Twenty-five or so local stalwarts turned out on a cold Saturday morning at 9 a.m. to engage Delegate Mitch Van Yahres (D-Charlottesville) and Senator-elect Creigh Deeds (D-Bath) in a discussion about their priorities for the 2002 General Assembly session.

Liz Kutchai said that her biggest concern was regional cooperation. She noted that "we are saddled with this horrible government structure in Virginia of the city being separated from the county -- unlike the other 49 states" -- and wanted to know what Deeds and Van Yahres could do about it.

Deeds said that every community in his district has had to work around it, citing Rockbridge, Buena Vista and Lexington as being good examples of communities which have worked at equitable revenue and cost sharing and citing Alleghany as an example of communities working together to create a regional economic authority.

Mitch Van Yahres said that the problem goes back to a dinosaur form of government which existed at a time when annexation was still possible. Now what you have is suburbs, cities, towns and rural areas all with competing interests [competing with each other].

In our own area, you have Charlottesville, Albemarle and the University of Virginia all with different sets of problems and they will just have to learn to work together on a regional basis. As for changing the government structure, it's not likely to happen. The state simply does not want to give up the power.

Francis Fife asked Van Yahres and Deeds to support the Virginia Housing Development Authority [VHDA]'s consideration of a change of rules which would extend state loans to nontraditional families, including homosexual couples and single parents, allowing them to pool their resources to purchase a home.

In the 2001 session of the General Assembly, a bill was introduced into the Senate [SB 1002] to require VHDA to develop regulations providing that single-family mortgage loans may be made to more than one person if the persons to whom the loan is to be made are living together in the dwelling as a single, nonprofit housekeeping unit. This bill failed and now VHDA is considering making such a change on their own.

Fife noted that while this change is supported by real estate agents, developers, lenders, nonprofits and others in the industry, it is coming under attack from some conservatives, including Delegate Robert Marshall (R - Prince William) and from the Family Foundation.

He asked Deeds and Van Yahres to support the change of rules, to which they agreed.

Claire Smith asked Van Yahres and Deeds what legislation would be proposed in the next session to help the poor, such as health insurance.

Will Harvey noted that last year Virginia failed to take advantage of federal monies available for uninsured children, monies which in turn were used by other states.

Deeds said that the best legislation can be introduced but it will not matter if we don't do a better job of outreach to get people to use it.

Both Deeds and Van Yahres thought that the governor-elect and his administration will be more sensitive to health care issues.

Van Yahres added that it will be important to convince the administration that helping the poor is the right thing to do.

"Battle lines will be drawn on whose priorities will win out when programs have to be cut," said Van Yahres. "I believe the poor, people who can't take care of themselves, must be given priority."

Jim Heilman asked that Deeds and Van Yahres support a legislative proposal expected to be introduced by Del. James Almand (D-Arlington) to allow other compelling evidence of innocence beyond the 21-day limit.

Deeds said that he had supported bills introduced by Almand in the past [HB 2345?] but that he has not seen a copy of the bill to which Jim Heilman refers.

Van Yahres noted that the committee structure, size and composition will be changing at the opening of the session. This will determine which legislative proposals go to which committees and the ability of legislators to have an impact on what comes out of committee. Van Yahres was not certain what committees he would be on.

Deeds thought that he would probably be placed on Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources and on Courts of Justice in the Senate and would not given Emily Couric's seat on the Education and Health Committee.

Other items of concern discussed at the forum included transportation, volunterism, public health, regulation of power plants, energy conservation, civil liberties and tax reform and tax increases.

Lane Kneedler noted that most tax reform proposals entertained by the Virginia General Assembly have been revenue neutral.

Mitch Van Yahres said that he believes we may need to consider an actual tax increase to pay for needed improvements in education, roads and health care once the economy turns around.