ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, January 21, 1997 TAG: 9701210111
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: ROBERT LITTLE STAFF WRITER
Anti-abortion forces got a boost Monday from a minor legislative technicality - one that could be all they need to require parental notice when minors receive abortions.
A change in the way the parental notification bill was drafted this year means it will bypass the Senate Education and Health Committee. And that committee is perhaps the only thing that has kept it from becoming law in the past.
The bill proposed by Sen. Mark Earley, R-Chesapeake, would prohibit doctors from performing abortions on minors unless a parent or legal guardian has been notified. The idea dies every year in the General Assembly, usually at the hands of the Education and Health Committee.
Because Earley drafted the bill this year to change a section of state law dealing with juvenile courts, Senate Clerk Susan Clarke Schaar sent it to the Courts of Justice committee Monday night.
The courts committee should have the votes to pass parental notification. And every other stage of the legislative process - the full Senate and the House of Delegates - approved the bill last year.
"I don't take anything for granted, but it looks promising this year," Earley said.
Monday was the last day of the 1997 session for lawmakers to introduce legislation.
Other proposals would:
Business and jobs
* Set criteria for when carpal tunnel syndrome and other diseases are treated as occupational diseases for the purpose of workers' compensation.
* Allow an employer to obtain another medical examination of an employee claiming worker's compensation benefits.
* Require a plaintiff in an action alleging that a former employer gave false information to a prospective employer to prove that the defendant knew the information was false.
* Provide incentive grants to semiconductor chip manufacturers.
* Permit injured employees eligible for workers' compensation to receive employee-paid medical treatment from the physician of their choice.
* Give employers immunity for disclosing ex-employees' criminal conduct to potential new employers.
Taxes
* Cut the taxable price of a motor vehicle by the value of a traded-in vehicle.
* Trim the sales tax on motorboats from 4 percent to 2 percent.
* Phase out the sales tax on food over five years.
Education, family
* Allow sponsoring organizations or boards to require certification from state police that a volunteer work applicant has not been convicted of a felony or sex crime against a child.
* Allow public and private school boards to develop policies and regulations concerning the possession and use of beepers on school property.
* Allow pupils to carry beepers in school with the principal's OK.
* Broaden the scope of the state's class-size reduction program from grades kindergarten to third grade to kindergarten through fourth grade.
* Prohibit smoking inside public school buildings.
* Prevent school boards from levying fees on students for academic or instructional purposes.
* Require schools to teach ``standard English,'' not any form of English-using jargon, such as Ebonics.
* Declare that Virginia will not recognize same-sex marriages entered into in other states and jurisdictions.
* Allow creation of charter schools.
* Provide limited civil immunity to public school teachers who give emergency first aid and, in another proposal, who discipline students.
* Require divorcing parents to attend a four-hour educational program and, when custody or visitation is at issue, requiring them to submit a parenting plan to the court.
* Increase the penalty for passing a stopped school bus from $50 to $250.
Public safety
* Require people served with a protective order in stalking and abuse cases to surrender all firearms within 24 hours.
* Require a complete set of fingerprints to be included with concealed weapons permit applications.
* Requiring personal water craft operators to complete a boating safety course.
* Make eluding a police officer a felony.
* Make a third prostitution offense a felony.
* Make a third drunken driving offense committed within five years of the first offense a felony.
* Raising fines for parking in a handicapped space to not less than $100 and not more than $500.
* Require state Fire Marshal's Office to conduct annual inspections of public college dormitories.
* Require sprinklers in all college dormitories over six stories that don't have them, affecting 13 buildings and 7,200 students.
Public life
* Create a system of public financing for Virginia elections. Candidates for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general could receive public funds if they agreed to cap individual contributions to their campaign at $500. The limit would be $250 for General Assembly members.
* Create the Judicial Nominations Commission to make nonbinding recommendations to the General Assembly for candidates for judgeships.
* Amend the state constitution to remove the confidentiality requirement of the Judicial Inquiry and Review Commission.
* Add a procedure for the restoration of the right to vote for any person convicted of a felony in Virginia who completes their sentence.
* Require that government officials disclose gifts with a value greater than $25 and requiring an estimate of compensation for government officials who represent businesses before government agencies.
* Create a study committee to work on changing the state song.
* Repeal laws granting immunity from arrest during the session to legislators, clerks, the lieutenant governor and certain staff.
* Delete the constitutional provision that prevents the criminal arrest of a legislator while the assembly is in session.
* Prohibit the governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general and legislators from soliciting or accepting campaign contributions during the legislative session.
Health and welfare
* Require insurers who pay for mastectomies to also pay for reconstructive breast surgery.
* Require that mastectomy patients be allowed a 48-hour hospital stay.
* Direct HMOs to provide members 24-hour access to medical care or 24-hour phone access to a doctor.
* Allow health policies to provide coverage for live-in domestic partners.
* Mandate the coverage of physician-administered acupuncture under state-regulated health insurance policies, health service plans and HMOs.
* Broaden the category of low-income tenants who receive reduced rent to include people who have been homeless in the past year.
* Prohibit discrimination in employment and housing on the basis of sexual orientation.
- The Associated Press contributed to this report.
LENGTH: Long : 137 lines KEYWORDS: GENERAL ASSEMBLY 1997by CNB