On Tuesday (gosh, is that just yesterday) 94 of your Delegates and 40 of your Senators returned to Mr. Jefferson’s Capitol and rumor has it that 122 of them told the other 12, “Get the damn budget decided!” Of course, these conversations were conducted behind closed doors during the various caucuses. Nonetheless, there are reliable reports that the language was pretty direct. As one legislator put it, “We were just expressing what we have heard Ôback home’ for the last two days!”
It appears the conferees got the message. As this is being written, the conferences on the budget bills have been concluded. There are still six of the conferees (three from each house) “locked” in a sixth floor office/conference room trying to hammer out the two bond bills. These negotiations could throw a “monkey wrench” into the whole deliberations. However, it is more likely if the two sides get “hung up” on the issue of bonds, the legislators will go ahead and meet and pass the budgets, if the Governor would give them (particularly the House Republicans) assurance that any “special session” which he would call would be with strict limitations as to what the GA could consider.
The Constitution is silent about special sessions except to say,
“The Governor may convene a special session of the General Assembly when, in his opinion, the interest of the Commonwealth may require and shall convene a special session upon the application of two-thirds of the members elected to each house.”Constitutional “experts” have argued for years as to whether a “special session” may be called for a particular purpose or whether once the legislators are in session they can bring up any issue they desire. So far, tradition (and perhaps common sense) has prevailed and every “special session” in the past thirty-seven years has been limited to the purpose for which the Governor convened it.
So far as I can remember two-thirds of the legislators have never petitioned the Governor to call a special session. Heck, with the present partisanship, it is difficult to get two-thirds of the members of either house to vote together on any controversial issue.
Back to the budget, all of the staff members and the conferees were still in “meetings” when I visited the General Assembly Building. We will try to get some details on the budget bills for the GP-Surprise, Surprise # 4 tomorrow.
There is an annual political “rite” in the state of Virginia called the “Shad Planking.” Just in case you are relatively new to Virginia or haven’t read many political histories of the state, you may not know that the Wakefield Ruritan Club sponsors a fund raiser, on the third Wednesday of every April, to finance their civic and community activities. While this event originally started as just a little group of local citizens celebrating the beginning of spring and the fishing season (the shad had started running in the James River) it evolved into a major political event after the Ruritans took it over in 1949. From 1950 until the late 1970s the leading Democrat politicians dominated the event and actually the Byrd Machine stalwarts frequently identified the next statewide candidates at this very event.
During the period of the Byrd’s dominance in Virginia the attendance at the Shad Planking was usually around a thousand plus white, Democrat males. Republicans started “sneaking in” in the late sixties and early seventies and the color line and the gender lines were breached in the late seventies. Actually most people give L. Douglas Wilder credit for being the first African-American to venture into the sportsman’s club park in Sussex County where the event is held. This is credited to have happened in 1977. The first females brave enough to attend the event were reportedly, you guessed it, media types. You have to understand while this was an all male event there were no restroom facilities. After all it was held in a very wooded area! (Oh yes, now the Ruritans do furnish sufficient “potty johns” for the crowd.)
Now the event has grown so that the attendance comes from all segments of our society and all political parties, including the Libertarians, so I am told. It has become the “war zone for political signs.” The political speeches however, are still delivered in a good natured fashion and most every body has a rollicking good time since there is an abundance of “attitudinal changing liquid.” In fact, it is reliably reported, that in addition to absorbing lots of liquid refreshments, some of the attendees actually eat the shad.
The Ruritans prepare the shad starting early in the day. The shad are nailed to a plank and cooked over an open fire for hours to soften the multitude of bones which this fish contains. Admittance is by ticket only. The Ruritans start selling them in January and are normally very successful.
Last year’s event fell on Wednesday, April 18, two days after the shootings at Virginia Tech. The keynote speaker, Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling, delivered a tribute to the VA TECH Nation rather than sticking to the usual humorous political rhetoric. Bill’s son is a recent graduate of Tech and knew three of the students who were killed on 416.
All of this leads up to the fact that this year, because of the extended session of the GA, legislators from both parties are more apt to attend. Remember from the GP-Surprise, Surprise #1 the “reconvened session of the General Assembly, 2008” will now be held on Wednesday, April 23 instead of the date of the first anniversary of the Tech Massacre. The speakers this year, in case anyone is really interested, are the U.S. Senatorial candidates, former Governors, Mark Warner and Jim Gilmore, and, Delegate Bob Marshall, who, now that the “veto override session” has been moved to the 23rd, will be there.
This means these three candidates are probably happy the session was extended. Now they may have a more “politically astute audience.”