Senate Rules Committee strikes, refers and tables multiple items; ceremonial portrait resolution adopted

The Senate Rules Committee met in Richmond and disposed of a mix of procedural and substantive items. Committee members voted to strike Senate Bill 463 from the docket after a request from Senator Roem; the motion carried by recorded board vote (Ayes 13, No 0). Several bills and a resolution were re-referred to the Senate Finance Committee, including Senate Bill 280 and Senate Resolution 6, each recorded as Ayes 14, No 0. On the docket the committee also allowed several bills to "go by for the day."

The committee took three commemorative resolutions in a single block — a resolution honoring Jean Vincent, a resolution designating March 14 as Black Midwives Day, and a resolution designating the first Thursday in May as the National Day of Prayer in Virginia — and approved them by voice vote.

Later in the session the panel passed Senate Bill 646 "by indefinitely" following debate about cost and staffing; the motion to pass it by indefinitely carried (Ayes 11, No 3). The committee considered but did not report Senate Bill 549 (the motion to report failed, recorded as Ayes 4, No 10).

The committee adopted Senate Joint Resolution 12, with an amendment adding consultation with clerks of the Senate and House, authorizing the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Commission to commission, frame and place a portrait of Yvonne Von Miller in the Capitol. With that adoption the chair closed the meeting.