Del. Jennifer Carroll Foy

Public institutions of higher education; eligibility for in-state tuition. Provides that any student is eligible for in-state tuition who (i) attended high school for at least two years in the Commonwealth and either (a) graduated on or after July 1, 2008, from a public or private high school or program of home instruction in the Commonwealth or (b) passed, on or after July 1, 2008, a high school equivalency examination approved by the Secretary of Education; (ii) has submitted evidence that he or, in the case of a dependent student, at least one parent, guardian, or person standing in loco parentis has filed, unless exempted by state law, Virginia income tax returns for at least two years prior to the date of registration or enrollment; and (iii) registers as an entering student or is enrolled in a public institution of higher education in the Commonwealth. The bill states that students who meet these criteria shall be eligible for in-state tuition regardless of their citizenship or immigration status, except students with currently valid visas issued under 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(F), 1101(a)(15)(H)(iii), 1101(a)(15)(J) (including only students or trainees), or 1101(a)(15)(M). Information obtained in the implementation of the provisions of the bill shall only be used or disclosed to individuals other than the student for purposes of determining in-state tuition eligibility. This bill incorporates HB 1138 and is identical to SB 935.

Coal ash ponds; well monitoring program; drinking water well testing. Requires each utility, defined in the bill as the owner or operator of a coal ash pond, to commission an independent well water test on behalf of the owner of any well located within 1.5 miles of such coal ash pond by January 1, 2021, and requires such test to be conducted once per year during each of the five years following the approval of the closure of the coal ash pond and once every five years thereafter. The bill provides that if any test exceeds groundwater quality standards for constituents associated with coal ash, the Virginia Waste Management Board shall instruct the utility to provide alternative water supplies to the owner of the well. The bill requires the Department of Environmental Quality to consider the results of the tests in its permitting, monitoring, or enforcement proceedings.

Clean Energy Advisory Board. Expands the membership of the Clean Energy Advisory Board (the Board) from 15 to 17 members. The measure specifies that one of the new members shall be an expert with experience implementing low-income and middle-income incentive and loan programs for distributed renewable energy resources and that the other new member shall be an attorney who maintains a legal practice dedicated to rural development, rural electrification, and energy policy. The measure also repeals the sunset provision for the Board, which is scheduled to expire on July 1, 2022, and directs the Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy, in consultation with the Board, to develop guidelines to administer any public power renewable grant program established by the general appropriation act.

Board of Education; school boards; dress or grooming codes.Requires the Board of Education to include in its guidelines and model policiesfor codes of student conduct (i) standards for reducing bias and harassment inthe enforcement of any code of student conduct and (ii) standards for dress orgrooming codes, which the bill defines as any practice, policy, or portion of acode of student conduct adopted by a school board that governs or restricts theattire of any enrolled student. The bill permits any school board to include inits code of student conduct a dress or grooming code. The bill prohibits anyschool board that does not include in its code of student a dress or groomingcode from subjecting a student to discipline for reasons typically assigned toa dress or grooming code. The bill requires any dress or grooming code includedin a school board's code of student conduct or otherwise adopted by a schoolboard to (a) permit any student to wear any religiously, ethnically, orculturally specific or significant head covering or hairstyle, includinghijabs, yarmulkes, headwraps, braids, locs, and cornrows; (b) maintain genderneutrality by subjecting any student to the same set of rules and standardsregardless of gender; (c) not have a disparate impact on students of aparticular gender; (d) be clear, specific, and objective and avoid anysubjective term or standard such as "distracting,""provocative," or "inappropriate"; (e) prohibit any schoolboard employee from enforcing the dress or grooming code by direct physicalcontact with a student or a student's attire; and (f) prohibit any school boardemployee from requiring a student to undress in front of any other individual,including the enforcing school board employee, to comply with the dress orgrooming code.

Worker cooperatives. Establishes worker cooperatives as a category of cooperative associations. A worker cooperative is a stock corporation that has elected to be governed by provisions established by this measure, which include (i) conducting its business primarily for the mutual benefit of its members, (ii) allowing only current and retired employees to be members, (iii) limiting voting rights to current employees, (iv) providing that each employee is entitled to one vote, (v) prohibiting any person from owning more than one membership share, (vi) requiring at least two-thirds of employees to own membership shares, and (vii) requiring that net earnings be paid or credited to members in accordance with the ratio that each member's amount of work performed during a period bears to the total amount of work performed by all members during that period.

Juvenile and domestic relations district court; intake. Makes various changes to the intake procedures for the domestic relations district court, including (i) providing that, if a juvenile is alleged to be a truant, the intake officer may defer filing a petition in order to develop and allow the juvenile to complete a truancy plan or program; (ii) changing the notice requirement for circumstances under which informal action has been taken on a complaint alleging that a juvenile is in need of services, in need of supervision, or delinquent so that the intake officer advises the juvenile and his parents that any subsequent complaint may result in the filing of a petition with the court; and (iii) adding possession of alcohol to the existing offense of possession of marijuana for which, if charged by summons, a juvenile is entitled to have the charge referred to intake for consideration of informal proceedings.

Financing clean energy projects. Authorizesthe Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy to sponsor a statewideclean energy financing program. The Department shall engage a privateentity through a competitive selection process to develop and administerthe program.

Electric utilities; fuel cost recovery. Requires an electric utility, as a condition of approval of any request by an electric utility for recovery through its fuel factor of costs incurred under a natural gas capacity contract not previously subject to review in a fuel factor case, to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the utility has (i) determined that the utility cannot meet its service obligations, giving due regard, in the Commission's sole discretion, to reliability of service and the need to maintain reliable sources of supply, without an additional fuel resource; (ii) reasonably identified and determined the date and amount of the new fuel resource it needs; (iii) objectively studied available alternative fuel resource options, as verified by the Commission, including options other than a new natural gas capacity contract or contracts to meet the identified and determined need; and (iv) determined that the natural gas capacity contract or contracts are the lowest-cost available option, taking into consideration fixed and variable costs and a reasonable projection of utilization.

Public utilities; use of small, women-owned, or minority-owned business. Provides that in any proceeding in which the State Corporation Commission is required to determine whether costs incurred by a public utility in its delivery or provision of any goods or service are reasonable or prudent, the incremental portion of the costs incurred as a result of its contracting with a small, women-owned, or minority-owned business to deliver or provide the goods or service will not be found to be unreasonable or imprudently incurred if the costs of contracting with the small, women-owned, or minority-owned business do not exceed, by more than three percent, the costs that would have been incurred had it used the lowest-cost qualified business. The measure applies to businesses that are certified as small, women-owned, or minority-owned by the Department of Small Business and Supplier Diversity.

State Corporation Commission; retirement of coal-fired or natural gas-fired electric generation facilities. Requires the State Corporation Commission to determine the amortization period for recovery of any appropriate costs due to the early retirement of any coal-fired or natural gas-fired electric generation facilities owned or operated by any Phase I or Phase II Utility. The bill requires the Commission, in making such determination, to (i) perform an independent analysis of the remaining undepreciated capital costs; (ii) establish a recovery period that best serves ratepayers; and (iii) allow for the recovery of any carrying costs that the Commission, in its sole discretion, deems appropriate.