Our national economy is making life expensive. The war with Iran is costing the U.S. military about $1 billion each day (of course, estimates vary), an expense that we don’t really feel directly yet but will eventually add a lot to our cost of living. That money needs to come from somewhere. More immediate is the high and increasing cost of groceries, health care, electricity and gasoline. It is a tough time to make ends meet. Everywhere you turn things simply are much more expensive.
The Virginia legislature is continuing to work on the state budget, as the current budget runs through June 30. A difficult decision needs to be made about continuing tax breaks for data centers – and one that does not follow political party lines. One estimate is that in 2025 these tax breaks cost Virginia about $1.6 billion in revenue. Yet, we attracted these companies with the promise of tax breaks – is it fair to remove them after the companies have already moved here? And will they remain if those breaks are lost, along with the jobs and other economic benefits associated with such major operations? Either decision will have a major effect on Virginia’s economy.
Although this decision about data centers has yet to be made, many other bills have been passed that will help with the cost of living. For example, several bills will reduce health and energy costs, focusing on low-income households. A lot of attention was given to energy efficiency – making better use of the energy we have available rather than demanding development of new (and expensive) supplies. An interesting bill allows households, including renters, to install small portable solar panels in their homes. For example, these panels could be used in a rental apartment and taken along when the renters move. The purchase price of these may be recovered in lower electric bills – I’ve seen claims that this could occur in just two years while other sources suggest that it would take up to seven years to break even. Nice would being able to produce your own electricity and not rely on the big electrical utilities!
Several other bills focus on affordable housing, a major issue in Virgina. For example, one bill allows local governments to increase zoning density, and another helps local governments preserve existing affordable housing. Clearly, a lot of emphasis in this year’s legislation focuses on local authority rather than providing more power to state government.
Great to see in this past legislative session was a lot of bipartisan work, with a clear focus on helping Virginians afford living here. Some partisan positions remain, and several will be addressed in direct voting. The November general election will be even more meaningful than usual as three constitutional amendments will be included. Of course, we also have an important partisan ballot issue on redistricting in our upcoming April 21 special election. Passage of that issue would counter Texas’ redistricting (helping Republicans) by doing the same thing here (and helping Democrats). Redistricting to help a political party outside of any normal process is unfortunate – so very surprising was Texas aggressively redistricting to help Republicans. In response, Democrats (including those who don’t like redistricting!) are responding by pointing out the need to do this now to even the playing field. Voting decisions really boil down now to which party you want to control Congress. Vote no if you like how the House of Representatives is functioning now. Vote yes if you want the majority in the House to shift from Republican to Democrat. It’s that simple.
