Bacon's Rebellion

  • Confusing “Workplace Harassment” Bill is Back

    Posted on

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    James A. Bacon

    by Hans Bader

    “Old bills never die, they just wait for votes,” notes the East Bay Times. A bad bill can die in one legislative session, only to come back with a vengeance in the next session, and get passed due to more intense lobbying, or the death or retirement of opposing lawmakers.

    That may happen this year in Virginia. One example is the resurrection of a complicated and confusing workplace harassment bill I discussed last year. It died in March 2020 on a 23-to-17 vote, apparently after legislators became concerned about the strange way it defined “workplace harassment.” That bill, HB 1418, banned both “sexual harassment” and “workplace harassment” at workplaces with five or more workers. It also redefined what “harassment” means.

    That bill has now come back from the dead. It has been re-introduced in the House of Delegates as HB 2155. And a more extreme version of the bill was introduced in the state senate as SB 1360.

    These bills say “conduct may be workplace harassment regardless of whether” the “conduct occurred outside of the workplace.” And they omit the requirement that conduct be “unwelcome” before it can constitute harassment. That requirement is found in federal sexual harassment laws and court rulings. (more…)

  • Taxing the Money That Saved Virginia Jobs

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    Steve Haner

    By Steve Haner

    Concern that Virginia is seeking to tax federal pandemic relief grants to Virginia businesses – grants which kept Virginians employed — is putting a normally routine tax administration bill in jeopardy.

    The House Finance Committee on Monday approved the annual bill to bring Virginia tax law into conformity with the Internal Revenue Code effective December 31, 2020. But eight of 22 committee members voted no, and a similar division in the full House would kill the bill. The bill needs to go into effect immediately to be reflected on tax returns now being prepared, but that requires an 80% super majority.

    The Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy, joined by the National Federation of Independent Business and the Virginia Society of Certified Public Accounts, opposed one section of the bill in committee testimony (watch with the link). While Congress told businesses with PPP loans that they can deduct the wages and salaries they maintained to earn forgiveness of the loans, Virginia wants to disallow those costs as a deduction.

    That effectively taxes the forgiven loan. Consider the following simple example. (more…)

  • Virginia’s Mass Vaccination Effort and Health Facilities Inspections — Troubling Evidence

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    sherlockj

    by James C. Sherlock

    M. Norman Oliver M.D., Virginia Health Commissioner

    Updated Jan 19 at 2:55 PM

    If you’ve been wondering why Virginia has fumbled its rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine, consider this: The Virginia Department of Health. As of one week ago, the Virginia Department of Health had not yet developed a vaccination plan.

    From a presentation, “Virginia Department of Health Budget,” to Senate Finance & Appropriations Committee by State Health Commissioner M. Norman Oliver on Jan. 12, 2021:

    COVID-19 Mass Vaccination Effort

    VDH is leading a Vaccine Unit that has been formed under the Public Health Surveillance and Guidance Workgroup of the Commonwealth’s unified command structure. The Vaccine Unit is currently developing a COVID-19 vaccination plan for the Commonwealth. Additionally, a Vaccine Advisory Workgroup will be formed to provide perspective from varying points of view on actions and policies developed by VDH as it relates to COVID-19 vaccine and other vaccine-preventable diseases.

    FY21 – $30,184,899 (General Fund)
    FY22 – $59,123,029 (General Fund)

    So VDH was “currently developing a COVID 19 vaccination plan” and had not yet formed a vaccine advisory group on January 12, 2021. The citizens of Virginia have known since March of last year that the state would need a vaccination plan. (more…)

  • HB 2094 Poses a Risk to Objective Assessments of Virginia Public Schools and Students

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    sherlockj

    by James C. Sherlock

    Dungeness School House

    HB 2094, Public schools; Standards of Learning assessments poses a risk that Virginia parents will be left without an objective measure of their children’s progress in school. That is likely a risk unforeseen by its patrons.

    The bill has been introduced by Del. Israel O’Quinn, R-Bristol, with support from co-patrons Del. Jeff Campbell, R-Marion, Del. Terry Kilgore, R-Gate City, Del. Will Wampler, R-Abingdon, and Sen. Todd E. Pillion, R-Abingdon.  

    I hope that they will consider redrafting the bill to eliminate this risk.

    Current Virginia law

    “The Standards of Learning assessments administered to students in all grades three through eight shall meet but not exceed (a) reading and mathematics in grades three and four; (b) reading, mathematics, and science in grade five; (c) reading and mathematics in grades six and seven; (d) reading, writing, and mathematics in grade eight; (e) science after the student receives instruction in the grade six science, life science, and physical science Standards of Learning and before the student completes grade eight; and (f) Virginia Studies and Civics and Economics once each at the grade levels deemed appropriate by each local school board.”

    (more…)

  • Virginia’s State Health System Will Continue to Kill its Citizens If We Let It

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    sherlockj

    by James C. Sherlock

    Dr. Northam

    Virginians of every political stripe have grown very tired of watching the Northam administration obfuscate repeated, very public failures to carry out its role in protecting the health of its citizens since the onset of COVID.

    But that is an effect, not a cause, of the massive and continuing failures at the state level to protect the public health.

    A parade of failures

    The bigger problems — incompetence in the Virginia Department of Health (VDH), lack of management oversight by the Governor and his appointees and political indifference driven in part by political corruption — go back as far as I can remember.

    The very latest is COVID vaccinations. VDH has known for 9 months that it would have to lead the internal distribution within the state of vaccines and oversee a program to make sure they get into peoples arms. That is going so well that we are 48th in efficiency of vaccinations.

    Before that it was the state’s failure to read much less practice the state emergency pandemic plan that was written at federal expense by federal contractors more than a decade ago; failure to maintain the state emergency stockpile that it called for; failure to effectively inspect for hospital and nursing home pandemic readiness prior to COVID; failure to appropriately manage COVID personal protection equipment distribution; delays and corruption in the program for COVID testing in nursing homes; failure to even acknowledge the attempted hostile takeover of EVMS; failure to support Health Enterprise Zones to improve access by the poor to primary care; VDH’s use of its role in COPN to create regional hospital monopolies and restrict the number of beds; severe and very costly restriction of the establishment ambulatory surgical centers under COPN; the list goes on. (more…)

  • Court Fines and the Poverty Trap

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    James A. Bacon

    Highest Fines & Fees in Areas with Most Black Residents. Source: The Commonwealth Institute

    by James A. Bacon

    Court-imposed fines and fees set poverty traps, disproportionately burden black communities, and “affront basic notions of equal protection under the law,” asserts The Commonwealth Institute (CI), a center-left think tank, in a new report, “Set Up to Fail.”

    Fines and fees relating to traffic and criminal cases amount to less than $200 million in fiscal 2019, a modest sum in the context of Virginia’s $70 billion budget, says the report, but they lock people into cycles of debt they cannot escape. “Unpaid court debt, even when resulting from low-level offenses, often leads to additional costs, court hearings, wage garnishments, and even deductions from state tax refunds.”

    The use of fines and fees does not afflict all poor Virginians equally, contends the Institute. “Race — explicitly or implicitly — is a factor that influences the level at which fines and fees are imposed. … Fines and fees are imposed at the highest rates in areas with the largest percentages of Black Virginians.”

    I think it is fair to say that CI has highlighted a real social problem. Poor people in Virginia do get caught in cycles of fines, fees, unpaid debt, compounding interest, and second-round punishments and fees stemming from the first. In a related problem, not related in this report, courts often take away peoples’ driving licenses as punishment for their inability to repay the fines, thus hindering their ability to generate an income. But is race really a factor? CI’s case is much weaker. (more…)

  • COVID Vaccine Distribution: What Can Virginia Learn from Florida?

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    djrippert

    Image used with permission of Coastal Cloud

    Fiasco. From the start, Florida prioritized anybody 65 or older into its top tier for receiving the COVID vaccine. Virginia initially limited early access to the vaccine to those 75 and over. Last Thursday Gov Northam announced that Virginia would include people 65 and over in the current distribution of vaccines. That adds 9.5% of Virginia’s population, or 810,920 Virginians, to the “eligible now” list. What can Virginia learn from Florida about distributing the vaccines to a larger percentage of the population?

    Florida’s initial efforts to distribute the COVID vaccine were widely described as a fiasco. Newspapers featured pictures of senior citizens in long lines waiting to get vaccinated. Just registering for a vaccination appointment was chaotic. Registration call centers were overwhelmed. CNN described the registration process as haphazard. If Florida is a benchmark … Virginia will soon enter the “chaos zone.” However, there is good news from Florida that could help Virginia. A Florida based technology company, Coastal Cloud, has started managing vaccine appointments using an application built on Salesforce.Com. I interviewed the husband-and-wife team that founded Coastal Cloud yesterday and they explained how their company is helping four counties in Florida get a handle on the scheduling of COVID vaccinations. (more…)

  • The House of Delegates’ Hidden Pay Raise

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    James A. Bacon

    Like last year, members of the House of Delegates will get to pocket $211 daily per diems for attending the General Assembly — even though they’ll be sitting in virtually and incurring no meal and lodging expenses. Reports Virginia Public Media:

    The so-called “session payment” rate is pegged to federal estimates of Richmond meal and hotel prices. Unlike formal per diems normally given to lawmakers who travel to Richmond during session, the 2021 payments are subject to taxes.

    The payments are separate from part-time delegates’ annual salary ($17,640), office stipend ($15,000 for most delegates) and compensation for non-session meetings ($300 for a half-day, $400 for a full day). Each lawmaker’s legislative assistant will also collect the $211. Del. Kirk Cox (R-Colonial Heights) and Del. Nick Freitas (R-Culpeper) have declined the payments, according to Elizabeth Mancano, the House’s chief communications officer.

    In a 30-day General Assembly session, the back-door pay raise amounts to about $6,000. (more…)

  • Governor’s Spox Deflects Blame for Vaccine Rollout

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by Kerry Dougherty

    Uh-oh. Seems Virginia’s governor and his staff are a bit touchy about the commonwealth’s desultory COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

    They ought to be apologizing.

    As the rest of the country manages to open 24/7 vaccine centers, the Old Dominion — the only state with a medical doctor in the Governor’s Mansion — has fallen to 48th in the rate of vaccine use. A week ago, we were 38th.

    This is especially worrisome because, according to The Richmond Times-Dispatch, the feds will be releasing future batches of the vaccine based on how quickly the states use the ones they have.

    Lucky us.

    Northam and his minions can’t blame this on Donald Trump, either. States are in charge  of deciding how the vaccine will be administered and Virginia’s total lack of preparation is embarrassing. (more…)

  • Virginia Pay Bill Will Be a Nightmare for Some Small Employers

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by Hans Bader

    Pay regulations that are a manageable hassle for the biggest employers can be a nightmare for small employers. One example is SB 1228, a bill pending in the Virginia legislature. If enacted, it would keep employers from setting employee pay based on employees’ past wages, even though wages are usually a sign of what an employee is worth, and often reveal more about an employee’s role in a company than the employee’s mere job title reveals. It would forbid any employer in Virginia, regardless of size, to “rely on the wage history of a prospective employee” in determining the employee’s wage. It would also forbid them from seeking “the wage history of a prospective employee.”

    Since federal law permits such wage-setting, and small businesses often don’t have lawyers, some small businesses will likely get sued for violating it, before they even learn about the existence of this law.

    SB 1228 also defines certain pay differences as discrimination even when they are unlikely to be due to bias — especially when they occur at small employers, where such pay differences affect only an isolated number of employees, and thus are statistically insignificant. SB 1228 requires pay equity for businesses of all sizes, for all protected classifications — not just sex, but also marital status, religion, race, disability, etc. (more…)

  • A Last-Ditch Effort to Improve Regulatory Balance

    Posted on

    by

    Steve Haner

    By Steve Haner

    In a matter of weeks, Dominion Energy Virginia is expected to initiate the long-awaited review of its revenues, expenses, and profits in front of the State Corporation Commission, the first since 2015. A series of bills in recent years has set rules for that process which constrain the SCC’s discretion and fix the game in the utility’s favor.

    Behind the smoke and mirrors, Dominion’s goals were clearly discernable: Despite growing profits, prevent any reduction in base rates. Keep the base rates unchanged even though more and more operating costs were being moved over to activity-specific rate adjustment clauses. Limit or eliminate the threat of major refunds to customers. Somehow, every bill ended up accomplishing those things for the utility.    (more…)

  • Restructuring Higher Ed for Greater Produktivität

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    James A. Bacon

    Pre-COVID, the UVa Kaffeestunde met every week. German speakers of all levels hung out to sprechen deutsch.

    by James A. Bacon

    Last month the University of Virginia Board of Visitors approved a recommendation to eliminate the M.A. and PhD programs in the Department of Germanic Languages & Literatures. While UVa students retained a healthy appetite for learning to read and speak in German, only a few showed an interest in plumbing the depths of German literature.

    The scaling back of the German department, which offered advanced courses in such authors as Freud and Kafka last semester, was part of a larger restructuring of UVa’s graduate foreign-language program. The board also voted to eliminate the M.A. program in Italian and the B.A. in Comparative Literature.

    Whether the rollbacks result in a reduction in the number of courses, staff or expenses is as yet unknown. The University is “still assessing” the impact of the cutbacks, says spokesman Brian Coy. “Because the University makes a practice of fully supporting doctoral students, we expect the termination of the PhD in German to result in some small savings, however other changes within the department have not been made.” (more…)

  • Everything Here Is Exactly As It Seems

    Posted on

    by

    sherlockj

    James Lane
    Superintendent of Public Instruction

    by James C. Sherlock

    I just reviewed the newest Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) CYA buck- passing disguised as K-12 school reopening guidelines. Interesting.

    It consists of a page of “indicators” followed by two pages of “considerations” and then seven pages of multivariable decision matrices called “steps” which together can help produce a decision. Or not. But it is carefully tailored so that whatever decision is reached, it cannot be blamed on the VDOE.

    What could go wrong? And what would we do without a Department of Education? (more…)

  • Live by the Sword

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    sherlockj

    Del. Jerrauld C. Jones. Credit: Washington Post

    by James C. Sherlock.

    This is a follow up to Jim Bacon’s story about Levar Stoney, his contributor and city statue removal contractor, credible accusations of corruption and Attorney General Herring.

    From the Washington Washington Post:

    “In what may become a heated Democratic primary contest for Virginia attorney general, state Del. Jerrauld C. “Jay” Jones Friday attacked Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) Friday for authorizing an investigation into allegations of impropriety surrounding Richmond’s mayor — a standard move in an ongoing court case that Jones called a Trump-like abuse of power. “Using the office of the Attorney General to investigate your political opponents is the same tactic employed by Donald Trump,” Jones (D-Norfolk) said in a statement, referring to the fact that Richmond Mayor Levar A. Stoney has endorsed him, and not Herring, for the Democratic nomination for attorney general this year.”

    Welcome to the quicksand of the left, General Herring.

    You are now officially accused of abuse of public office for “authorizing an investigation” into allegations of corruption on Stoney’s part. Not indicting, investigating. As is your job. (more…)

  • Update: Herring Hands Stoney Contract Investigation to State Police

    Posted on

    by

    James A. Bacon

    by James A. Bacon

    Attorney General Mark Herring has authorized the Virginia State Police to investigate Mayor Levar Stoney’s circumvention of procurement protocols to award a $1.8 million Confederate statue-removal contract to a campaign contributor, reports Virginia Public Media.

    The investigation, requested by Kim Gray, Richmond City Councilwoman and rival candidate for Richmond mayor, had been handed to Timothy Martin, commonwealth’s attorney for August County, as special prosecutor. He kicked it over to Herring, and Herring has given it to the state police. I was concerned that Herring might simply bury the case, but I am pleased to see that he did not. (more…)

Now Available

Book cover of 'Dust Mites: A Second American Revolution' by James A. Bacon, featuring astronauts planting a flag with a blue and white emblem on a lunar landscape, with Earth visible in the background.
For sale on Amazon.com

The year: 2075. The American colonies on the Moon are getting restless under Washington’s tyrannical rule….

This second edition of “Dust Mites” has a snazzy new cover, includes helpful lunar maps, and is 5,000 words tighter than the original. The sequel, “Trogs,” is scheduled for publication this summer.

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Bacon’s Rebellion is Virginia’s leading politically non-aligned portal for news, opinions and analysis about state, regional and local public policy. Read more about us here.

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