Every year begins with questions. Here are 24 of them for 2024.
- Who will be elected president? That question will dominate much of the year, so we might as well get it out of the way first.
- Will Donald Trump get convicted of something? That’s not Virginia-focused and I like to keep my columns focused on Virginia, but it’s hard to avoid this one because it’s tied into so many other questions.
- Who will win the 5th District Republican nomination? Rep. Bob Good, R-Campbell County and the new head of the House Freedom Caucus, faces a challenge from state Sen.-elect John McGuire, R-Goochland County, who accuses Good of being insufficiently loyal to … Trump. That primary promises to be wild.
- Who will be elected to Congress in November? U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Virginia, is up for reelection and faces a parade of little-known Republican contenders so far. Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-Henrico County, is leaving her 7th District seat to run for governor, so that’s up for grabs. Rep. Jen Kiggans, R-Virginia Beach, is in a district that’s going to be competitive no matter what. Rep. Jennifer Wexton, D-Fairfax County, is retiring for health reasons. That means we’re guaranteed to get at least two new members of our congressional delegation; will we get any more?
- What will Gov. Glenn Youngkin do? While all these national elections are going on, Youngkin still has a state government to run. He also faces the challenge of a Democratic General Assembly. What would he like his legacy to be?
- What will the General Assembly do? Democrats have regained full control of the legislature. In the House, we’ll have a new Speaker: Don Scott, D-Portsmouth, our first Black speaker. The Senate will be under new management because both party leaders have retired. Now Scott Surovell, D-Fairfax County, will be the Senate majority leader, and Ryan McDougle, R-Hanover County, will be the Senate minority leader. We’ll also have a major remaking of the Senate Finance Committee because so many members left, willingly or otherwise.
- What will be in the state’s budget? This is a budget year, when the legislature will pass a two-year spending plan. In recent years, that’s become harder and harder to get done on time. How will a Republican governor and a Democratic legislature manage the task? The governor, for instance, has proposed a combination of income tax reductions and sales tax increases, which Democrats certainly don’t seem keen on.
- How many constitutional amendments will the legislature set in motion? Democrats have talked about at least three constitutional amendments: one to enshrine the right to an abortion in the state constitution, another to restore civil rights to convicted felons once they’ve served their time, a third to repeal the part of the constitution that bans same-sex marriage. That provision has been rendered moot by the U.S. Supreme Court but some fear that if the high court ever reversed its ruling, then the state’s ban would come back into force. Constitutional amendments in Virginia involve a multiyear process, so even if Democrats passed these now, the earliest they’d go to a referendum would be 2026.
- Will Virginia legalize a retail market for cannabis? The Democrats who are about to take over the General Assembly would like to, but Youngkin so far hasn’t been keen on the idea. The problem is Virginia now exists in a legal gray area. The state has legalized personal possession of small amounts of weed but hasn’t set up a legal way to buy it or sell it, so right now the only sales are taking place on the black market. Proponents of a legal retail market hope that some Republicans will see a regulated market not as enabling weed sales but as cracking down on drug dealers.
- Will something big land at the Southern Virginia Megasite? This may become a perennial question until the answer is finally “yes.” The 3,528-acre site came achingly close in May 2022 to landing an 8,100-job Hyundai electric vehicle battery factory that went to Georgia instead. Will its time come this year?
- Will Virginia get its first on-shore wind farm? Another perennial question. The Rocky Forge wind farm was first proposed for a mountaintop north of Eagle Rock in Botetourt County in 2015, but so far hasn’t happened. If and when it does, it will be the state’s first.
- Will we see any movement on a small modular nuclear reactor in Virginia? Yes, maybe another perennial question. Youngkin wants to see one — specifically in Southwest Virginia. Dominion Energy has said it’s likely to build a fleet of them someday, but hasn’t said where (and has space available for some at its existing nuclear facilities in Louisa County and Surry County). There’s lots of excited talk in the nuclear energy community that small reactors are the next big thing, but so far we don’t have any underway in the United States (although some are under construction elsewhere). Will 2024 see any action on this front?
- Will the Mountain Valley Pipeline get completed? It looks likely but we still need to ask.
- Will the Atlantic Coast Conference remain intact? The college football landscape was rocked last year by some spectacular realignments: the Pac-12 conference basically exploding, with the biggest name schools departing for the Big Ten. Others decamped for the Big 12. Meanwhile, the ACC added three schools, none of them anywhere near the Atlantic Coast. The big driver behind all this is the widening gap in television revenues between conferences, with the Big Ten and the Southeastern Conference getting the most and others falling behind. A group of schools — including Virginia Tech — made some noises last year about wanting more revenues, prompting speculation that the ACC might blow apart. Florida State has been the most vocal about wanting to get into a higher-paying conference. For now, the ACC is held together by a legal agreement that requires steep exit fees, but late last year Florida State filed suit to challenge that “grant of rights.” Something will happen on that this year, we just don’t know what. All this matters to Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia.
- How much more turmoil will the Lynchburg City Council endure? The council’s newly installed Republican majority broke into two factions from day one last year. Meanwhile, council member Marty Misjuns became such a lightning rod that even most of his fellow Republicans on the council voted to censure him for the rude way he has treated people. Will that be the end of such bad behavior?
- Who will get elected to the Lynchburg City Council? The four council members elected by ward will be up for reelection: Democrats Mary Jane Dolan and Sterling Wilder and Republicans Chris Faraldi and Jeff Helgeson. Expect to see a primary challenge to Faraldi by a more conservative faction among Lynchburg Republicans who had tried to censure him as part of the ongoing factional fighting in the Hill City.
- What progress will there be toward an inland port in Southwest Virginia? The General Assembly last year put up some money for a study and land acquisition. Will money be found to actually build such a facility? For those not in the know, an inland port is a big rail terminal where goods headed for the port at Hampton Roads can be collected and processed so they aren’t delayed there come loading time. Likewise, goods can be off-loaded at the port and then sent straight to the inland port for processing. The goal is to speed up loading and unloading at the port — and also to create jobs inland. The state’s existing inland port near Front Royal is said to be responsible for up to 8,000 jobs in trucking and warehousing in the northern Shenandoah Valley.
- Who will run for statewide office in 2025? We already have two candidates announced for the Democratic nomination for governor next year: Spanberger and Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney. By year’s end, we should have a sense of who’s running on the Republican side, as well as who’s running for the other offices.
- Who will get elected Roanoke mayor? Mayor Sherman Lea has announced he’s not seeking reelection.
- Who will be elected to the Roanoke City Council? Three other seats will be on the ballot: the ones now held by Stephanie Moon-Reynolds, Luke Priddy and Trish White-Boyd.
- Will Kaine succeed in his quest to make Pell Grants available to students in short-term training programs? This has been something he’s pushed for eight years now. Ironically, there’s bipartisan support for the measure but the concept still hasn’t gotten through Congress because members haven’t always agreed on the details. Now, it looks as if some of those roadblocks are falling away. Kaine says the effect of this would be “transformational” in getting low-income workers trained for better jobs. Rep. Bobby Scott, D-Newport News, has been pushing this on the House side.
- What will become of the proposal to grow the region’s advanced manufacturing and materials industries? A joint bid by the New River Valley and Danville failed to net a regional tech hub but did bring home a consolation prize: a grant of up to $450,000 to develop a strategy to further grow that economic sector. By year’s end, what will we have to show for it?
- Will we see more armadillos in Virginia? The armor-plated critters are waddling north. Some have been sighted in Virginia, as far north as Roanoke, but so far no breeding population has been found. As with many other things, will this be the year?
- What will happen that we don’t know to ask about? Something will, right? It always does.