The House Appropriations Committee advanced HB 29, the caboose budget bill for the remainder of the current biennium, with nine amendments — most notably replacing Governor Youngkin's 2% employee bonus with a $1,500 flat bonus and swapping his tax conformity language with Delegate Vivian E. Watts's HB 977. The bill passed 15 to 7 over the objection of at least one named member who opposed the redistricting and election schedule provisions.
[Doug Gawala] opposed the measure, arguing that the 2019 redistricting commission was supposed to handle such matters and that Virginia should act the proper way, and asked the committee to vote against the bill. No named member explicitly rebutted his statement on the record. The bill passed 15 to 7, indicating at least 7 members voted against, but no additional named dissenters are identified in the transcript.
“We had the 2019 redistricting commission that was supposed to handle all this matter and we're not acting like D.C. it's, this is Virginia. And I want to reemphasize we do it the proper way and I vote or I ask that our committee vote against this measure.”
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Sign in to subscribeGood afternoon, everyone. Thank you for your presence here. We open roll for attendance. Okay, you can close the roll. Thank you. We have before us House Bill 29. Ann. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. As you mentioned, you're here today to adopt amendments to House Bill 29, the caboose bill, which is the budget for the remainder of the biennium that ends on June 30. As introduced, it included the revenue changes emanating from the annual fall revenue forecast, as well as 15 spending and 15 savings amendments that had been proposed by Governor Youngkin. At the close of the biennium, more than $2.3 billion is carried forward to address budgetary needs in the upcoming biennium. In terms of changes to the bill, there are nine amendments and nine amendments only before you today. The first makes the adjustments to the front page, which is the enumeration of all the resources resulting from the federal tax conformity bill, which is included in Part five. Second, there is language relating to the Department of Election that delays the July 1 reporting deadline for the elect audits that were set to be due then under legislation passed in 2022. This would delay…
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