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ACROSS SESSIONS
- Subject Index: Since 1995
- Bills & Resolutions: Since 1994
- Summaries: Since 1994
Developed and maintained by the Division of Legislative Automated Systems.
2019 SESSION
Chairman: Stephen D. Newman
Clerk: Patty Lung
Staff: Thomas Stevens
Date of Meeting: January 31, 2019
Time and Place: 8:00 a.m. - Senate Room A, Pocahontas Bldg.
Patron: Chase
School calendar; opening day of the school year. Makes local school boards responsible for setting the school calendar and determining the opening day of the school year and eliminates the post-Labor Day opening requirement and "good cause" scenarios for which the Board of Education may grant waivers of this requirement. The bill requires local school boards that set the school calendar with a pre-Labor Day opening date, except those schools that were granted a "good cause" waiver for the 2018-2019 school year, to close all schools in the division from (i) the Thursday immediately preceding Labor Day through Labor Day or (ii) the Friday immediately preceding Labor Day through the Tuesday immediately succeeding Labor Day.
Patron: Marsden
Industrial hemp; definition; exclusion from certain marijuana provisions. Includes in the definition of "industrial hemp" any compound, manufacture, salt, derivative, mixture, or preparation of the plant Cannabis sativa, its seeds, or its resin that contains a concentration of tetrahydrocannabinol that is no greater than that allowed by federal law. The bill excludes industrial hemp from various provisions related to marijuana, including from Schedule I of the Drug Control Act.
Patron: Howell
School calendar; opening day of the school year. Provides that the local school board of a school division located in Planning District 8 shall be responsible for setting the school calendar and determining the opening day of the school year.
Patron: Favola
School calendar; opening day of the school year. Provides that the local school board of a school division located in Planning District 8 shall be responsible for setting the school calendar and determining the opening day of the school year.
Patron: Cosgrove
Certificate of public need; definition of "medical care facility." Adds to the list of medical care facilities for which a certificate of public need is required any facility that has common ownership with an affiliated licensed hospital located within 35 miles of the facility and that includes, as part of the facility, a dedicated emergency department as defined in 42 C.F.R. § 489.24(b) that is subject to the requirements of the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act.
Patron: Locke
School resource officers; training and certification; memoranda of understanding. Requires each school resource officer to be trained and certified by the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety. The bill expands the topics on which school security officers are required to be trained. The bill also requires any school board that agrees to place school resource officers in any school in the school division and the relevant local law-enforcement agency to establish and annually review and update a memorandum of understanding (MOU) governing the use and duties of school resource officers, and ensure that all relevant parties receive initial and ongoing training on the contents of such MOU.
Patron: Petersen
Public high schools; graduation requirements; credit for work-based learning experiences. Requires the Board of Education in its graduation requirements to permit students in locally approved internships, externships, apprenticeships, credentialing programs, certification programs, licensure programs, and other work-based learning experiences to receive credit, up to a full course load, based on time spent in such programs. The bill also requires the Board to permit students in grade twelve to earn the equivalent of a full course load and to substitute each credit earned in such a program for a standard unit of credit in English, mathematics, science, or history and social science.
Patron: Newman
School boards; local law-enforcement agencies; memorandums of understanding. Requires the school board in each school division in which the local law-enforcement agency employs school resource officers to enter into a memorandum of understanding with such local law-enforcement agency that sets forth the powers and duties of the school resource officers. The bill requires each such school board and local law-enforcement agency to review and amend or affirm the memorandum at least once every five years.
Patron: Chase
School holidays; certain election days. Prohibits local school boards from requiring students to attend school on the second Tuesday in June or the Tuesday after the first Monday in November. The bill also prohibits parent-teacher conferences and meetings from being held on those dates.
Patron: Cosgrove
Length of school term; waiver for evacuation. Requires the Board of Education to waive the requirement that school divisions provide additional teaching days or teaching hours to compensate for school closings resulting from an evacuation directed and compelled by the Governor. The bill provides that there shall be no proportionate reduction in the amount paid by the Commonwealth from the Basic School Aid Fund or the amount paid by a local governing body.
Patron: Barker
Certificate of public need; nursing homes and hospitals; disaster exemption. Provides for a 30-day exemption from the requirement to obtain a certificate of public need for an increase in the total number of beds in nursing homes or hospitals if the State Health Commissioner has determined that a natural or man-made disaster has caused the evacuation of nursing homes or hospitals and that a public health emergency exists due to a shortage of nursing home or hospital beds.
Patron: Barker
Public schools; kindergarten instructional time. Increases from 540 hours to 990 hours the minimum instructional hours in a school year for students in kindergarten. The bill directs the Board of Education to promulgate regulations by July 1, 2021, establishing standards for accreditation that include a requirement that the standard school day for students in kindergarten average at least 5.5 instructional hours in order to qualify for full accreditation. The bill has a delayed effective date of July 1, 2021.
Patron: Barker
School resource officers; training and certification; memoranda of understanding. Requires each school resource officer to be trained and certified by the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety. The bill expands the topics on which school security officers are required to be trained. The bill also requires any school board that agrees to place school resource officers in any school in the school division and the relevant local law-enforcement agency to establish and annually review and update a memorandum of understanding (MOU) governing the use and duties of school resource officers, and ensure that all relevant parties receive initial and ongoing training on the contents of such MOU.
Patron: Stanley
Modernization of public school buildings and facilities. Establishes standards for the design, construction, maintenance, and operation of public school buildings and facilities and allows for a local school division to enter into a lease agreement with a private entity to meet such standards. The bill would allow for net energy metering in public school buildings and facilities. The bill would also authorize the Virginia Resources Authority to provide partial funding for school modernization projects, effective January 1, 2020.
Patron: Wagner
Facilities providing imaging services; shared savings; exemption from certificate of public need. Provides that a certificate of public need shall not be required for the addition of certain imaging services or for the addition by an existing facility of certain new imaging equipment, provided that the medical care facility complies with quality of care standards and charity care requirements established by the Board of Health. The measure also requires health carriers to establish a comparable imaging service incentive program, subject to approval by the Commissioner of Insurance, under which incentives are offered to a covered person who elects to receive a covered imaging service from a lower-cost provider. The measure requires health carriers to make available an interactive mechanism on their website that enables a covered person to compare costs between providers in-network, calculate estimated out-of-pocket costs, and obtain quality data for those providers, to the extent available.
Patron: Wagner
Certificate of public need. Repeals the certificate of public need program.
Patron: McClellan
Public high schools; clock hours of instruction; experienced-based learning. Requires the Board of Education, in establishing high school graduation requirements, to permit time spent by students in locally approved courses aligned with the Standards of Learning, service learning opportunities, internships, externships, apprenticeships, credentialing programs, certification programs, licensure programs, and other work-based learning experiences, to be included in the 140 clock hours of instruction required for the relevant course.
Patron: Carrico
Public schools; electives on the Hebrew Scriptures/Old Testament and the New Testament. Requires local school boards to offer as an elective in grades nine through 12 with appropriate credits toward graduation a course on the Hebrew Scriptures/Old Testament of the Bible or the New Testament of the Bible or a combined course on both. The bill requires the Board of Education to develop Standards of Learning and curriculum guidelines for such courses. The bill provides that the purpose of such courses is to introduce students to biblical content, characters, poetry, and narratives that are prerequisites to understanding contemporary society and culture, including literature, art, music, mores, oratory, and public policy. The bill prohibits students from being required to use a specific translation of a religious text when taking the courses and provides that such courses shall maintain religious neutrality and shall not endorse, favor, promote, disfavor, or show hostility toward any particular religion or nonreligious perspective.
Patron: Carrico
University of Virginia's College at Wise; reduced rate tuition. Permits the board of visitors of the University of Virginia to charge reduced rate tuition to any student enrolled at the University of Virginia's College at Wise who resides in the Appalachian Region as defined in relevant federal law, is domiciled in the Appalachian Region, and is entitled to in-state tuition charges at a public institution of higher education in the Appalachian Region. The bill contains an emergency clause.
EMERGENCY
Patron: Ruff
Dual enrollment and graduation requirements; postsecondary credential, certification, or license attainment. Requires local school boards and comprehensive community colleges to enter into dual enrollment agreements for postsecondary credential, certification, or license attainment concurrent with a high school diploma. The bill also requires the Board of Education to include in its graduation requirements provisions for the award of standard units of credit for successfully completing such a program at a comprehensive community college through a dual enrollment agreement.
Patron: Sturtevant
Certificate of public need; psychiatric beds and facilities. Repeals the requirement for a certificate of public need for certain projects involving mental hospitals or psychiatric hospitals and intermediate care facilities established primarily for the medical, psychiatric, or psychological treatment and rehabilitation of individuals with substance abuse. The bill creates a new permitting process for such projects, exempted from the certificate of public need process, that requires the Commissioner of Health to issue a permit upon the agreement of the applicant to certain charity care conditions and quality of care standards.
Patron: Deeds
Department of Criminal Justice Services; school resource officers; school administrators; training. Directs the Department of Criminal Justice Services (Department) to establish compulsory minimum training standards for law-enforcement officers serving as school resource officers that may include (i) relevant state and federal laws; (ii) school and personal liability issues; (iii) security awareness in the school environment; (iv) mediation and conflict resolution, including de-escalation techniques; (v) disaster and emergency response; (vi) awareness of cultural diversity and implicit bias; (vii) working with students with disabilities, behavioral health or substance abuse disorders, or trauma experiences; and (viii) student behavioral dynamics, including child and adolescent development. The bill also directs the Department, in consultation with the Department of Education and the Virginia State Crime Commission, to include such similar minimum training standards for school security officers. The bill requires each school board to ensure that every public school employs at least one school administrator who has attended school safety training conducted by the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety in school safety, anti-bullying tactics, and effective identification of students who may be at risk for violent behavior and are in need of special services or assistance.
Patron: Vogel
Music therapy. Requires the Board of Medicine to regulate the practice of music therapy and to set requirements for licensure to practice music therapy. The bill establishes the Advisory Board on Music Therapy to assist the Board of Medicine in such regulation.
Patron: Surovell
School resource officers; memorandums of understanding. Requires the school board in each school division in which the local law-enforcement agency employs school resource officers to enter into a memorandum of understanding with such local law-enforcement agency that sets forth the respective roles and responsibilities of the school board and the law-enforcement agency and the roles and responsibilities of such school resource officers. The bill requires that the memorandum of understanding be consistent with the model memorandum of understanding developed by the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety. The bill requires that the model memorandum contain provisions that prohibit school resource officers from (i) conducting a search of a student's person or property while on school property unless such resource officer has probable cause to conduct such a search and either has a judicial warrant authorizing the search or has identified exigent circumstances necessitating a warrantless search; (ii) participating in any request for assistance from a federal agency without a subpoena or warrant; (iii) inquiring as to whether a student was born in a country other than the United States or is a citizen of a country other than the United States, unless such inquiry is in connection with an kidnapping or extortion investigation; and (iv) absent exigent circumstances, questioning any student without prior notification to the parent or guardian of such student's right to refuse to be questioned or searched. The bill also provides that the model memorandum of understanding shall contain provisions regarding the use of translators or appropriate guardians to assist students in responding to questions from a school resource officer. The bill requires each such school board and local law-enforcement agency to review the memorandum of understanding every four years or at any time upon request of either party and provides that the memorandum of understanding may be revised as agreed to by the parties. The bill provides that such memorandum shall be made available for public review and comment at least 30 days prior to its adoption. The bill also redefines school resource officer to specifically prohibit a school resource officer from investigating or enforcing violations of school board policies, including student conduct codes.
Patron: Lewis
School boards; local law-enforcement agencies; memorandums of understanding. Requires the school board in each school division in which the local law-enforcement agency employs school resource officers to enter into a memorandum of understanding with such local law-enforcement agency that sets forth the respective roles and responsibilities of the school board and the law-enforcement agency and the roles and responsibilities of such school resource officers. The bill requires each such school board and local law-enforcement agency to (i) review the memorandum of understanding every two years or at any time upon the request of either party and may revise such memorandum at any time as agreed by the parties and (ii) ensure that all relevant personnel employed by either party are informed of and review the provisions of the memorandum of understanding, including any revisions to the memorandum of understanding. The bill also requires the Virginia Center for School and Campus Safety to develop a model memorandum of understanding that may be used by local school boards and local law-enforcement agencies to satisfy the new requirements put forth in the bill.
Patron: Ebbin
Teacher licensure; exemption for certain teachers. Permits any school board to employ any individual, who is employed by an accredited institution of higher education as an instructor, to teach career and technical education courses or dual enrollment courses in the local school division, regardless of whether such individual holds a license issued by the Board of Education.
Patron: McDougle
Certificates of public need. Exempts specialized centers or clinics or that portion of a doctor's office established for the provision of ambulatory or outpatient ophthalmic, urologic, or endoscopic surgery from the definition of medical care facility and creates a new permitting process for projects involving specialized centers or clinics or that portion of a doctor's office established for the provision of ophthalmic surgery and services.
Patron: Boysko
Eligibility for in-state tuition; certain individuals who have applied for permanent residency.
Patron: Boysko
Menstrual supplies; certain school buildings.
Patron: Boysko
School boards; prospective school security officers; background investigation.
Patron: Vogel
School bus operators; training. Requires the Board of Education to include in its training program for school bus operators safety protocols for responding to adverse weather conditions, unsafe conditions during loading and unloading of students, students on the wrong bus, and other circumstances, as determined by the Board, where student safety is at risk.
Patron: Black
Standards of Quality; reading diagnostic tests. Requires that the first reading diagnostic test administered in the school year to a student in kindergarten through grade three include a rapid automatized naming component and that local school divisions report the results of reading diagnostic tests, including subset scores, to parents.
Patron: Barker
Certificate of public need; certain nursing facilities in a continuing care retirement community; nursing home bed cap. Changes from 10 percent of a nursing facility to the lesser of 25 percent of a nursing facility or 15 nursing home beds the cap on nursing home beds that are eligible for medical assistance in certain nursing facilities in Planning District 8 in a continuing care retirement community that may be certified to participate in the state program for medical assistance without regard to a certificate of public need.
Patron: Newman
Standards of Learning Innovation Committee; conflicts of interest; repeal. Provides that in addition to any conflict of interest prohibited by the State and Local Government Conflict of Interests Act, no person shall serve as a nonlegislative citizen member or as the chair of the Standards of Learning Innovation Committee if he has a personal interest in a contract with a school board. Under current law, the State and Local Government Conflict of Interests Act prohibits a person from serving on the Committee if he has a personal interest in a contract or other conflict of interest with the Board of Education. The bill repeals the Standards of Learning Innovation Committee effective January 1, 2020.
Patron: Lucas
Medicaid Supplemental Payment Program Fund. Establishes the Medicaid Supplemental Payment Program Fund (the Fund). The bill requires the Department of Medical Assistance Services to accept and to pay into the Fund, from any county, city, or town provider, assessment funds that have been collected, pursuant to an ordinance, from inpatient hospitals authorized to receive Medicaid supplemental payments pursuant to the State Plan for Medical Assistance Services amendments 11-018 and 11-019.
Patron: DeSteph
School boards; race and ethnicity data. Prohibits a local school board from using a student's race or ethnicity information for any purpose other than compliance with federal law, when the local school board requires a student or his parent to disclose such information and because of such federal law does not give an option for the student or his parent to designate "other" for the student's race or ethnicity. The bill also requires that for the purposes of a student's permanent record each local school board shall obtain information related to such student's race or ethnicity in a manner that provides such option to designate "other."
Patron: DeSteph
Diagnostic X-ray machines; operation. Provides that no person who has been trained and certified in the operation of a diagnostic X-ray machine by the manufacturer of such machine is required to obtain any other training, certification, or licensure or be under the supervision of a person who has obtained training, certification, or licensure to operate such a diagnostic X-ray machine, provided that (i) such diagnostic X-ray machine (a) is registered and certified by the Department of Health, (b) is being operated to conduct a body composition scan, and (c) is not operated to determine bone density or in the diagnosis or treatment of a patient and (ii) the subject of the body composition scan is notified of the risks associated with exposure to radiation emitted by the diagnostic X-ray machine.
Patron: Boysko
Board of Pharmacy; two-year pilot; controlled substance tracking system. Directs the Board of Pharmacy (Board) to conduct a two-year pilot program beginning September 1, 2019, for the development, management, use, and evaluation of a controlled substance tracking system using dispenser data compliant with the federal Drug Supply Chain Security Act. The bill requires each pharmacy permitted in the Commonwealth to participate in the program and to collect and report certain data to the Board. The Board is required to provide access to the reported information to state and federal law-enforcement agencies having jurisdiction over prescription drug law enforcement. The bill authorizes the Board to enter into agreements with the Department of Health and the Department of State Police to implement the program and requires a final report by October 31, 2021, to the Governor's Advisory Commission on Opioids and Addiction and to the Chairmen of the House Committee on Health, Welfare and Institutions and the Senate Committee on Education and Health. Finally, the bill requires the Board to promulgate regulations to implement the provisions of the program to be effective no later than September 1, 2019.
Patron: Dunnavant
Health regulatory boards; conversion therapy. Directs the Board of Counseling, the Board of Medicine, the Board of Nursing, the Board of Psychology, and the Board of Social Work to each promulgate regulations or guidance documents defining conversion therapy and the unprofessional conduct in the practice of conversion therapy with any person under 18 years of age. The bill requires such regulations or guidance documents to ensure any interventions in such practice are patient-centered and align with relevant primary sources or policy statements from the relevant professional association.
Patron: Newman
Health regulatory boards; conversion therapy. Directs the Board of Counseling, the Board of Medicine, the Board of Nursing, the Board of Psychology, and the Board of Social Work to each promulgate regulations prohibiting the use of electroshock therapy, aversion therapy, or other physical treatments in the practice of conversion therapy with any person under 18 years of age.