Democratic majorities in Virginia's House and Senate released their budget proposals for the 2025 legislative session Sunday.
At the cost of about $1 billion, every taxpaying Virginian would get $200 dollars, $400 for couples filing jointly, if Democrats in the majority of both legislative chambers get their way. It’s less targeted than Governor Glenn Youngkin’s rebates for lower income folks, and far from his hope to nix the car tax, offer no tax on tips or no tax on overtime.
“I want to help provide Virginians with more certainty and stability. In these uncertain times, this committee is different. We work together," President of the Senate Democrat Louise Lucas said during Sunday's budget presentation. "And while we might not agree on everything... there’s a lot in this budget for everyone to be proud and support.”
Both of Virginia’s legislative chambers pride themselves on—or at least pretend to— showing a unified effort in their budget proposals across party lines.
To that end, Republican Senate minority leader Ryan McDougle noted his side didn’t get everything they wanted, but they did use some of the state’s multi-billion-dollar surplus to give money back to Virginians.
“Even though we might have had different views on how to accomplish that we still are accomplishing that,” McDougle said.
The Mechanicsville Senator also said large spending priorities were shared enough to make both parties happy.
Other notable additions were increased spending in K-12 schools, an extension and increase of the standard deduction and over $600 million in new Medicaid spending.
Differences between the two are still being divined, but the Senate version does include language authorizing gas station gambling skill games in the state. The House budget does not contain such language.
"I genuinely believe we need to do all we can to help small businesses," Lucas said. The language is identical to a bill Democratic Senator Aaron Rouse got to the governor's desk in 2024. Despite bipartisan support, and tons of spending by the skill game industry, Youngkin vetoed that bill.
Perhaps predicting similar actions, Lucas qualified the budget language with: "we'll see what happens once it gets to the Governor's desk."
Senator Bryce Reeves also got $25 million in grants that localities can apply for to fix aging water systems. The request came after outages in his district last year, including two weeks without water in Orange County. But he said it could be used to aid Richmond with their recent water problems that caused a delay in the 2025 session as well.
Over in the House, Appropriations Chair Delegate Luke Torian said his chamber was trying to address the needs of all Virginia's citizens. He also said the two chambers worked more closely than they had in the past.
"We conferred with leadership for several weeks during the session," he said. "We're close on the same page, on a lot of the issues."
Ashley Kenneth with the left-leaning Commonwealth Institute for Fiscal Analysis was in the room for the senate presentation. She also noticed similarities between the two chambers.
"I think these two budgets show they there doing the work, and they're working together to support Virginia families," Kenneth said.
She pointed to both chambers removing the cap on support staff funding in K-12 schools. Set during the 2008 recession, advocates argue it's allowed the state to not "pay their fair share" for school support staff. She also applauded a new add-on for students with disabilities, calling it "a huge win."
Delegate Mark Sickles, appropriations vice chair, called the $1 billion in rebates a one-time solution.
"We've got a little extra cash right now," Sickles said. "We can afford to give some back to the taxpayers."
Concerns about the future Medicaid were also front of mind in both chambers. In the senate they developed a process that would ask the governor to call a special session to address any funding needs. But Sickles said they weren't panicking yet.
"If [Congress] makes drastic cuts, we'll have to come back to Richmond and deal with that," he said.
The massive document is still being poured through by advocates, reporters and the public alike, but a final version of Virginia's spending plan won't be realized until after the session ends in February and Governor Youngkin calls elected officials back for a reconvene session in April.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.