Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, March 2, 1990 TAG: 9003023319
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
The Senate Committee on Education and Health toughened a House-passed public smoking bill at the suggestion of Sen. Thomas J. Michie Jr., D-Albemarle, who is trying to get his own bill out of a House committee.
Michie said he and the sponsor of the House bill, Del. Richard Cranwell, D-Vinton, have made their bills more similar.
"The compromises are not that far apart," Michie said. But Cranwell declined to endorse Michie's changes in his bill.
Michie's version would require substantial no-smoking areas in schools, medical facilities and stores of more than 20,000 square feet statewide while Cranwell's does not.
Michie would prefer to leave workplace smoking rules up to the employer in localities that adopt a model local ordinance outlined in the bill. Cranwell would have the decision rest with the majority of the employees.
They also differ on how the smoking law should be enforced. Michie would leave regulation with the Health Department while Cranwell would place it with local governments.
Anthony F. Troy, a lobbyist for the Tobacco Institute, said Michie has "come a long way" in making his bill more modest. But he objected to letting the Health Department enforce the law, saying the department would have the power to make smoking regulations even tougher. Michie said he would forbid that under the bill and the committee passed the measure 7-4.
The House Counties, Cities and Towns Committee will take up Michie's bill today.
In other action:
The Education and Health Committee also voted 10-2 for a bill that would require children entering public kindergarten turn 5 by Sept. 30. Under current law, children who turn 5 between Oct. 1 and Dec. 31 can enter kindergarten if they pass a readiness test.
But the bill's sponsor, Del. James H. Dillard II, R-Fairfax, said too many children have been placed in kindergarten before they are ready.
"The children who are in early are suffering a disadvantage," he said. "They're having a harder time in school."
The bill would allow younger children to enter kindergarten in 19 school divisions that offer two-tier kindergarten programs. Dillard said he hoped his bill would encourage more divisions to offer programs for 4-year-olds.
The House of Delegates overwhelmingly rejected a bill to continue tolls on the Norfolk-Virginia Beach Toll Road after the bonds that financed the road are paid off next year.
Sen. C.A. Holland, D-Virginia Beach, proposed that the tolls be continued and the money used to finance a southeast expressway through the resort city.
The House Rules Committee approved a resolution establishing a commission to study future higher education needs in Northern Virginia. Included on the 15-member commission would be members of the boards of visitors of George Mason University, the University of Virginia and Virginia Tech.
"We made a policy decision - and I think the correct policy decision - in the 1960s to keep our colleges relatively small," said Sen. Hunter B. Andrews, D-Hampton. "Studies have shown that beginning in 1995, two states on the East Coast - Virginia and Florida - will have a tremendous upswing in high school graduates. We're trying in an orderly way to ancticipate our needs."
by CNB