Local Dels. Rip Sullivan (D-McLean-Arlington) and Marcus Simon (D-McLean) have introduced a host of bills for consideration in this year’s 46-day General Assembly session, which kicked off Jan. 11.
Much of the legislation patroned by the duo likely will face an uphill battled in the Republican-controlled House of Delegates. But the survivors may have make it to the desk of Gov. Youngkin, as the state Senate is in Democratic hands.
The pair’s legislation likely will face more of a challenge in the Republican-controlled House of Delegates and find a warmer reception in the state Senate, where Democrats hold sway.
These are some of the bills filed by Sullivan, who first was elected in 2014:
• HB 1579 would prohibit people from purchasing or transporting a handgun if they had been convicted twice within a five-year period of misdemeanor offenses for driving or voting while intoxicated.
• HB 1581 would require parties in petitions involving contests over child custody, visitation or support to show proof they have attended an educational seminar or similar program conducted by a qualified person or organization.
• HB 1582 would provide compensation to David Wayne Kingrea, who was wrongly convicted of indecent liberties with a minor.
• HB 1583 would make it illegal to secretly peep or spy into buildings, structures and enclosures occupied or intended for occupancy, or attempt to do so. The bill also would prohibit intentionally using an electronic device to do so. Current law prohibits such activities only if the person or electronic device enters upon another’s property.
• HB 1584 would set standards for the storage, preservation and retention of biological evidence in felony cases. If those standards were not followed, courts could grant new trials, dismiss charges, reduce sentences, vacate convictions or find that the evidence could have been exculpatory.
• HB 1585 would make it a Class 1 misdemeanor for unauthorized people to wear hard body armor except on their own private property.
• HB 1586 would require paying people wrongfully incarcerated on felony charges at least $25,000 per year for each year they were imprisoned after being sentenced to death, served on parole or post-release supervision, or had to register on the Sex Offender and Crimes Against Minors Registry.
• HB 1588 would create the Electric Vehicle Rural Infrastructure Program and Fund to aid private developers with non-utility costs associated with the installation of electric-vehicle-charging stations. The program would be limited to $25 million worth of grants each fiscal year.
• HB 1888 would require a seller’s written, informed consent before a real-estate settlement agent could collect fees from the seller.
Here is some of the legislation submitted by Simon, who first was elected in 2013:
• HB 1552 would prohibit people from converting contributions to a candidate or his or her campaign committee for personal use.
• HB 1697 would remove the city of Falls Church charter requirement that board and commission members be qualified voters and instead require them to be at least 18 years old. The city-residence requirement would remain.
• HB 1698 would exempt from required Board of Education licensing any child-day program offered by a local school division that operates no more than four hours per day on full instructional days or for more than four hours per day on shortened instructional days or non-instructional days.
The program would have to be staffed by local school-division employees and attended by children who are at least 3 years old and enrolled in public school or a preschool program within the school division.
• HB 1837 would prohibit property-owner and unit-owner associations from using a nominating committee or similar entity to solicit, nominate, select or appoint a member or unit owner or reject an otherwise qualified member or unit owner for a position on the association’s board of directors or executive board.
• HB 2349 would prohibit any citizen, commonwealth’s attorney or city attorney from instituting an adjudication proceeding concerning the obscenity of a sold or commercially distributed book or motion picture in the circuit court of the city or county where such sale or distribution of the product occurs.
• HB 2350 would require people who possess a firearm in a residence where they know or reasonably should know that a minor under 18 years old is present to store such the weapon unloaded in a locked container, compartment or cabinet and store all ammunition in a separate locked container, compartment or cabinet. The key or combination to such locked areas would need to be inaccessible to minors.
• HJ 488 would designate October in 2023 and in each succeeding year as Dyslexia Awareness Month in Virginia.
• HJ 508 would request that the Department of Health and the Department of Education study medical forms and medical-information collection by summer camps and similar programs and determine the viability of a standardized medical-information form for such programs. The bill also encourages the agencies to explore possibilities for streamlining the collection of medical information for such programs and create a draft universal form for potential use by such programs.
The Sun Gazette previously has detailed legislation submitted by other Northern Virginia delegation members. The only local legislator who has not filed bills yet is Del. Holly Seibold (D-Oakton-Vienna), who won a Jan. 10 special election to serve the remaining term of former Del. Mark Keam (D), who resigned last September to work in the Biden administration.