The General Assembly will gavel in on Wednesday and then recess until Monday due to a citywide water outage caused by a powerful winter storm, according to a statement by the House of Delegates clerk.
Lawmakers and their staff will not be permitted to meet at length in the Capitol or its surrounding buildings on the scheduled first day of the 2025 session due to an ongoing water shortage, caused by the storm that rocked the Mid-Atlantic region on Sunday evening. That storm brought inches of snow and a slick coating of ice that ground much of Richmond to a halt.
The problem with the water reportedly started Monday, when city officials discovered that the storm caused a power outage and equipment failure at the city’s water reservoir system, which led to a city-wide outage of the utility, according to reporting by the Richmonder. Richmond’s newly minted mayor, Danny Avula, said at a press conference Tuesday morning that city officials had worked through the night in an effort to restore water service. But after starts and stops, it appears that the outage could last longer than anticipated.
“Unfortunately, things that were looking promising this afternoon did not end up panning out,” G. Paul Nardo, clerk of the House of Delegates, wrote in an email to staff and media. “The water system at the city continues to be unstable and therefore problematic, which presents continuing health and safety issues.”
Nardo said that the plan for the General Assembly on Wednesday is for the body to gavel in at noon. It will take up two procedural resolutions — HJ 429 and HJ 430 — followed by the traditional salaries and contingencies resolution to ensure that everyone gets paid. Those procedural resolutions establish the 2026 regular session prefiling schedule and the schedule for conduct of business during the 2025 session.
Then the General Assembly will recess until 9 a.m. Monday.
The Capitol and General Assembly Building will be closed through Sunday with no public allowed in the campus’ buildings. Water service has not been restored and will not be working, Nardo said.
The state Senate clerk issued a similar statement, obtained by Cardinal News, and noted that Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s State of the Commonwealth address will be postponed until Monday as well.
Pages in both the House of Delegates and Senate have been sent home until Monday, and staff members have been instructed not to report to the Capitol until Monday.
Legislators will be able to access the General Assembly Building to retrieve materials, but legislative assistants and legislative staff will not be allowed into the building.