Legislative Support Commission; publication of House and Senate voting records. (HB778)
Introduced By
Del. Jim LeMunyon (R-Oak Hill)
Progress
✓ |
Introduced |
✗ |
Passed Committee |
✓ |
Passed House |
☐ |
Passed Senate |
☐ |
Signed by Governor |
☐ |
Became Law |
Description
Publication of House and Senate voting records. Provides that, beginning with the 2011 Regular Session of the General Assembly, the Legislative Support Commission, through the Division of Legislative Automated Systems, from information and data provided by the Clerk of the House and the Clerk of the Senate, must post on the electronic legislative information system (LIS) the recorded committee and floor votes of each member of the General Assembly on legislation acted upon in each house. The information pertaining to the voting records of legislative members must be electronically accessible to state agencies, political subdivisions, and the public. Read the Bill »
Outcome
Bill Has Failed
History
Date | Action |
---|---|
01/12/2010 | Committee |
01/12/2010 | Prefiled and ordered printed; offered 01/13/10 10101578D |
01/12/2010 | Referred to Committee on Rules |
02/11/2010 | Reported from Rules with substitute (12-Y 3-N) (see vote tally) |
02/11/2010 | Committee substitute printed 10105353D-H1 |
02/14/2010 | Read first time |
02/15/2010 | Read second time |
02/15/2010 | Committee substitute agreed to 10105353D-H1 |
02/15/2010 | Engrossed by House - committee substitute HB778H1 |
02/16/2010 | Read third time and passed House (86-Y 13-N) |
02/16/2010 | VOTE: --- PASSAGE (86-Y 13-N) (see vote tally) |
02/17/2010 | Constitutional reading dispensed |
02/17/2010 | Referred to Committee on Rules |
03/05/2010 | Continued to 2011 in Rules (14-Y 2-N) (see vote tally) |
Comments
What this bill proposes to do (if I understand it properly) is add another dimension to the data available on the General Assembly's website. Right now, it's possible to look at who voted how on a given bill, but it's not possible to look at a history of how a given legislator voted. That is, to see how a legislator has voted over the course of a year, one would need to look at every single vote held in the legislature, an exhausting task.
We've solved this problem on Richmond Sunlight by gathering up every single vote and reindexing it by legislator, which is how we provide a file for every legislator (available on each legislator's page) to download their voting record.
It seems to me that Del. LeMunyon is seeking to have the legislature replicate this functionality on the General Assembly's website. Which is really great, and here's hoping that it passes. It strikes me as unlikely that it'll ever make it out of the Rules Committee—I expect it'll sit there, never voted on, until the end of session. That way it will remain difficult for the public to figure out legislators' voting records, but nobody will have to take the blame for voting against it.