It's Lawmaking Time In the Old Dominion
For Kaine's First Session, Transportation Crowds Out Other Issues

By Chris L. Jenkins
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 5, 2006

RICHMOND -- Timothy M. Kaine plans to use the first legislative session of his four-year gubernatorial term to address Virginia's transportation problems, including traffic congestion in the Washington suburbs.

Meanwhile, he will probably not focus as intensely on some of the other goals he set for his term, such as his proposals for universal access to preschool education and tax relief for homeowners.

The Democratic governor-elect will be inaugurated on Jan. 14, three days after the General Assembly convenes for its 60-day session.

During the 2005 election campaign, Kaine developed several transportation proposals that he plans to present to the assembly.

"The governor-elect understands this is the key issue for Northern Virginia," said Kaine's press secretary, Delacey Skinner.

Kaine said local governments should have more power to control growth if they determine that it would overwhelm local roads.

"This will give local governments a way to curb some of the problems with traffic that they're seeing," Skinner said.

The idea is attractive to many people in Northern Virginia's fast-growing suburbs who believe that traffic congestion is affecting the quality of their lives. But such plans have run into stiff opposition from some local officials, lawmakers and people in the home-building industry. They say development would be pushed farther west and south to communities outside of Northern Virginia or into West Virginia.

In addition, opponents contend that local governments already have such power but choose not to use it. Kaine and some local officials dispute that, saying state law must be clarified to ensure that governments are explicitly given the power.

Kaine also pledged to address concerns about how the state is spending money raised for transportation programs by making certain the transportation trust fund is used only for transportation. He said he will not approve any new types of spending for transportation unless the trust fund is locked up.

That could be done through the lengthy process of amending the state constitution. An amendment must be approved by two separately elected legislatures and pass in a statewide referendum. Kaine has said he is open to other options; Skinner would not say what some of those alternatives might be.

Kaine also will begin putting together the pieces of another campaign promise that would affect the Washington suburbs: universal preschool. Kaine aides said that they are unsure whether the first parts of the plan will involve submitting legislation but added that the matter will probably not be central to the upcoming session.

"You don't want to get so broad that you lose your focus," Skinner said. "As big and as complex an issue as transportation is, it seems sensible to just try to focus on that."

Similarly, Kaine is not planning to immediately pursue a campaign promise that was of great interest in Northern Virginia: curbing the rapid rise in real estate taxes.

In March, Kaine called for a state constitutional amendment to allow local governments to exempt as much as 20 percent of a home's value from real estate taxes. Homeowners in the Washington suburbs had just received their tax bills, a number of which had more than doubled over the previous five years.

But Kaine's tax relief plan, like the transportation trust fund proposal, would require the assembly to pass a resolution supporting an amendment this year or next and then again in 2008, then present the amendment to voters.

Kaine aides said that because the governor-elect will focus much of his time on transportation, he will launch the tax relief effort next year.

Several lawmakers have said they will offer bills to restore the authority of local governments in Northern Virginia and the Hampton Roads area to use cameras that monitor whether drivers stop at red lights. Sen. Jeannemarie Devolites Davis (R-Fairfax) is drafting such legislation.

The law authorizing the cameras expired last year despite efforts by lawmakers from Northern Virginia to extend it. Advocates of the technology say that it helps reduce serious accidents, but opponents say that its benefits are not clear and that the cameras are an invasion of privacy.

Kaine believes local governments should have the authority to install the cameras if they want, putting him at odds with many Republican lawmakers from rural areas.

The debate -- so prominent in Northern Virginia -- over whether the state should impose more restrictions on illegal immigrants also will probably continue during the session.

Kaine's stance that the enforcement of immigration law is a federal responsibility is likely to put him in conflict with conservative legislators, such as Del. David B. Albo (R-Fairfax), who want to impose new state restrictions on illegal immigrants.

Albo is developing a proposal that would make it a violation of state law for an illegal immigrant to be in Virginia. He said he is having some difficulty working out language that would help law enforcement officers distinguish between legal and illegal immigrants.

"One thing I don't want to do is have legal immigrants sitting in jail for two months," Albo said. His bill is still being drafted.

Kaine is against any bill that would put more responsibility for enforcing immigration laws on local police. That issue came up in the campaign when his Republican opponent, Jerry W. Kilgore, entered the debate over whether to create a taxpayer-supported center for day laborers in Herndon.

Kilgore said that public funds should not be used to support facilities that might serve day laborers in the United States illegally.

Kaine said it was not the role of state or local governments to enforce federal laws on immigration.