As to be expected with an uncontested bill, included in a bloc of other uncontested bills, on the very last day of the session before Crossover, HB542 was passed by the House by a 99 – 0 vote and now goes over to the Senate, where I expect it will be referred to the Courts of Justice Committee, perhaps as early as Monday at 8 a.m. As I reported earlier, this bill will make it legal to wear a mask outdoors in public places, but definitely NOT into a bank or retail establishment, as long as it is NOT with the intent to conceal one’s identity, but rather for the physical safety of the wearer. Should we get this all the way through, as I now expect, you winter time balaclava wearers should get ready to cite Section 18.2-422 of the Code of Virginia, should you ever get questioned while wearing one.

This was an excellent example of how, in this legislature, much of the heavy discussion takes place in a bill’s first stop in its originating body, and should it come out of there in good shape, it has a good chance of sailing right through.

Its shaping up as though Monday will be a big day for us, with the Mask bill on at 8 a.m. and both SB97 the 3 ft. Passing Bill & SB225 the Dooring bill on at 4 p.m. Stand by for an alert on Thursday to make some contacts to the members of the two committees.

Update: Due to having a conflicting commitment, Del. Comstock requested, and was granted, that HB82,the Don’t Follow Too Closely bill, be Passed by for the Day, so that it will be listed on the Docket of the next meeting of the Senate Trans Committee, which is Wednesday, 2/19, 45 minutes after Adjournment of the Senate.

This does not indicate that the bill is in any trouble, but is only a routine postponement.

Just reported by Champe from the GAB that the Mask bill, HB542 has been reported out of the House Courts of Justice Committee in a bloc of Uncontested Bills, and now goes on to the House Floor, on Monday, unless they have to meet over the weekend, where it should sail on through.

That gives us four bills that we are interested in crossing over, for the first time in a number of years.

No high fives yet, as we need everyone to keep working to get these bills all the way home.

Stand by for further appeals to make contacts in support of these bills late next week.

The last week before Crossover has been a quiet one, with three of our bills, “3 foot Passing”, “Don’t Follow Too Closely”, & “Dooring” all passing their House of origin and awaiting their hearings in the other House starting the week after next. (Please contact your legislators.)

Champe Burnley & Tom Bowden did join me for our favorite Monday morning at 7 a.m. House Trans Sub 2 meeting, where we had been led to believe that we had a chance for HB277/the “Stop for Pedestrians in a Crosswalk” bill patroned by Del. Rob Krupicka to be reconsidered since it had previously failed to report by a 3 – 3 vote with one of the members absent with a Drs. appointment. Alas, SubComm Chair Dr. Garrett from Lynchburg kept his unbroken streak of opposition intact to any bill that would benefit bicyclists or pedestrians intact by failing to call the bill for reconsideration.

Smarting a little from that not entirely unexpected setback, we headed for the General Assembly Building’s Cafeteria for a bit of breakfast and networking with early arriving legislators following which it was back out into the rain for the walk down to the Patrick Henry building for our appointment with Molly Ward. We briefed her on the 2015 races, and the Trails projects currently underway in the state — Cap2Cap, Tobacco Heritage, Beaches to Bluegrass, and U.S. Bike Rt. 11. After a lengthy audience with her, we departed encouraged.

After meeting again with Del. Dolores McQuinn and her aide to go over the several times modified language for HB 542, the bill that currently makes it a felony to wear a mask, and learning that it finally was listed for hearing on Wednesday at some indefinite time after adjournment, we departed the GAB still well before lunch time.

Come Wednesday, with no one having a real idea when the Criminal Law SubComm of the House Courts of Justice Comm would be meeting, only that it would be after the Adjournment of the House (usually about 1 p.m. or so) and the conclusion of the Constitutional and then the Ethics SubComms of the Committee. Not wanting to be late, having spent so much time on this bill already, Champe & I arrived about 3 p.m. only to find that the House had not adjourned until 2:45, so that the Constitutional SubComm was just getting started. It had a lengthy docket, with a number of controversial bills on it. So we had a chance to hear the spirited and lengthy debates on several Abortion bills and a number of other less controversial ones, prior to the SubComm finishing its business about 5:45.

With no break in between, the same 11 persons became the Ethics SubComm and launched right into the bill to revise the law regarding the acceptance of gifts by elected officials. Even though this topic was discussed solely by the Committee members with no testimony from the audience, it took almost two hours before it concluded.

With the clock now approaching 8, the same SubComm changed hats again and became the Criminal Law SubComm which began to hear the Docket our Mask bill was on. Unfortunately, our patron had been a little late in signing up to be heard, so we were down the line a bit. Late hour or not, the Committee was giving the full treatment to each bill, for which they are to be commended.

Finally, a little after 10, our bill was called, and our much revised language was presented by Del. McQuinn to the still attentive Committee, with the representative of the motorcyclists testifying very effectively and citing previous cases involving bikers wearing masks and being stopped by law enforcement. I followed him, followed by a law enforcement rep, one from the Retail Merchants (who wanted no masks whatever inside their banks and stores, stating that the police would be called immediately if someone entered wearing one). Lastly came the rep from the ACLU, who recognized the problem, but was concerned that people might be stopped by law enforcement for no reason other than wearing a mask. Along the way, the exception we had put in for “participating in recreational activities” was stricken since one of the delegates didn’t want the Ku Klux Klan to be able to say while marching that they were participating in a “recreational activity”. Finally, after some back and forth, language was generally agreed upon that would leave as a felony anyone “wearing a mask with the intent of concealing their identity”, recognizing that someone riding a motorcycle, or bicycle, or standing waiting for a bus, or hunting, or running in cold weather, would be considered as “protecting their face” rather than “intentionally concealing their identity” and would be taking it off prior to entering a retail establishment. After all of this, the bill was unanimously reported by the 11 members and will go on to be heard by the full Courts of Justice Committee, probably tomorrow.

As we walked out at 10:38 p.m. we said “Good Luck” to the guys in orange caps who had also been waiting since about 3 p.m. to oppose a bill they felt was trying to restrict their “fox penning” . When I note on the Legislative website this morning that the bill was Passed by Indefinitely by a voice vote, I would assume that they went home happy, some time around 11. Although I’ve not experienced this previously in the 15 years I’ve been going down there, some of the regulars tell me that this occasionally happens on the House side only, when certain committees get a backlog of bills and Crossover is approaching.

Please, no one nominate me to run for Delegate! $18,000 a year is not enough to compensate one for this kind of pressure, and I commend the ones who take on the responsibility.

SB 225, the dooring bill patroned by Sen. Chap Petersen, was passed by the Senate today 28-12. How senators voted is below. While support was bipartisan, the “noes” were only Republican.

Now it goes to the House after Crossover (Wed. Feb. 12).

If your senator voted for the bill, a note of thanks is in order; if they didn’t, a note expressing your disappointment. More importantly, ask your House delegate to support this bill when it gets to the House.

We can never take votes for granted, as shown by some surprises here — including some pleasant ones, like Sen. Carrico voting with us, after a perfect record of voting against.

How Senators Voted

YEAS — Alexander, Barker, Carrico, Colgan, Cosgrove, Deeds, Ebbin, Edwards, Favola, Garrett, Howell, Locke, Lucas, Marsden, Marsh, McEachin, McWaters, Miller, Newman, Norment, Petersen, Puckett, Puller, Saslaw, Smith, Vogel, Watkins, Wexton — 28.

NAYS — Black, Hanger, Lewis, Martin, McDougle, Obenshain, Reeves, Ruff, Stanley, Stosch, Stuart, Wagner — 12.