Water in the 2000 Virginia General Assembly

Abstract

The Virginia General Assembly held its 2000 session from January 12 to March 10. Lawmakers considered 3,172 bills and resolutions (compared to 2,735 measures considered in 1999). Of these, 125 were water-related; that is, their provisions would have an impact on water resources or on water-related activities. To identify these water-related bills, Water Central used the Internet site of the General Assembly’s Legislative Information Service (http://leg1.state.va.us/). Using the system’s subject index, we checked the following nine categories: 1 = Waters of the State, Ports and Harbors; 2 = Water and Sewer Systems; 3 = Fisheries and Habitat of Tidal Waters; 4 = Game, Inland Fisheries, and Boating; 5 = Drainage, Soil Conservation, Sanitation, and Public Facilities Districts; 6 = Health; 7 = Conservation; 8 = Mines and Mining; 9 = Waste Disposal. Our list includes all bills found under categories 1, 2, and 3. For categories 4—9, we include only those bills that appear, from the bill summary, to have a potentially significant impact on water resources or their management. For example, some solid-waste bills are included, but others are omitted because their provisions would affect water resources only marginally. Most land-conservation measures are included, however, because land use directly impacts water resources. On the bottom of page 5 we list passed bills for which the governor subsequently recommended changes (often minor). None in our list were vetoed. The legislature considered the governor’s recommended changes at its reconvened session (the “veto session”) on April 19. Following the bill inventory is a Feature Article from the June 2000 Water Central examining bills that received the attention of various water-resource and public-policy professionals.