B.

Pandering; minors; penalty. Increases from a Class 4 felony to a Class 3 felony the penalty for pandering involving a minor.

H.B. 2061 Circuit court; electronic filing in civil proceedings.

Patron: Kilgore

Electronic filing in civil proceedings; fee. Increases from $2 to $5 the amount that a circuit court with an established electronic filing system may charge for every civil case initially filed by paper.

H.B. 2384 Workers' compensation; electronic billing and payment.

Patron: Byron

Workers' compensation; electronic billing and payment. Requires employers and their insurance carriers to electronically process claims for medical expenses incurred under the Virginia Workers' Compensation Act. This requirement becomes effective January 1, 2018.

H.B. 2385 Wireless telecommunications device; possession, etc., by prisoner, penalty.

Patron: Gilbert

Possession, etc., of wireless telecommunications device by prisoner; penalty. Provides that a person who provides or causes to be provided a wireless telecommunications device to a prisoner or person committed to a juvenile correctional center or a prisoner or committed person who possesses such a device is guilty of a Class 6 felony. Current law prohibits only such provision or possession of cellular telephones.

H.J.R. 597 Constitutional amendment; real property tax exemption.

Patron: Hugo

Constitutional amendment (first resolution); real property tax exemption. Provides that the General Assembly may provide for a local option to exempt from taxation the primary residence of the surviving spouse of any law-enforcement officer, firefighter, search and rescue personnel, or emergency medical services personnel killed in the line of duty. Such tax exemption may not be claimed by a surviving spouse who has remarried.