Assembly briefs: No action on illegal immigrant tuition bills

The Virginian-Pilot

Illegal immigrant students

Committee takes no action on tuition bills

A conference committee failed to take action on competing bills related to whether illegal immigrants should be eligible for in-state tuition at state colleges or universities.

This was the second year in which lawmakers attempted to address the issue.

The two measures in question were fundamentally different:

SB1204, sponsored by Sen. Emmett Hanger Jr., R-Augusta, would have prohibited undocumented immigrants from paying in-state tuition unless they met certain requirements, including proof that the student filed paperwork to receive permanent residency, lived in Virginia for three years and graduated from high school here and that his or her parents paid taxes over the p ast three years.

Del. John Reid, R-Henrico, proposed HB2623, which would have not allowed illegal immigrants to be eligible for any postsecondary benefit, including in-state tuition, unless the same right was afforded to citizens or nationals living outside of Virginia. The bill would have aligned itself with federal law.

Both legislators said they want to continue to discuss the issue and consider future legislation.

"We'll see after the election how people in both the House and Senate react to what they hear during the election cycle " about illegal immigration and education matters, Reid said.

- Gillian Gaynair

Retirement system

No action taken on Sudan divestment bill

Lawmakers failed to act on legislation that aimed to have the Virginia Retirement System divest funds in companies doing business in Sudan.

The bill's sponsor, Ken Cuccinelli II, R-Fairfax, called the outcome one the most disappointing in his Senate career.

State senators had rejected a House subcommittee amendment to SB1331, which specified that the General Assembly consider official U.S. policy toward Sudan before giving any directives to the retirement system. The amendment was one reason the conference committee decided not to act on the bill, Del. Lacey Putney, I-Bedford, said.

Putney said there also was concern about the precedent legislators would set by telling the pension system how to handle its investments.

Six states nationwide have passed divestment legislation in response to the genocide in Darfur.

- Gillian Gaynair

Regulating industry

Lawmakers don't act on payday lending bill

Lawmakers failed to reach consensus Saturday on how to address high interest rates attached to payday lending or the repeat borrowers who industry opponents say are forced into a cycle of debt.

Payday lenders, many of whom are in Hampton Roads, charge about $15 per $100, for as much as $500, for a two-week loan. Their interest rates can reach 300 percent.

A conference committee did not act on SB1014, which would have limited payday borrowers to three loans at any one time and established a database to track such activity.

The measure also would have required payday lenders to offer an extended payment plan, without interest, for 60 days to anyone who couldn't repay a loan.

And it would have prohibited payday loans to members of the military.

"Each side got as far as it could go, and that was it," the measure's sponsor, Sen. Richard Saslaw, D-Fairfax, said Saturday.

During a news conference Saturday, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine said there is a continued need "for very real reform of this industry."

But Saslaw doubted that legislators would see a reform bill in coming years.

"The bills put in will be the repeal bills or interest cap bills, and they don't have a prayer in the world of getting out of either committee," he said.

"Essentially, probably for the next decade, that industry will have no regulation at all."

- Gillian Gaynair

Bill to phase out voting machines OK'd

A bill that would require localities to phase out touch-screen voting machines passed the House and Senate on Saturday.

HB2707, sponsored by Del. Timothy Hugo, R-Fairfax, would not ban the use of the controversial machines but would ban localities from purchasing more of them.

Del. Melanie Rapp, R-York County, said she hopes in time that the state comes up with the funding to replace all touch-screen machines.

Although voter registration officials say the machines are accurate, they have been under fire around the nation. Hugo wants cities and counties to replace them with paper ballots, which are scanned into voting machines.

His bill passed the House 82-14 and the Senate 29-11.

- Harry Minium