Controversial bills: How your legislators voted

The TANF drug-testing bills had companions in the Senate, and the final version (SB6) actually passed the Senate before being left in House Appropriations, so there are local Senate votes to report on that.

You also might want to add a few other controversial abortion-related bills that drew votes from our local legislators, like HB62, which would have disallowed Medicaid funding for indigent women to receive an abortion in cases in which a physician certifies that he believes that the fetus would be born with a gross and totally incapacitating physical deformity or mental deficiency. There was also SB637, which would have prohibited abortions after 20 weeks, based on the medically unsubstantiated idea of "fetal pain." That bill nearly escaped the Senate, despite tremendous constitutional issues.

And HB1 hardly "died quietly" in the Senate. It actually passed out of committee amidst one of the largest pro-choice demonstrations at the Capitol this year, and what signified a great spark in Virginia women's overall response to such legislation.

In the future, I'd love to see The Hook pay more attention to these issues while the session is ongoing. Citizen participation was a critical component to this year's session, and given that Cville counts the House Minority Leader as its Delegate, we do have some faces that are out in front of the media more than other areas...Our area might have seen even more such participation if our local media placed more value on these topics.

Bob is spot on. If this is supposed to be a "news" story, it falls quite short. It is opinion and one-sidedness. Heck, Provence even had a gripe about the "child rape life sentence" bill. Of course, she had to put both sides of the story in her little rant on that one bill: how dare a liberal think that a child rapist should be incarcerated for life?

And the pot bill...again, true lib colors come out, using the moral relativity test. If I received three traffic tickets for going 35 in a school zone, I should not vote to keep the speed limit as law because "I did it too when I was young." Such logic.
I 'spose that's why our media is in this market.

And of course, we all want be wee-weeing into an endless abyss by providing "social services" to drug users. I think I want my tax dollars going to support addicts. How dare taxpayers demand that?

And that Voter ID bill...how discriminatory? Even Eric Holder thinks so! And I value everything he says. I would submit that, in any larger metro area (Va Beach, Richmond, northern counties), I could find evidence of voter fraud. While we may not have it here (then why does Charlottesville have the most media-present registrar I have ever seen?), it does exist. If voting is such a precious ritual, then a little photo ID is not such a hardship.

R.I.P.: Peter Ham

Why are Charlottesvillers not up in arms to outs the lame Rob Bell? Are we paralyzed with inertia? Or do we place more value on playing nice with whomever we have than getting good legislators -- no matter how bad they are.

I am surprised that Rob Bell proposed a bill to mandate a life sentence for child rape but failed to understand and adopt the language of HB2490 and was not in favor (as Chair of the VA Crime Commission) of a bill to require collaboration of campus/local police when campus rape occurs - these "children" involved in campus rape are only 5 years older than the max age in his child rape bill. I've been told, off the record, that he sees campus rape as "different" from real rape. Is there really a difference? The trauma is the same....

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@meanwhile...
Believe it or not, people that live in Albemarle County do live in "Charlottesville". At least that is what their address tells them and that is what they consider their locality.

I have always presented my voter registration card at the polls and there never has been any problem.
I do not drive(never have). I do not fly(on airplanes). I do all my banking and other financial activities with ATMS or online.My bank account, library card, etc were set up years ago before all this "security" madness hit our society.
I am retired, still have my employers card with my photo, but since its not state issued not acceptable.
I feel like Jack Burns the Brave Cowboy in Ed Abbey's book of the same title. "He said "I don't need an ID, I know who I am."
That book was written when it was illegal for a male not to have and carry a draft card, eben if a veteran who had served in a previous war. The State still likes to think it owns us.
I may have cast my last ballot. Maybe the best way to deal with the system is not fight it,but to simply not participate in it.

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Some commenters don’t like the tone of this article, claiming that it is “opinion” and “one-sided,” with one noting sarcastically the “objective, unbiased titles” given to bills voted on in the General Assembly. That, however, IS the crux of the article: how area legislators voted on particular bills that were “controversial” and that “grabbed national attention. And that’s news, not opinion.

I want to thank 26World and cville reader2 and Susan Russell and B for thoughtful and helpful comments. 26World suggests more emphasis by the local media on the kind(s) of legislation spawned by conservative Republicans, cville reader2 wonders why Bell gets re-elected while Susan Russell calls out Bell’s hypocrisy (and there’s a lot of it), and B sheds light on the epic failure of the war on drugs.

I wonder why LiberalAce favors drug testing for poor welfare recipients, but says not a word about drug testing those who get subsidies for historic preservation and conservation tax credits. These credits cost taxpayers more than $100 million a year, and that does not include the additional subsidies that accrue under local land use tax subsidy programs (60 percent of the land in Albemarle county in land us). See, for example:

http://readthehook.com/101906/flip-flopped-biscuit-run-men-want-20-m...

http://readthehook.com/90675/extreme-makeover-va-rehab-tax-credit-ed...

Bob says that Rob Bell is a “hard worker” and has a “high level of integrity.” Perhaps. I don’t doubt that Bell works hard, and I’ll bet he loves his family, and if he owns a dog he probably doesn’t kick it. But let’s just look at the kinds of legislation that Bell , who claims to be a lover of freedom and believer in limited government, voted for.

Bell voted to require women seeking a legal, constitutionally-protected abortion to undergo an “expensive, invasive procedure called a transvaginal ultrasound, wait 24 hours, and have it go on their permanent record.”

Bell voted to allow private adoption agencies to legally practice discrimination. So much for “liberty and justice for all.”

Bell claims to be a law-and-order Republican, but he voted to eliminate minor gun purchase restrictions even though it’s already incredibly easy to buy guns in Virginia and the Commonwealth is already “the number one source for illegal guns entering New York” and one of the top ten for “illegal guns that are shipped across state lines for use in crimes.”

Bell voted to make it harder to vote, even though democracy is based on popular sovereignty (“We, the People”) and there is no evidence that there’s any kind of voter “fraud” problem. Maybe Bell is not fond of government “of the people, by the people, for the people.”

Bell voted to make what amounts to religious belief –- that life begins at conception –– into law.

Bell was not alone on these issues. He was joined in nearly every case by his conservative brethren. It’s hardly “one-sided” or “opinionated” to point out these votes.