Celebrating the life of Walter Lowrie MartinIII.
Constitutional amendment (first reference);Governor's term of office. Permits a Governor elected in 2025and thereafter to succeed himself in office. The amendment allowstwo four-year terms (either in succession or not in succession) butprohibits election to a third term. Service for more than two yearsof a partial term counts as service for one term.
In-person instruction; education vouchers; emergency. Requires, in the event that any school board does not provide theoption of in-person instruction as the sole method of instruction for any enrolled student, the parent of any such student who withdraws his child from attendance to receive, upon request, an educationvoucher in an amount equal to a prorated share of the applicableStandards of Quality per-pupil state funds appropriated for publicschool purposes and apportioned to the school division, includingthe per-pupil share of state sales tax funding in basic aid and anystate per-pupil share of special education funding for which thechild is eligible, to cover the expenses of providing in-person instructionin an alternative setting. The bill permits the Department of Educationto establish rules, regulations, or procedures for the issuance ofsuch education vouchers. The bill contains an emergency clause.
Public institutions of higher education; perstudent enrollment-based funding; noncredit workforce training programs.Requires the per student enrollment-based funding provided to publicinstitutions of higher education to include funding for each Virginiastudent enrolled in a noncredit workforce training program. Undercurrent law, per student enrollment-based funding follows each Virginiaundergraduate student.
Board of Education; high school graduation requirements; certain substitutions. Requires the Board of Education, in establishing high school graduation requirements, to provide for the substitutionof computer coding course credit for any foreign language coursecredit required to graduate with a standard or advanced diploma forchildren with disabilities. Such requirement replaces a narrowerprovision in current law that requires the Board to permit a studentwho is pursuing an advanced diploma and whose individualized educationprogram specifies a credit accommodation for world language to substitutetwo standard units of credit in computer science for two standardunits of credit in a world language.
Board of Agriculture and Consumer Services;membership. Expands the Board of Agriculture and Consumer Servicesby adding as an at-large member an expert in companion animal welfarewho is employed by a releasing agency in the Commonwealth. Undercurrent law, the Board is composed of one member from each congressionaldistrict, of which there are 11, two at-large members engaged inthe application or sale of pesticides, and two ex officio members.
Individual income tax; late paymentpenalty. Provides that the Department of Taxation shall not assessa late payment penalty to the entire tax or to any unpaid balanceof the income tax owed by an individual unless and until the taxpayerfails to file his return by the time fixed by law for filing a returnor by the time prescribed pursuant to a filing extension, as applicable. Under current law, the late payment penalty is assessed at the timea return is received by the Department if payment is not made infull when due.
Victims of human trafficking; eligibility forin-state tuition. Provides that a non-Virginia student who iscurrently present in the Commonwealth as a result of being a victimof human trafficking, defined in the bill, is eligible for in-statetuition. The bill provides that a person may be a victim of humantrafficking regardless of whether any person has been charged withor convicted of any offense and that eligibility for in-state tuitionmay be proved by a certification of such status as a victim of humantrafficking by a federal, state, or local agency or not-for-profitagency, one of whose primary missions is to provide services to victimsof human trafficking. The bill also requires institutions of highereducation to automatically record such a student as opting out ofmaking any directory or educational information available to thepublic unless the student voluntarily and affirmatively chooses toopt in to allowing such directory or educational information to be made available.
Public schools; Standards of Learning assessments;reduction. Reduces the total number and type of required Standardsof Learning assessments to the minimum requirements established bythe federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, as amended.
Public education; student education accounts.Permits any school division to establish a program to create savingsaccounts for students to be used for alternative educational programs.The bill requires the Department of Education to establish policiesand procedures under which the parent of each student may use suchfunds on public or private educational programs.
Purchase, possession, or transportation of firearmsfollowing conviction for assault and battery of a family or householdmember; penalties. Prohibits a person who has been convictedof assault and battery of a family or household member from purchasing,possessing, or transporting a firearm. A person who violates thisprovision is guilty of a Class 3 misdemeanor.
Suspension or modification of sentence; transferto the Department of Corrections. Provides that if a person hasbeen sentenced for a felony to the Department of Corrections (theDepartment), the court that heard the case, if it appears compatiblewith the public interest and there are circumstances in mitigationof the offense, may, at any time before the person is transferredto the Department or regardless of whether the person has been transferredto the Department, at any time within 12 months of entry of the sentencingorder, suspend or otherwise modify the unserved portion of such asentence. Additionally, notwithstanding the foregoing, the bill providesthat for good cause shown and in the interest of justice the courtmay, at any time before the sentence has been completely served, suspend the unserved portion of any such sentence, place the personon probation for such time as the court shall determine, or otherwisemodify the sentence imposed. Current law allows such suspension ormodification of the unserved portion of a sentence only if the personhas not yet been transferred to the Department of Corrections.
