Legislative Priorities
Every year, the City prepares a set of Legislative Priorities, its official wishlist for next year's General Assembly in Richmond. You can see the City's draft Legislative Priorities here.
We are asking for a short list of items to be added to the priorities for 2026. These include requests to support:
- Legislation to give localities the option to set stronger standards to preserve and expand tree canopy
- Staffing for the Virginia Department of Forestry's Urban and Community Forestry program, threatened by federal funding cuts
- Increased funding for the Virginia Conservation Assistance Program (VCAP), Virginia Agricultural Cost-Share (VACS), as well as sufficient staffing in Soil and Water Conservation Districts to implement these programs.
- Legislative initiatives that protect non-data center customers from rising electricity costs caused by the need to expand electricity infrastructure to support large data centers
- Legislation to have the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) establish regulations on PFAS and PFOA "Forever Chemicals,” to protect residents from water and soil pollution
- Legislation to enable localities to prohibit hunting from state waters adjacent to any subdivisions of a city that are so heavily populated as to make such hunting dangerous to the residents
The draft document is being presented to the City Council at their Work Session on Tuesday, Oct 28. There is an opportunity for Citizen Comments on Non-Agenda items later that evening at their Council's regular meeting starting at 6:30 pm. See the meeting agenda at https://chesapeake.granicus.com/DocumentViewer.php?file=chesapeake_f24dd328fe7f013b978571bffdc7204b.pdf&view=1