Hello Friends,
I wanted to be sure you were aware of some significant news that occurred earlier this week in the Virginia Legislature.
As you know, the Virginia Senate came under control of the Democrats during this past General Assembly Session. Although the House of Delegates fulfilled its traditional obligation to produce a budget and forwarded it to the Senate, it has been stalled there. Governor McAuliffe and the Senate Democrats believed that this would be the time to try to force Medicaid expansion through the Legislature.
Many of us in the House of Delegates have been taken to task for not compromising with the Senate on this issue, although it is worth noting that the Editorial Page of the
Virginian Pilot stated today:
"
Democrats, led by Sen. Dick Saslaw, had refused to approve a proposal that would've allowed House and Senate negotiators to hammer out a compromise."
So despite what you might have heard in the media, it was the Democratic leadership in the Senate that wouldn't come to the table and attempt to reach a compromise.
Refusing to seek a compromise for the good of our state while our state budget hangs in the balance is, I believe, a disservice to every hard-working Virginian. It also places our state's economy and triple-A bond rating at risk.
I believe that the issue of Medicaid expansion in Virginia should be taken up by the General Assembly separately and apart from the budget, where it won't imperil funding the core functions of our state government. Medicaid expansion is obviously a complicated and controversial subject - and I think people understood that it was wrong to use the budget as leverage on that issue. As we have said throughout this process, we can have a full debate over Medicaid expansion, what it means for Virginia, how much it will cost, and what it would look like. That's a debate I am willing to have; but it wasn't right to do that in the budget.
However, Senator Phillip Puckett, a Democrat, resigned from the Senate this week and his departure has tipped the balance of power in the Virginia Senate. Senator Puckett has been a long-serving, well-regarded member of the Virginia Senate for many years and I respect his decision to step down at a time of his own choosing. As a result of this decision, the General Assembly will gather this week and take up the budget issue again.
I was not privy to or involved in Senator Puckett's decision to step down, and it came as quite a surprise to many of our elected leaders. However, speculating on "palace intrigue" does nothing to further the goal of producing a state budget for our Commonwealth.
As things currently stand, our state is facing
1.5 billion dollars in tax revenue shortfalls. The danger before us was that had the Virginia Legislature failed in our duty to produce a budget by June 30th, under state law and Constitutional restrictions, we would have been unable to tap into Virginia's "rainy day fund" to help offset any budget shortfalls. This is where the term "going over the cliff" would have accurately described the result of not producing a budget on time for our state.
On Thursday, the General Assembly will reconvene in our state capitol and as of this moment, it appears that we will level-fund most areas of the budget as well as re-benchmark K-12 Education, preserve our investments in mental health, and keep our Virginia Retirement System on-track.
We will now be able to give the Medicaid debate the time, energy and attention it deserves.
I will report to you the results of the General Assembly session as soon as our work there is done. In the meantime, please don't hesitate to share your thoughts or concerns with me. As always, I can be reached at
[email protected] or (757) 321-8180.
With warmest regards,
