The Labor and Commerce Subcommittee #2 advanced a sweeping public-sector collective bargaining bill and several worker-protection measures — including whistleblower expansion, veteran claims protections, pay transparency, and immigration-status coercion prohibitions — while tabling a cash-acceptance mandate and carrying over two bills to 2027.
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Dylan Bishop (Virginia Government Employees Association) argued against the bill citing a $3.2 billion budget shortfall attributable to Medicaid expenses alone and a fiscal impact of 'almost $90 million,' proposing modernizing job classifications for $500,000 as a prudent first step instead. Delegate Lavar Boland countered that the bill is 'about affordability, plain and simple' for workers and characterized opposition as choosing government bureaucracy over workers' voices.
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“The Virginia General assembly passed a joint resolution prohibiting the state from recognizing public sector unions after black nurses at the University of Virginia tried to organize. Right. And we are here in 2026 and we have to right that wrong. The bill is not just about economic justice, but it's also about racial justice.”
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Sign in to subscribeGood afternoon, everybody. We have a hefty docket that we want to try to get through as quickly as possible. We're going to move things around a little bit in the. In the queue for bills. I'd like to begin with Delegate Tranquility and her bill. Let me pull it up here, make sure I have the right one on collective bargaining. 1263. Delegate Tran. Thank you so much. Mr. Chair and members of the committee. I do have a substitute from the introduced bill. It's been online this afternoon and I had a chance to give everybody a hard copy, but if we could please move the substitute. I moved, second moved and seconded. The substitute is before us. These. The substitute, I just want to say, provides some technical clarifications about the intent of the bill, such as correcting the deadline years for implementation, related matters to 2026, exempting workers, personal cell phone from FOIA disclosure, those types of things. If you're particularly interested in the handful of changes we had, and I'll ask council to walk us through that, but otherwise, if you are okay, Mr. Chair, I would like to present the bill. Yes, ma'. Am.…
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