Advocacy Update 3

BudVye January 24, 2018

As reported over the weekend, a Dangerous Dogs bill, HB271/carried by Mark Cole, which increases some of the requirements for owners of dogs that are declared to be dangerous was heard in House Agriculture, Sub committee 1 Monday at 4:30. As with several of the sub committee meeting venues in the Pocahontas Building, the rooms are small and this meeting was packed wall to wall with interested people, with several waiting outside who couldn’t get in. Fortunately for Champe & me, it was heard first, and Del. Cole gave it a good presentation, citing an incident where one of his constituents in the Fredericksburg area had been injured by a dangerous dog which had gotten away from its owner, so the bill was intended to tighten up some of the conditions of the Dangerous Dogs Registry and prevent this type of situation.

As the situation was similar to the incident we had on Jordan Drive in Henrico county with several RABA rides, resulting in Pat Reddington being severely bitten, by the pit bull we eventually had cited and registered on the Dangerous Dogs Registry, I testified in favor of the bill.

After a woman from an SPCA group testified that better enforcement of the existing conditions of the Registry would be sufficient to handle such incidents, and several members of the dog sympathetic committee agreed with her, the bill failed by a unanimous 8-0 vote.

This morning, House Transportation SubCommittee 1 met at 7 a.m. and ALL the bills on its docket but one were Passed by Indefinitely (PBI’d or killed) on straight, party line votes, with all the R’s voting to PBI; all of the D’s opposed. Included in the bills that failed were–

HB9/Krizek & HB1272/Watts slightly different bills that would require ALL occupants of a passenger vehicle to utilize seat belts when the vehicle is moving, with failure to do so a primary offense

HB207/Mullin A penalty for operating a vehicle after failing to clear accumulated snow or ice from it, as is the law in most states to the north of here

HB811/O’Quinn A penalty for motor vehicles traveling at “slower than normal speed for existing conditions” if they are not in the far right lane

HB464/Carter Driver must STOP for a pedestrian in a marked crosswalk

All of these bills were well presented, and were fully discussed, with speakers (including Champe Burnley for the Pedestrians in Crosswalks) speaking in support, but all were PBI’d on party line votes.

The only bill still surviving is HB308/Watts which would prohibit motor vehicles from passing in bike lanes. After extensive discussion, including my support, she requested, and was granted, that it be Passed By for the Day, so she can change some of the language prior to it being brought back and heard at the next meeting of the SubCommittee.

Since the hearing of these bills in SubComm took right up to about 8:15, the rest of the members of the Full Committee joined the SubComm members to make up the full House Trans Comm for their docket which was scheduled for 8:30. Those of us who make the trip down there are thrilled to now have the SubComm1 on Tuesday (rather than Monday, as previously, for a number of years) and have it be followed by the Full Committee meeting, thereby saving one early morning trip.

Since the entire docket consisted of routine matters, it went very quickly,

with the following bills referred to other committees — HB672/Kilgore Suspension of License for unsatisfied Judgments to Courts; HB1021/ Adams, LR Use of speed monitoring systems in school crossing zones to Militia & Police; HB134/Bell, John Raise minimum cost requiring Value Engineering from $5 to 15 million to General Laws; HB59/Bell, John, Use of Practical Design Methods to General Laws

and two license plate bills, a naming of a bridge, and a naming of a section of highway being handled reported out routinely.

Now we look forward to Senate Trans Tomorrow which appears to have only the two Value Engineering bills SB117/Favola & SB125/Black of interest to us, as we try to make sure that Bike/Ped components of highway projects don’t get “Value Engineered” out of the projects in an effort to save money.

Advocacy Report — Week 1

BudVye January 19, 2018

As reported Wednesday, extreme partisanship returned as a backlash to Governor Northam’s speech, with the result that three of the bills we were interested in FAILED by party line votes of 6 – 7 in Senate Transportation, as the word had been put out to kill any bills carried by D patrons.

In this category were SB46/Favola Stop for a pedestrian in a marked crosswalk

SB87/Surovell Providing a penalty for a motorist who injures a vulnerable road user

SB88/Surovell No passing by a motor vehicle in a bike lane

Surprisingly, SB74/Surovell expanding the prohibition on using a handheld personal communication device while operating a motor vehicle unless it is being operated in a hands free manner was reported on to the Senate floor by a 9-4 vote, as Republican Sens. Chase, Cosgrove, & DeSteph crossed the party line, which was a tribute to Drive Smart Virginia’s Janet Brooking who had lined up a strong supporting contingent including Triple A & Geico in addition to VBF.

On Thursday, in Senate Agriculture, Champe Burnley was representing us and surprisingly was the only one speaking against SB375/Chafin which was to permit Sunday hunting of deer & bear. In the past, Garden club, Equestrian groups, & other conservation oriented groups have also opposed such legislation, but this year were conspicuous by their absence. For some reason, another bill carried by Sen. Kilgore was rolled into this one, which only permits Sunday hunting of raccoons, and the amended bill was reported on to the floor by 14-0. Raccoons are generally hunted at night, but there is no day time prohibition in this bill so it appears to be a classic “camel’s nose under the tent” for Sunday hunting, which the hunters have been trying to get for a number of years.

Additionally, we noticed a Dangerous Dogs bill, HB271/Mark Cole which increases some of the requirements for owners of dogs that are declared to be dangerous. This bill will be in House Agriculture, Sub committee 1 which meets Monday at 4:30. With a Republican patron, it stands a good chance of being reported, but you can never be sure with dog bills, and we will see on Monday. I expect that this meeting will be streamed for those who may want to watch it. It’s a little tricky to find the links to the committee broadcasts on the legislative home page, but they are there, and its a huge improvement over previous years!vAs reported Wednesday, extreme partisanship returned as a backlash to Governor Northam’s speech, with the result that three of the bills we were interested in FAILED by party line votes of 6 – 7 in Senate Transportation, as the word had been put out to kill any bills carried by D patrons.

In this category were SB46/Favola Stop for a pedestrian in a marked crosswalk

SB87/Surovell Providing a penalty for a motorist who injures a vulnerable road user

SB88/Surovell No passing by a motor vehicle in a bike lane

Surprisingly, SB74/Surovell expanding the prohibition on using a handheld personal communication device while operating a motor vehicle unless it is being operated in a hands free manner was reported on to the Senate floor by a 9-4 vote, as Republican Sens. Chase, Cosgrove, & DeSteph crossed the party line, which was a tribute to Drive Smart Virginia’s Janet Brooking who had lined up a strong supporting contingent including Triple A & Geico in addition to VBF.

On Thursday, in Senate Agriculture, Champe Burnley was representing us and surprisingly was the only one speaking against SB375/Chafin which was to permit Sunday hunting of deer & bear. In the past, Garden club, Equestrian groups, & other conservation oriented groups have also opposed such legislation, but this year were conspicuous by their absence. For some reason, another bill carried by Sen. Kilgore was rolled into this one, which only permits Sunday hunting of raccoons, and the amended bill was reported on to the floor by 14-0. Raccoons are generally hunted at night, but there is no day time prohibition in this bill so it appears to be a classic “camel’s nose under the tent” for Sunday hunting, which the hunters have been trying to get for a number of years.

Additionally, we noticed a Dangerous Dogs bill, HB271/Mark Cole which increases some of the requirements for owners of dogs that are declared to be dangerous. This bill will be in House Agriculture, Sub committee 1 which meets Monday at 4:30. With a Republican patron, it stands a good chance of being reported, but you can never be sure with dog bills, and we will see on Monday. I expect that this meeting will be streamed for those who may want to watch it. It’s a little tricky to find the links to the committee broadcasts on the legislative home page, but they are there, and its a huge improvement over previous years!

Today’s Senate Transportation Committee Meeting

BudVye January 17, 2018

…just concluded at 4:33 p.m.

For the first time, all were able to follow the proceedings as they were streamed, without being there, and Champe Burnley was there in person to testify on several of the bills. In order to get the streamed coverage of sessions, click on the link for the session you are interested in on the home page of the General Assembly website. It’s really helpful!

Of the bills we were interested in, it was encouraging that

SB74, carried by Scott Surovell, which expands the prohibition on using a handheld personal communication device while operating a motor vehicle unless it is being operated in a hands free manner PASSED by a 9-4 vote

Three of the other bills we were interested in FAILED by a 6-7 vote, along party lines, with the D’s voting for & the R’s against. These bills included

SB46/Favola STOP for a pedestrian in a marked Crosswalk

SB87/Surovell this year’s Vulnerable Road User bill, which was opposed by the Commonwealth Attorney’s Assn. rep. who this week is from Emporia

SB88/Surovell No passing by a motor vehicle driving in a bike lane

Two other bills we were interested in also Failed

SB97/Marsden No person shall operate a moving motor vehicle with an animal on their lap Failed to receive a motion to report

SB744/Barker Requiring Seat belts to be used & fastened while in the back seat of moving vehicles Failed 9-3

Annual Meeting Rescheduled to Saturday, December 16

admin November 15, 2017 @vabike

Varina Library — Henrico, VA

We have rescheduled the VBF Annual Meeting to Saturday, December 16 from 10am to 3pm at the Varina Library, 1875 New Market Rd, Henrico, VA 23231.

We will hold the business meeting from 10 until noon, then John Bolecek from VDOT will be giving you an update.

The library is located across the street from the VA Capital Trail.

For those who can stick around, we’ll plan a ride on the trail after the meeting.

I look forward to seeing you.

–Champe

Let’s Include a Greenway in the DC to Richmond High Speed Rail Corridor

admin November 2, 2017 @vabike

The new rail corridor plan should include greenway, as has already been done for the Petersburg to Raleigh segment. We’ve submitted our comments. Please submit your comments before next Tuesday, November 7.

The Virginia Bicycling Federation supports this project to increase travel options including high speed rail from Richmond to Washington, DC. However, we believe that this project is not fully vetted by not looking at all of the multimodal options for the corridor and the benefits could be vastly increased with the inclusion of a parallel greenway similar to that recommended on the Southern High Speed Rail segment from Petersburg to Raleigh, NC.

Billions of taxpayer dollars will be spent on this project. Once completed, this corridor upgrade will likely be unchanged for the next hundred years or more. We have only one chance to get this project right for many generations to come and it is imperative that our limited tax-dollars be used most effectively.

Providing a greenway along this corridor increases access to train stations, gives citizens more local transportation choices, decreases car parking demands at the train stations, reduces air pollution and provides health, recreation and tourism benefits for all of the communities it passes through.

In addition, providing a separated greenway provides a safe, off-road travel option for bikes and pedestrians and could save the lives of countless citizens over decades to come. More importantly, more citizens would likely use the greenway on a daily basis – particularly in Northern Virginia – than would use the high-speed trains, thus reducing transportation demands on local roads and highways.

Please add a parallel greenway to this project.