The School Board’s legislative agenda underscores several issues:
1. Cost-of-Competing Adjustment (COCA): Stafford County receives only 25% of the COCA funding that neighboring Northern Virginia districts enjoy, despite facing similar cost-of-living and market conditions. The Board urged lawmakers to support full COCA funding to help Stafford attract and retain educators, noting a $10,000 average salary gap between teachers in Stafford and nearby districts.
In Prince William County, a catch-and-release style revolving justice system keeps more criminals on the street in the name of fairness.
A shooting at Manassas Mall on July 9, 2024, left two people injured, including one of five suspects in the case, underscores a more significant problem with the justice system in a much more progressive Prince William County.
By Morgan Sweeney
(The Center Square) — Gov. Glenn Youngkin signed Virginia’s budget for fiscal years 2025-2026 Monday after the state’s General Assembly voted to pass it in a special session convened for that purpose.
By Morgan Sweeney
(The Center Square) — Gov. Glenn Youngkin signed 100 bills into law on Tuesday and vetoed four, bringing his tally so far this session to over 360 bills signed and a record 132 vetoed.
“Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s veto of a bill that would have allowed young immigrants brought to the U.S. as children to become police officers was met with disappointment from Prince William County Police Chief Peter Newsham, who pushed for the measure and went to Richmond to support it.”
“[We wanted to allow] those kids who grew up and had a dream to be a police officer,” State Senator Jeremy McPike (D) WFTF Radio. “And what happened was the governor just crushed those kids’ dreams.”
“Peter Newsham, Chief of Police for Prince William County, also advocated for McPike’s bill. He said his jurisdiction is the most diverse part of the state and having Spanish speakers, let alone DACA recipients, on staff can help reach communities that are afraid to speak to cops.”
“As passed, the budget doesn’t just remove Youngkin’s income tax rate reductions while keeping an expanded sales tax on certain digital transactions, it ups the ante. Their budget expands the sales tax to include business-to-business transactions which are typically untaxed because taxing them only results in “pyramiding” — piling on costs at every stage of completing the final consumer product, with those costs passed on to consumers,” writes Chris Braunlich at The Jefferson Journal.
Delegate Ian Lovejoy (R-22, Prince William County) was one of the few Virginia lawmakers who passed any new legislation on fentanyl. This deadly drug kills four to five Virginians a day.
The bill, awaiting Governor Glenn Youngkin’s signature, standardizes how children. “We’re seeing fentanyl dig deeper and earlier and younger into the school system.
