Officials share their victories, priorities from this legislative session

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This morning the Prince William Chamber of Commerce hosted their annual Legislative Wrap-Up breakfast in Woodbridge.

The breakfast was an opportunity for members of the chamber, business owners and elected officials to interact with one another and speak about issues that impact residents in Prince William and Manassas.

Each year, the chamber issues a legislative report card to each of the county’s elected officials, giving them a grade of A to F – based on their voting record in Richmond, and how well it aligns with the chamber’s business platforms.

During the program, two longtime incumbents – Senator Chuck Colgan and Senator Toddy Puller – were both commended for their service to the state. Both will be retiring this year.

House of Delegates

Delegate Bob Marshall, delegate for the 13^th district – who received an A grade – spoke about his bill to push for more privacy, which passed.

“I authored a bill which [was] an invasion of privacy bill. You should need a warrant if you’re going to enforce the Fourth Amendment provisions in the Virginia Constitution in regards to privacy of citizens…I want police to have the tools that they need to protect us, but I also want those who are using those tool to follow the procedures to protect our liberties,” said Marshall.

Delegate Jackson Miller, delegate from the 50^th district – who received an A grade – pointed out that the Republicans were the group looking out for the businesses interests that are key to the chamber.

“[The Republican Caucus] is the pro-business group in the Commonwealth of Virginia. We are the reason that Virginia is such a better location, as opposed to somewhere like Maryland,” said Miller.

Additionally, Miller mentioned a bill he pushed to change insurance notices, and the Veterans Air Center that he is working on with Delegate Rich Anderson.

For Delegate Michael Futrell, delegate from the 2^nd district – who received an A grade –  his focus this session was on improvements for small business.

“Each of us went down to Richmond and we continued to work – and we wanted to hear from you…the one bill that I’m most proud of is…where we changed the definition of what small business is…now we’ve changed [regulations] to say that you need to have 250 employees or less, and make $10 million a year,” said Futrell.

Delegate Scott Lingamfelter, delegate from the 31^st district – who received an A grade – recalled his support for higher education in Virginia, particularly with the the state’s large community college system.

“States with a robust, higher education system are leading to higher development and growth. That’s where we need to keep our focus…I am proud to be a part of legislative initiative that advanced the program where kids can go to [community college]…and then transfer to a 4-year college in Virginia. Those are the kind of things I like to work on,” said Lingamfelter.

State Senate

Senator George Barker, senator from the 39^th district – who received a C grade – stated that while Virginia’s economy suffered last year, it was back on the right track.

“Virginia – in fiscal year 2014, took a big hit – our economy, for the first time since we began keeping that data, went down while [nationally] it was moving forward…the great news is this year, the economy has far outperformed any expectations and projections that we had…a lot of what I think is the potential for our future is science and technology,” Barker commented.

One of the senators that will be retiring this year, Senator Toddy Puller from the 36^th district – who received an A grade – spoke about her victory in securing funding for more veteran’s care centers.

“We have two [veteran’s care centers] right now that are quite old – one’s in Richmond and one’s in Roanoke – but we’re going to now build two more. One n Northern Virginia, which will be in Prince William County, and the other one will be in Hampton Roads,” Puller said.