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byline: Katharine DeRosa | Capital News Service

GOP lawmakers push to protect workers who decline COVID vaccines

RICHMOND, Va. – Lawmakers narrowly passed a bill this month that would allow people fired for refusing a COVID-19 vaccine to receive unemployment benefits if no other misconduct took place.

The measure advanced from the House of Delegates on a 51-48 party line vote and was assigned to a Senate committee on Feb. 10.

The bill was one of several introduced by Republicans this session to protect and defend workers who do not want to get the COVID-19 vaccine.

Del. Kathy J. Byron, R-Forest, introduced House Bill 1201 to protect the unvaccinated from potential discrimination. The bill adds a line to the current unemployment misconduct law stating refusal to receive a COVID-19 vaccine does not hinder someone from obtaining unemployment benefits.

Byron said her bill is not an endorsement for or against the vaccine. She is a proponent of the COVID-19 vaccine but said vaccination is a personal choice.

“There are many reasons why people have declined to take it, due to religious reasons and other reasons,” Byron said in a February subcommittee meeting.

The bill preserves a worker’s right to make decisions about their own health, Byron said. However, she said the legislation doesn’t prevent employers from requiring employees to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.

“They are not getting purposely fired so they can go home and collect unemployment,” Byron said. “We need to make sure they have the ability to have benefits until they find another position.”

There is currently no explicit ruling as to whether refusing a COVID-19 vaccine without reason qualifies as misconduct, according to Norfolk-based employment lawyer John M. Bredehoft. Reasons to refuse the vaccine include medical injury, disability, or a “sincere religious objection,” he said.

“Knowing what the rule is has a definite value independent of what the rule would be,” Bredehoft said.

Generally, if someone gets fired, they get unemployment benefits and if they quit, they don’t receive the benefits, Bredehoft said. However, the bill isn’t clear enough, Bredehoft said.

“Let’s be clear. Nobody gets fired for refusal to get vaccinated – period,” Bredehoft said. “People get fired for refusal to be vaccinated when the company has a policy requiring them to be vaccinated.”

Nicole Riley, deputy secretary of labor for Gov. Glenn Youngkin, spoke at the subcommittee meeting. She said the governor’s administration supports the bill.

Virginians have received over 15 million doses of various COVID-19 vaccines, and 71% of the population is fully vaccinated, according to the Virginia Department of Health. Over 80% of the adult population 18 and up is fully vaccinated. A person is considered fully vaccinated by the VDH when they received one dose of a single dose vaccine and both doses of a two dose vaccine.

Del. Don L. Scott, D-Portsmouth, was the only person to question Byron during the subcommittee meeting. No delegates asked questions during subsequent meetings. Scott confirmed with Byron that Youngkin’s administration supports giving unemployment benefits to those who were fired for refusing a COVID-19 vaccine.

The Senate Commerce and Labor committee expected to read the bill meets on Mondays. The bill is one of approximately 70 House measures waiting for the committee’s action.

Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly referred to Nicole Riley as the state director of the National Federation of Independent Businesses. She is now the deputy secretary of labor for Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Capital News Service regrets the error.

Capital News Service is a program of Virginia Commonwealth University’s Robertson School of Media and Culture. Students in the program provide state government coverage for a variety of media outlets in Virginia.

Va. bills advance to halt minimum wage increases

RICHMOND, Va. – Two bills introduced by Republicans to halt future minimum wage increases have advanced to the House floor.

Minimum wage in Virginia increased to $11 an hour on Jan. 1 and is set to increase to $12 next January.

The House Commerce and Energy committee approved House Bill 320, introduced by Del. Nicholas J. Freitas, R-Culpeper, and HB 296, introduced by Del. Joseph P. McNamara, R-Roanoke. Both bills would eliminate scheduled future increases to the current minimum wage law.

McNamara’s bill was amended to include payment for health care benefits as long as the hourly minimum wage is not below $11. Sen. Mark J. Peake, R-Lynchburg, introduced a similar bill in the Senate, which was subsequently shot down by Democrats.

Both House measures advanced out of committee on a 12-9 vote along party lines, with Republicans holding the majority.

“I know what it is to work for minimum wage,” Freitas said during the subcommittee meeting. “In fact, there’s probably a couple times I was working for a little bit less than it; I was actually happy to have that job.”

Increasing the minimum wage would take away people’s ability to bargain with employers for a wage they are willing to accept, according to Freitas.

Freitas said the state government should not “arbitrarily” increase the minimum wage. He told the panel, when asked, that he does not plan on rolling back the current minimum wage, due to recent inflation.

The state’s minimum wage was $7.25 prior to May 1, 2021. This is in line with the federal minimum wage of $7.25, which has not changed since 2009.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics released two consumer price index reports in late 2021 that included parts of Virginia. One included the Washington metropolitan area. The other report is for the South region, which includes Virginia.

Consumer price index is a measure of change over time of the prices consumers pay for goods and services. Both reports show the index rising.

The index increased in a year by almost 5.8% in the Washington metropolitan area, according to the BLS report. The index in the South increased by 7.4% in a year.

“When inflation has actually moved a job past a particular level, at that point you’ve negated the own minimum wage raise that you currently have,” Freitas said. “To keep it $11 at this point achieves the objective I’m having.”

Freitas said he questions the idea that a higher minimum wage fosters an environment where people and businesses can create the “maximum amount of jobs that you can get that people would actually want.”

A few House Democrats questioned Freitas as he presented the bill. Del. Jeion A. Ward, D-Hampton, said she believes it would be wrong to end the minimum wage increases. Ward also said she wants the public to have a chance to voice their opinion on the matter.

“When you talk about kitchen table issues, this is what people are talking about at their table,” Ward said. “It’s those small families, those families that work minimum wage, and I don’t think they’re saying, ‘This is too much.’”

The state’s current minimum wage law has a reenactment clause. Next January, the minimum wage automatically bumps up to $12 an hour. However, the General Assembly must pass the measure again prior to July 1, 2024 for the pay increase to $13.50 and then to $15 to remain in effect. Lawmakers could make changes to the bill during the process. The commissioner of Labor and Industry would establish the adjusted state hourly minimum wage if lawmakers fail to pass the bill again.

Kim Bobo, executive director for the Virginia Interfaith Center for Public Policy, spoke against the bill at the subcommittee meeting. One of the main focuses of the center is eliminating poverty, Bobo said.

“The largest number of people and families in poverty have family members who are working, and they frankly just don’t earn enough to get themselves out of poverty,” Bobo said in an interview. “The best way really to tackle that is to raise the minimum wage.”

The Republican Party branded itself as pro-business during the gubernatorial election, Bobo said. However, she believes there’s a “disconnect” between the party and working class families.

“I would think that the Republican Party and the new governor ought to look at these bread-and-butter issues like minimum wage, like paid sick days,” Bobo said.

One percent of hourly workers over the age of 25 earned minimum wage in 2020, according to the latest available data from the BLS. Women were more likely to earn minimum wage than men in 2020.

“I thought Freitas’ main argument that ‘Oh, this is really going to help teenage workers and people get into the workforce’ was really very deceptive in terms of who’s really on minimum wage,” Bobo said.

About 50% of hourly workers earning minimum wage in 2020 were under the age of 25, according to the BLS. Southern states had the highest percentages of people working minimum wage. About 3% of Virginia’s hourly workers earn minimum wage or less.

“A lot of young people are in college,” Bobo said. “If the minimum wage is $15 versus $7.25, there’s a huge difference in terms of their ability to make their ends meet.”

The House gave both bills a first reading on Jan. 27. If either bill passed in the House, Bobo said she is convinced the measure would die in the majority Democratic Senate.

“I’m not going through the full-court effort on it,” Bobo said.

Capital News Service is a program of Virginia Commonwealth University’s Robertson School of Media and Culture. Students in the program provide state government coverage for a variety of media outlets in Virginia.

Virginia public transit grapples with reduced ridership, zero fare

RICHMOND, Va. — Virginia public transit systems from Northern Virginia to Hampton Roads are looking for a path forward after losing riders and revenue during the pandemic. Some transit systems have been harder hit than others.

“We are serving a market of essential workers that can’t stay home; they have to use our service,” said Greater Richmond Transit Co. CEO Julie Timm during a recent presentation.

Gov. Ralph Northam issued a state of emergency in March of last year in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The move prompted limits on public and private gatherings, telework policies and mandates to wear masks in public, although some restrictions have eased.

GRTC faced a “potentially catastrophic budget deficit” since eliminating fares last March in response to the pandemic and reductions in public funding starting in July of this year, according to the organization’s annual report. The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act funding and Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation emergency funding covered the deficit, according to the report.

The transit system lost about 20% of riders when comparing March to November 2019 with the same 9-month period in 2020. Overall, fiscal year-to-date ridership on local-fixed routes decreased the least (-16%), compared to the bus-rapid transit line (-49%) and express routes (-84%), according to GRTC data. Local-fixed routes had a 7% increase from March 2020 to March 2021.

GRTC eliminated fares in March 2020 to avoid “close interactions at bus fareboxes,” Timm said in a statement at the time. CARES Act funding made the move possible. GRTC will offer free rides until the end of June.

GRTC will need an additional $5.3 million when federal funding ceases to continue operating with zero fare, Timm said. Zero fare can be supported through the third round of federal stimulus money and Department of Rail and Public Transportation funding, advertising revenue and other funding sources, Timm said.

“This is the conversation and it’s a hard conversation,” Timm said. “To fare or not to fare?”

GRTC serves a majority Black and majority female riders, according to the 2020 annual report. Commuters account for over half the trips taken on GRTC buses and almost three-quarters of commuter trips are five or more days per week. Nearly 80% of riders have a household income of less than $50,000 per year.

GRTC spends about $1.7 million to collect fares annually, according to Timm. Eliminating fares is more optimal than collecting fares, Timm said in March. She believes in zero fare operation because the bus rates act as a regressive tax, which takes a large percentage of income from low-income earners.

Free fares could lead to overcrowding on buses, opponents argue. However, Timm said that’s not a good reason to abolish the initiative.

“If we have a demand for more transit, I don’t think the answer is to put fares out to reduce the ridership,” Timm said. “I think the answer is to find additional funding sources and commitment to increase service to meet that demand.”

GRTC will continue to evaluate the effectiveness of the zero fare model, according to Timm.

“We’ll have a lot of conversations post-COVID about how we consider transit, how we invest in transit and how that investment in transit lifts up our entire region, not just our riders but all of our economy for a stronger marketplace,” Timm said.

GRTC added another bus route as the COVID-19 pandemic hit last March. Route 111 runs in Chesterfield from John Tyler Community College to the Food Lion off Chippenham Parkway. The route surpassed ridership expectations despite being launched during the pandemic, according to the annual report.

GRTC also will receive additional funding from the newly established Central Virginia Transit Authority. The entity will provide dedicated transportation funding for Richmond and eight other localities. The authority will draw money from a regional sales and use tax, as well as a gasoline and diesel fuel tax. GRTC is projected to receive $20 million in funds from the authority in fiscal year 2021. The next fiscal year it receives $28 million and funding will reach $30 million by fiscal year 2026.

These funds cannot be used to assist in zero fare operation, Timm said.

Almost 350,000 riders boarded the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority buses per day on average in 2019, which includes passengers in Northern Virginia. That number dipped to 91,000 average daily boardings in 2020, according to Metro statistics.

Metro’s $4.7 billion budget will maintain service at 80-85% of pre-pandemic levels, according to a Metro press release. Federal relief funds totaling almost $723 million filled Metro’s funding gap due to low ridership.

“The impact of the pandemic on ridership and revenue forced us to consider drastic cuts that would have been necessary absent federal relief funding,” stated Metro Board Chair Paul C. Smedberg. “Thankfully, the American Rescue Plan Act has provided a lifeline for Metro to serve customers and support the region’s economic recovery.”

Hampton Roads Transit buses served 10.7 million people in 2019 and 6.2 million people in 2020. The decline has carried into 2021. Almost 1.6 million passengers took HRT transit buses in January and February 2020 and just over 815,000 have in 2021, resulting in a nearly 50% decrease. HRT spokesperson Tom Holden said he can’t explain why HRT bus services saw a higher drop off than GRTC buses.

“We had a substantial decline in boardings in all our modes of transportation just as every transit agency in the U.S. did,” Holden said.

HRT operated with a zero fare system from April 10 to July 1, 2020. Ridership had a slight uptick from April to October, aside from an August dip. Fares for all HRT transit services were budgeted for 14.2% of HRT’s revenue for Fiscal Year 2020.

“We are hopeful that with vaccinations becoming more widespread, the overall economy will begin to recover, and we’ll see rates increase,” Holden said.

Capital News Service is a program of Virginia Commonwealth University’s Robertson School of Media and Culture. Students in the program provide state government coverage for a variety of media outlets in Virginia.