February 26, 2024 Newsletter
Dear friends,
This week’s newsletter provides updates about my legislation and highlights select meetings from this past week. Thank you for reading and staying informed.
Legislative Updates
Last week was productive at the General Assembly. Four of my bills passed the House floor and are now on their way to the Governor’s desk. Four other bills also made progress through committees. These are the bills that have passed the House:
SB232 provides protections for tenants in mobile/manufactured home parks. It ensures that these tenants have rights similar to tenants in other situations such as apartment communities. This bill passed with strong bipartisan support with a vote of 65-34.
SB 235 also passed the House with bipartisan support, on a 53-46 vote. The legislation restates the distinction between parental notification and book bans in school libraries. In 2022, one of my Republican colleagues passed the same legislation, with strong backing from the Youngkin administration. However, the clarifying language about prohibiting book bans was placed in an enactment clause. My bill now places that clarifying language directly into legislation itself and is meant to be a safeguard against the book banning and censorship actions that we have seen some school boards take in certain localities.
SB 236 will help our academic researchers gather useful and critical information about the crisis of eviction in Virginia. For the past several decades, five of the nation’s top ten cities experiencing high rates of eviction are in Virginia. Better information leads to better community resources and improved policies to help address eviction concerns. This bill passed the House on a 51-49 party-line vote. The legislation allows full-time faculty members of baccalaureate public institutions of higher education to request aggregated, nonconfidential case data on evictions. The party-line vote is an odd one. Effective data gathering ought not to be a partisan issue.
SB 239 is the Social Work Licensure Compact, and this bill passed the House with strong bipartisan support on a 91-6 vote. The bill authorizes the Commonwealth of Virginia to become a part of a new interstate Compact that enables licensed social workers to apply for multistate licenses, allowing them to practice in other compact-member states. The Compact takes effect when it is enacted by seven member states. Joining the Social Work Licensure Compact will help to provide critical mental health and support resources in Virginia.
Here are updates on a few other bills that the House considered this past week:
- Sadly, SB 229 was carried over to 2025 by the House Rules committee. This bill directed the State Health Commissioner to create a work group to assess the feasibility and make recommendations for the infrastructure of an Advisory Council on Breakthrough Therapies for Veteran Suicide Prevention. While similar legislation is working through federal channels, the inability of Congress to pass meaningful legislation places an urgency on us at the state level. It was my hope that we would be able to deliver life-saving medications in a thoughtful and regulated manner to our military veterans facing severe depression and PTSD. I will be bringing the bill back next year, working again with Reason for Hope, the advocacy group that supports veterans’ access to therapeutic medications.
- On Thursday, SB 231, also known as the Cover All Kids bill, made it through the House Social Services subcommittee on a 5-2 vote. Cover All Kids aims to implement a comprehensive healthcare coverage program for all children in the Commonwealth regardless of documentation status. As it stands now, 88,000 children across the Commonwealth currently do not have access to healthcare coverage. Many of these children cannot access coverage due to immigration status, literacy barriers, and bureaucracy. Cover All Kids would help provide healthcare coverage to this vulnerable population, strengthening protections and leading to better outcomes for Virginia’s children. The bill has now been referred to the House Committee on Appropriations.
- SB 237, also known as the Right to Contraception bill, made it through the House Health and Human Services committee on a 12-8 vote. The Right to Contraception Bill codifies the right to obtain contraception in Virginia. We have seen and continue to see many attacks on the right to reproductive and contraceptive care around the country following the disastrous Supreme Court Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade. It is vitally important that we prioritize the protection of these rights in the Commonwealth in response.
- SB 276 was re-referred to House Appropriations by the Rules committee on Friday morning. SB 276 directs the State Corporation Commission to convene a work study group that will study the feasibility of implementing an energy upgrade program for eligible customers.
- SB277 was also re-referred to House Appropriations by the Rules committee on Friday morning. The bill instructs the Board of Health to convene the State Health Services Plan Task Force to make recommendations on the expedited review of clinical projects that are subject to the Certificate of Public Need (COPN) requirements.
Town Hall: Proposed Chesterfield Peaker Plant
Yesterday afternoon, I hosted a community town hall with invited guest speakers from Dominion Energy and environmental organizations on the proposed natural gas peaker plant in Chesterfield County. Over one-hundred community members came to hear presentations from our speakers, ask questions, and connect with local and state representatives. A recording of the town hall is available here, as well as the presentations from Friends of Chesterfield and Dominion Energy.
Select Community Events and Meetings
This week, my team and I met with several groups and individuals who visited the General Assembly. Here are a few highlights:
I had the chance to speak with the Virginia Government Employee Association to learn more about the challenges facing our state agencies, including staffing shortages, competition with the private sector for skilled and talented employees, wages, and more. Our government employees are the backbone of the Commonwealth, and we must address the issues of recruitment and retention.
I also met with advocates from the Fund our Schools coalition to discuss the legislature’s efforts to provide more effective and much-needed funding for our public schools.
Later that morning, I was delighted to welcome advocates from Edu Futuro to learn about their educational priorities and the challenges that their students face.
My staff welcomed students from DECA for their day of action. This young group highlighted priorities that impact their educational experiences.
My office was also pleased to welcome the Mech Tech Dragons from Maggie Walker Governor’s School for their advocacy day. Their success highlights the potential our students can achieve with STEM programs based in the real world.
This past week, I also joined LEGO for its Learning Playground event that highlighted how the company’s educational programs are impacting children as they learn through play. I also represented the Senate in a heated robotics competition between the two Chambers. I’m delighted to report that the Senate prevailed!
My staff met with advocates from YWCA Richmond for its day of action and learned more about the outstanding programs provided by our YWCA partners in the area.
I ended my week by visiting our Senate Pages to discuss my experiences as a state senator and to answer our Page’s thoughtful questions. This year’s cohort of exceptional and talented young people has been a delight to watch over the course of the Session. They have learned so much and have grown in confidence and maturity over the past several weeks.
Connecting With My Office
My office can be reached at the following:
Email: SenatorHashmi@senate.virginia.gov
Phone: 804.698.7515
If you were forwarded this email, you can sign up to receive my office’s weekly newsletter here.
— Ghazala
