Below you can find the status of Delegate Brink’s 2008 bills.

Constitutional amendment (voter referendum); property exempt from taxation.  Provides for a referendum at the November 2008 election on approval of a proposed constitutional amendment relating to property tax exemptions.  The proposed amendment authorizes the General Assembly to enact legislation that will allow localities by ordinance to exempt or partially exempt from real property taxes, or defer real property taxes on, up to 20 percent of the value of residential or farm property that is the owner-occupant's primary dwelling and lived in continuously.

Status: Impact statement from DPB (HB6), 01/14/2008

Constitutional amendment (second resolution); property exempt from taxation.  Authorizes the General Assembly to enact legislation that will allow localities by ordinance to exempt from real property taxes, or defer real property taxes on, up to 20 percent of the value of residential or farm property that is the owner- occupant's primary dwelling and lived in continuously.

Status: Assigned P & E sub: Constitutional, 01/15/2008

Conditional release; voluntary admission to a state hospital.  Clarifies that voluntary admission to a state hospital shall not solely constitute grounds for revocation of a person's conditional release.

Status: Assigned Courts sub: Mental Health, 01/16/2008

Sex offenses prohibiting from residing in proximity to children; penalty. Adds to the places where a sex offender is prohibited from living a public park that is adjacent to a primary, secondary, or high school.

Status: Assigned Courts sub: Criminal, 01/16/2008

Elections; early voting.  Provides that any registered voter qualified to vote in the election may vote in person from 17 to three days before the election at specified times and at the sites provided in the locality. The provisions for absentee voting remain in effect except that the provisions for in-person absentee voting are superseded by the early voting process during the early voting period. The bill takes effect January 1, 2009.

Status: Assigned P & E sub: Elections, 01/15/2008

Setoff Debt Collection Act; setoff against federal tax refunds for local tax debt.  Allows local governments, with the Department of Taxation's assistance, to collect past due local taxes from federal income tax returns. The provisions of the act will take effect on the effective date of federal legislation enacted by the United States Congress allowing such debt to be offset against federal income tax refunds.

Status: Assigned Finance sub: 2, 01/15/2008

Elections; prohibited activities at the polls.  Adds campaign advertisements as defined in the "stand by your ad" law to the list of campaign materials that cannot be exhibited within the polling place or prohibited area around the polling place. The bill also creates an exception to the prohibition for a voter's wearing apparel and buttons or stickers on a voter's apparel that contain a candidate's name or a political slogan.

Status: Assigned P & E sub: Elections, 01/15/2008

Elections; voting equipment; wireless communications at polling places.  Provides exceptions to the prohibition on wireless communications to or from voting devices at the polls on election day.  First, wireless communications to transmit results from voting equipment by modem to the electoral board after the polls close is permitted.  Second, electronic pollbooks may be used.

Status: Impact statement from DPB (HB685), 01/18/2008

Elections; form of ballots.  Replaces current law provisions specifying the details for the form of ballots with a directive that ballots comply with election law requirements and standards prescribed by the State Board of Elections.

Status: Assigned P & E sub: Elections, 01/15/2008

Local vehicle licenses; agreements with DMV.  Provides that DMV will refuse registration or renewal of registration of a vehicle if any delinquent taxes are owed to any county, city, or town, not just the county, city, or town that has entered into an agreement with DMV to deny registrations to persons who owe that particular locality the taxes.

Status: Assigned Transportation sub: 3, 01/17/2008

Freezing access to credit reports.  Authorizes any consumer to freeze access to his credit report. If a consumer has placed a freeze on his credit report, a consumer reporting agency is prohibited from releasing the credit report, or any information in it, without the consumer’s express authorization. The measure provides a means by which a consumer can release his report, permanently, temporarily, or to a specific third party. Certain disclosures are exempt from the freeze. A consumer reporting agency may charge a fee of no more than $5 for establishing a freeze or removing a freeze; however, victims of identity theft shall not be charged a fee and a fee shall not be charged for temporarily lifting a freeze. A system shall be in place by September 1, 2008, to allow for a security freeze to be removed or lifted within 15 minutes if a request is received through an electronic contact method. Violations are a prohibited practice under the Consumer Protection Act.

Status: Referred to Committee on Commerce and Labor, 01/08/2008

Transient occupancy tax; Arlington County. Extends the sunset date from January 1, 2009, to January 1, 2012, for Arlington County’s additional transient occupancy tax of one-fourth of one percent. Under current law, revenues from the tax are required to be used by the county for promoting tourism and business travel in the county.

Status: Assigned Finance sub: 1, 01/15/2008

Veterans Services; mental health program.  Requires the Commissioner of Veterans Services to develop, in cooperation with the Department of Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Substance Abuse Services and the Department of Rehabilitative Services, a strategy for coordinating the various programs that address the unique mental health needs of veterans, including post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injuries, and to seek additional federal, state, and private sources of funding for such programs.

Status: Assigned GL sub: ABC/Gaming, 01/17/2008

Virginia Indoor Clean Air Act; restaurants in Northern Virginia. Allows localities in Northern Virginia to adopt concurrent ordinances containing standards or provisions relating to smoking in restaurants which exceed those established in the Virginia Indoor Clean Air Act.

Status: Assigned GL sub: ABC/Gaming, 01/17/2008

Elections; persons entitled to vote absentee.  Adds women who are pregnant at the time of applying to vote absentee to the list of persons eligible to vote absentee.

Status: Assigned P & E sub: Elections, 01/15/2008

Redistricting process.  Creates a seven-member Citizen Advisory Redistricting Board to prepare and recommend state legislative and congressional redistricting plans for consideration and enactment by the General Assembly. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court designates a special master who is chair. The Governor appoints four members from recommendations (three each) of the majority and minority leaders in each house. The remaining two Board members are appointed by the Governor after considering recommendations of the state party committee chairs of parties with candidates receiving at least 25 percent of the vote in the last gubernatorial election. This bill adopts apportionment standards of federal and state law (currently, population equality, compactness, and contiguity). This bill is patterned in part after the Vermont redistricting process and adapted for Virginia's election schedule and district structure. The bill provides for continuation of the Joint Reapportionment Committee to facilitate development of proposed plans by the Citizen Advisory Redistricting Board and enactment of plans by the General Assembly under Article II, Section 6, of the Constitution.

Status: Assigned P & E sub: Elections, 01/15/2008

Elections; absentee voting and absentee ballot applications.  Provides that any person who will be commuting to perform volunteer service on election day may vote absentee if his commute and service time equals 11 or more hours of the 13 hours that the polls are open.

Status: Assigned P & E sub: Elections, 01/15/2008

Reporting designated campaign contributions. Requires political committees, out-of-state political committees, and federal political action committees to report contributions they receive that are designated for the election of a particular candidate. Political party committees and organized political party groups of elected officials are the only entities currently required to report such information. Such committees will be required to provide a candidate's campaign committee with information regarding the contributor of the designated contribution so that the candidate can identify that contribution on his or her campaign finance report. In turn, candidate campaign committees will be required to report designated contributions transmitted from such committees as being made by the person who designated the contribution. The provisions of the bill will become effective January 1, 2009.

Status: Impact statement from DPB (HB1389), 01/18/2008