Budget Amendment yays and nays
Virginia has a new two-year state budget after the legislature reconvened last week and passed several of Governor Glenn Youngkin’s proposed amendments. Three Democrats defected and voted in favor of an amendment that restricts the number of people eligible for early release under the expanded earned sentence credits. That vote will block the early release of hundreds of individuals convicted of violent offenses. An amendment to expand the number of university-operated laboratory schools also passed with a tie-breaking vote cast by Lieutenant Governor Winsome Sears. Two Democrats voted in favor of an amendment to divert $10 million in financial aid from undocumented students to Virginia HBCUs. Amendments to create a gas tax holiday and restrict protests outside of courthouses and judges’ homes were shot down.
In brief
No new names
The Greene County Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a resolution opposing “any proposed name changes” to the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library last week, after Louisa County passed a similar resolution earlier this month. Last month, the Reclaimed Roots Descendants Alliance called on JMRL to change its name to one that does not honor enslavors. The library board of trustees will discuss a potential name change at its June 27 meeting.
Signer exposed
After 31 armed white supremacists were arrested in Idaho earlier this month, former Charlottesville mayor Mike Signer offered advice for preventing violence to WTOP last week. “You have to really creatively monitor the dark web, not just social media, like anybody can see, but the accounts that these people might have in the nooks and crannies of the internet,” Signer said. In a blog post, activist Emily Gorcenski claimed that in July 2017 she gave Signer and then-city manager Maurice Jones a dossier (available on her website) detailing violent threats made online by people affiliated with Unite the Right organizer Jason Kessler. “Mike Signer was uniquely unqualified to lead Charlottesville, and he is astonishingly unqualified to proffer any opinion on how to combat neo-Nazi threats,” wrote Gorcenski.
VDH deviates from CDC
The Virginia Department of Health now considers contracting COVID within the last six months a “recent infection”—deviating from the Centers for Disease Control, which defines a recent infection as one that occurred within the last three months. A person with a recent infection—or a vaccinated person—is not required to quarantine after being exposed to the virus. However, high-risk environments like hospitals are still advised to follow CDC guidelines.