RICHMOND – As the House of Delegates prepares to debate legislation for the state to intervene in the financial affairs of “fiscally distressed” localities in the Crater Planning District of Virginia, opposition to the measure continues to mount.

On Thursday, the Crater Planning District Commission and the Hopewell Democratic Committee sent letters to lawmakers echoing concerns raised by members of Hopewell City Council that the bill as recently amended unfairly targets cities in the district such as Hopewell, Petersburg and Emporia. While the CPDC letter calls for the bill to be carried over for study, the Democratic letter wants the bill rejected outright for a reason other than the isolation of the district.

The committee accused the bill’s Senate sponsor, fellow Democrat Lashrecse Aird of Petersburg, of not giving due diligence to opposition during the deliberation process.

“This was not a democratic process led by a fellow African American Democrat,” the letter stated. “This goes against the core values and principles of every Democrat, especially African Americans who have fought hard to allow us to have our voices heard in this country.”

In short, the committee said, Aird pushed the bill through “without details, opposition, or fact checks.”

A message left for Aird was not immediately returned by publication time.

Aird’s bill codifies an existing state budget practice that would allow the state Auditor of Public Accounts to deem a locality on the precipice of fiscal distress if the locality has had problems with the required annual audits it must submit to the state for review. Those problems can either be a record of not receiving a “clean” opinion – one with no problems cited – from the state auditor on the reports or a simple unwillingness to submit the reports. The nonpartisan Virginia Commission on Local Government would then appoint an emergency fiscal manager to take over the task of getting the locality’s books in order, essentially assuming control of the locality’s bank accounts.

Senate Bill 645 cleared the Senate, but it was amended in the House Counties, Cities & Towns Committee to add a caveat that would only apply the process to the Crater Planning District that extends from the Tri-City area southward to the state line.

The committee vote was 19-3, which put the bill on the House floor in a contested bloc. It is due to be debated on the House floor sometime Friday morning.

Hopewell City Council sent a letter to the legislature Wednesday opposing the amendment, calling it made the legislation “unfair, unjust, and severely overreaching.” Most of the council previously opposed the bill prior to the House amendment.

“The current language modification to SB645 suggests that the bill is inappropriate for the entire state; however, it’s best for localities in District 19 (Crater Planning),” the Hopewell Democrats wrote.

The letter from the CPDC was far less critical of the process than the Democratic Committee letter. Instead, it suggested a legislative study committee be established to work out kinks in the language surrounding the process covering the labeling of the locality as fiscally distressed and the appointment of the emergency manager to take over the money decisions.

“We respectfully request that you recommend that this fiscal stress of local government be studied in a [Joint Legislative Audit Review Commission] study/review prior to any action by the commonwealth and apply to all regions of the state,” read the letter, signed by Jay Ellington and Michelle Johnson, CPDC’s executive director and chairperson, respectively.

The measure also has been opposed by the Virginia Treasurers Association who claims it would give an appointed official the right to take over duties of a constitutional officer directly elected by the locality’s voters. Aird said the bill would only grant the manager temporary control that would be turned back over to the treasurer once the crisis is resolved.

The bill was introduced following last year’s showdown between Hopewell City Council and the Youngkin administration over the level of state intervention into Hopewell’s ledger controls. Hopewell had not received a clean audit from the state since 2015 and had not actually submitted the paperwork since 2019.

Hopewell shunned the state’s assistance in favor of hiring the Robert Bobb Group to help sort things out.

The House of Delegates is scheduled to convene at 10 a.m. Friday.

Bill Atkinson (he/him/his) is an award-winning journalist who covers breaking news, government and politics. Reach him at batkinson@progress-index.com or on X (formerly known as Twitter) at @BAtkinson_PI.

This article originally appeared on The Progress-Index: Local groups write letters opposing Hopewell fiscal-distress bill