The Virginia Catholic Conference – the public policy agency
of the Commonwealth’s Catholic bishops and their two dioceses
– will pursue the initiatives described below during the 2015
Virginia General Assembly session, which convenes for 46 days
beginning Jan. 14. The conference’s agenda was formulated in
consultation with its Education and Respect Life, Health, and
Social Concerns policy committees, and was approved Nov. 17
by its Management Committee, headed by Arlington Bishop Paul
S. Loverde and Richmond Bishop Francis X. DiLorenzo. (Note:
Other items may be added to the conference’s agenda as
legislation is filed and reviewed.)
Respect Life
– Preserving pro-life gains made in prior years.
– Banning state funding of all abortions not required by
federal law. (Under the Medicaid Program, the federal
government funds abortions when the life of the eligible
woman is at risk and in cases of rape and incest. States are
permitted, but not required, to spend their own funds, with
no federal match, for abortions that fall outside these three
categories. Conference advocacy seeks to prohibit government
funding of abortion to the greatest extent possible.)
– Prohibiting state investment in research that requires the
destruction of human embryos or fetuses and in entities that
conduct such research.
– Opposing establishment of a system of presumed consent for
organ donation.
– Closing Virginia’s “gun-show loophole” by requiring
unlicensed gun sellers at gun shows to conduct background
checks on potential purchasers. (Background checks would
determine if the potential buyer has a criminal record or a
mental health history making him or her ineligible to own a
firearm. The requirement that background checks be conducted
currently applies to licensed gun dealers.)
Capital Cases/ Criminal and Juvenile Justice
– Opposing “electric chair default” legislation mandating
that electrocution be used to administer the death penalty if
the Department of Corrections certifies that lethal injection
drugs are unavailable.
– Removing electrocution as a method of execution in
Virginia.
– Ensuring that individuals with intellectual disabilities
are ineligible for the death penalty.
– Requiring biological evidence for capital punishment.
– Requiring the state to conduct a study of execution
procedures.
– Requiring that Virginia law enforcement agencies adopt the
Model Policy on Eyewitness Identification in an effort to
decrease wrongful convictions. (Between 1989 and 2013, at
least 18 people whose convictions were based largely on
eyewitness misidentifications have been exonerated of serious
violent felonies following DNA testing or newly discovered
evidence, including several capital cases.)
– Eliminating the lifetime ban on Temporary Assistance to
Needy Families (TANF) benefits for people with drug-related
felony convictions who are reentering their communities after
incarceration.
Restoring voting rights to individuals convicted of
non-violent felonies who have completed their sentences.
– Opposing disproportionate cuts to community-based juvenile
justice programs.
– Increasing the minimum threshold for the crime of “grand
larceny” from $200 to $500. (Virginia’s threshold is the
lowest in the country and has not been updated since 1980.
Young people are incarcerated for this crime at a very high
rate.)
Making juveniles convicted of non-homicide felonies eligible
for sentence modification after 20 years. (In 2010, the
Supreme Court ruled that juveniles could not be sentenced to
life without parole. Legislation is needed to provide
retroactive justice to individuals sentenced to life without
parole prior to the Supreme Court ruling.)
Family Life and Freedom of Conscience
– Supporting measures to connect victims of human trafficking
to appropriate services and treatment.
– Strengthening laws against human trafficking.
– Preventing minors’ access to pornography.
– Protecting the ability of religious institutions to make
personnel, housing, and other decisions that reflect their
beliefs regarding marriage.
– Preserving current conscience protections for faith-based
child-placing agencies that protect them from being forced to
participate in placements that violate their beliefs.
– Supporting legislation, reflecting federal policy, to
ensure that state government officials cannot censor sermons
in services of worship by chaplains of the Virginia National
Guard or the Virginia Defense Force.
– Supporting legislation, reflecting federal policy, to
ensure state religious practice protections for active-duty
military members.
– Opposing legislation to include within the state’s
definition of birth control anything deemed by the FDA to be
a “contraceptive.” (The FDA’s list of currently approved
“contraceptives” includes abortifacients and sterilization
procedures.)
– Supporting increased funding for post-adoptive services.
– Changing the foster-care “age out” from 18 to 21.
Health
– Supporting efforts to expand access to health insurance
coverage to people up to 133 percent of the Federal Poverty
Level. (This means that an individual makes $15,521 or less a
year.)
– Reducing the waiting list for community-based services for
individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
– Protecting Medicaid reimbursement rates.
Social and Economic Concerns/ Environmental Justice
– Opposing budget reductions to programs that provide
shelter, health care, and other basic necessities to
low-income Virginia residents.
– Raising Virginia’s minimum wage beyond the federal
requirements.
– Making the state Earned Income Tax Credit refundable for
the lowest-income taxpayers.
– Closing the open-end line of credit loophole, and
regulating lines of credit as other lenders are regulated.
(Many open-end line of credit lenders charge interest rates
between 260 percent and 400 percent APR.)
– Requiring Virginia’s payday and car-title lending
industries to operate under the same annual-percentage-rate
cap on interest (36 percent) as other small-loan lenders
operating in Virginia.
– Supporting proposals to increase state contributions to the
Housing Trust Fund, and identifying other sources of
consistent support for the program.
– Providing state-subsidized rental assistance to working
families whose wages do not enable them to afford adequate
housing.
– Supporting affordable and accessible housing for
individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities
to facilitate the transition from institutions to
community-based living.
– Implementing a cost-of-living adjustment for payments to
low-income families under the TANF program.
– Opposing the diversion of TANF funding toward non-TANF
purposes.
– Supporting a Back to School Supplies and Clothing Allowance
for TANF-eligible, school-aged children.
– Opposing legislation to require local departments of social
services to drug test Virginia Initiative for Employment Not
Welfare (VIEW) recipients and to make those who test positive
ineligible for TANF benefits for one year.
– Prohibiting officers from inquiring about the immigration
status of those who report being victims of a crime or
witnesses to a crime.
– Compensating victims of Virginia’s prior forced
sterilization program. (Between 1927 and 1979, about 8,000
Virginians were sterilized under this former program.)
– Maintaining Virginia’s moratorium on uranium mining.
– Supporting tax credits for employers who hire individuals
with disabilities.
Education
– Preserving the Education Improvement Scholarships Tax
Credits program.
– Advocating that preschools accredited by the Virginia
Council for Private Education be recognized as quality early
childhood education programs.
– Preserving the current prohibitions against weapons on the
property of private and religious schools.
– Preserving eligibility for in-state tuition for immigrant
children who have been granted Deferred Action for Childhood
Arrivals (DACA) status by the federal government and who meet
Virginia’s residency requirements.
Make a difference
Sign up for the Virginia Catholic Conference’s Email
Advocacy Network to receive regular alerts and updates on
legislative issues. To join,
click hereand complete the short form that is
provided. Alerts include pre-drafted messages that you can
send (“as is” or modified to suit your own style) to your
elected representatives with just a few mouse clicks. It’s
effective advocacy with very little time commitment.
Participate in Catholic Advocacy Day in Richmond Jan.
29, from 8:45 a.m. until 2:00 p.m. (with registration
beginning at 7:45 a.m.). The day begins with prayer and issue
briefings, followed by constituent visits at legislators’
offices, “debriefing,” and closing prayer. For registration
and additional information, visit vacatholic.org. Please join
Arlington Bishop Paul S. Loverde and Richmond Bishop Francis
X. DiLorenzo at this important advocacy event.
“Like” the conference on Facebook, follow the
Conference on
Twitter (@VaCatholicConf), and sign up for the conference’s
blog for the latest news on legislative issues.
