Counties Cities and Towns

Friday, January 23, 2026·39m·▶ Watch / Listen

The Virginia Counties, Cities and Towns Committee advanced a broad package of housing and land-use bills — including a contested mandate requiring localities to grow housing stock by 7.5% over five years and a multifamily-by-right zoning measure — while killing a Rocky Mount town charter because counsel warned its term-limits provision violates the Virginia Constitution.

Key Actions

·HB 153 – Sound Assessment for High Energy Use FacilitiesNo Vote

+ 11 more actions

Controversies

Term limits in the Rocky Mount town charter (HB 732)

Delegate Will Davis argued the term limits provision was included at the explicit request of the mayor, town council, and town manager. Counsel countered that term limits are not allowed under the Virginia Constitution, noting the issue had been raised in previous years, and the chair stated the committee would 'struggle to move this to report this,' leading to a 17 to 1 vote to table the bill.

+ 2 more controversies

Notable Quotes

“There are concerns with adding term limits in a charter or in general law based on our constitution. This is an issue we've discussed in previous years as well, that we believe that term limits are not allowed under the Virginia Constitution.”
Counsel (name not stated on record) — Counsel's statement during consideration of HB 732, a proposed new charter for the town of Rocky Mount that included term limits requested by local officials, which led directly to the bill being tabled 17 to 1.

+ 2 more quotes

Votes

Report HB 804 (7.5% housing stock increase mandate)Passed

Report HB 816 (multifamily by-right in commercial zones) as amendedPassed

Lay HB 732 (Rocky Mount charter with term limits) on the tablePassed

Report HB 153 (sound assessment for high energy use facilities) with substitutePassed

Report HB 168 (single member districts for voting-rights court order localities) with substitutePassed

Report HB 187 (Virginia Beach charter, single member districts)Passed

Report HB 164 (remove cap on locality homeownership grants) with amendmentsPassed

Report HB 352 (affordable housing performance grant program via IDA/EDA)Passed

Report HB 552 (Williamsburg charter amendments)Passed

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TranscriptPreview

Committee will come to order. Welcome to the committee of counties, cities and towns. Plan it, Dream it, Build it. We have a number of matters before us. We will begin by taking the roll. The clerk shall open the roll. Appears we have a quorum. The clerk shall close the roll. All right. We will begin today with subcommittee reports. Subcommittee one. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair. We met this morning just before this, and we have a number of bills that came out of the committee that I'd like to report back to you. Full committee on House Bill 62. The subcommittee, which is from Delegate Moorefield and was related to a charter amendment for the town of Tazewell eliminating the requirement for the town manager to live inside the town limits. The committee recommended reporting. I'm so sorry. Could I hold on one second? All right, I apologize. Thank you for highlighting. I miss actually an administrative matter. So let me deal with that first. So first of all, House Bill 727. We have a letter that this needs to be referred to. Media. Be it easy. We are going to refer House Bill 727 to…

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