Saturday, May 18, 2013
Sens. Kaine and Warner offered language promoting Arlington's Four Mile Run as a recreational resource.
Virginia’s Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine this week offered an amendment to an environmental bill that will promote efforts to restore Four Mile Run as a recreational resource. The senators amended the Water Resources Development Act, which passed the Senate Wednesday by a vote of 83-14. They offered two other amendments to the measure – one dealing with a marine terminal on Craney Island and the other to increase authorized funding for oyster restoration. “… I am pleased we…were successful in updating an outdated regulation that prevented the Four Mile Run project from moving forward into a recreational and ecological resource for Northern Virginia,” Warner said in a statement. “This bill will advance a project of critical importance for…
Tuesday, May 7, 2013
U.S. Air Force JAG office requested case be turned over to the military.
The Commonwealth's Attorney's Office for Arlington and Falls Church will proceed with the the sexual battery case against Air Force Lt. Col. Jeffrey Krusinski rather than hand it over to the military for prosecution. Krusinski, a 41-year-old Arlington man who works at the Pentagon, was charged this weekend by local police after a woman said he groped her in Crystal City parking lot. Thanks to his position as chief of the U.S. Air Force Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Branch, his face — scraped and cut in a booking photo — appeared in national news stories Monday afternoon. Upon hearing the news, the Air Force removed him from his position. Gen. Mark Walsh, Air Force Chief of Staff, told U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine on Tuesday that an area …
Arlington police charged the Air Force's Sex Assault Prevention chief With sexual battery Sunday in Crystal City.
U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., pressed U.S. Air Force officials at a hearing Tuesday about sexual assault in the military, specifically noting the recent arrest of Lt. Col. Jeff Krusinski. Krusinski, a 41-year-old Arlington resident who works at the Pentagon, was removed from his position as chief of the Air Force Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Branch on Monday. Arlington County police early Sunday charged him with sexual battery after a woman said he fondled her breasts and buttocks in a Crystal City parking lot. “I just worry about the effects of this,” Kaine said. “There are all sorts of today effects of this event when someone is charged — particularly when a person overseeing a program to deal with victims of sexual assault is in…
Monday, February 25, 2013
Sequestration could affect every traveler at airports nationwide, say U.S. Reps. Jim Moran, Gerry Connolly and U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine speaking from Reagan National Airport Monday.
Federal sequestration could mean fewer flights and increased wait times at airports, Virginia lawmakers said Monday. In addition to flight delays caused by sequestration, it threatens to close small- to mid-sized airports across the country. The massive, indiscriminate spending cuts Congress put in motion to force a budget compromise would cut $600 million from the Federal Aviation Administration if they go into effect Friday. Jobs on the Line Under sequestration, the FAA would have to furlough employees for 11 days — with as much as 10 percent of its workforce furloughed on any given day — and the agency would be unable to hire replacements for the 30 percent of its workers eligible to retire. Up to 2,200 air traffic controllers would be …
Monday, February 18, 2013
Governor sends letter to president, congressional delegation.
Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell on Monday sent a letter to President Barack Obama and the Old Dominion's congressional delegation calling for immediate action to prevent automatic spending cuts under sequestration. The $1.2 trillion in cuts — meant to force Congress to compromise, which hasn't happened — are slated to go into effect March 1. That deadline has been pushed back several times as lawmakers have brokered Band-Aid solutions. "The automatic sequestration reductions mandated by the Budget Control Act of 2011 are already having a significant adverse effect on the Commonwealth," McDonnell stated. "When fully implemented, they could force Virginia and other states into a recession. Sequestration-mandated reductions will be implemented …
Saturday, February 16, 2013
Virginia’s junior senator calls sequestration ‘abdication of responsibility.’
The looming sequestration that is slated to cut military spending across the board will also cost Virginia about $48 million in federal funds for pre-kindergarten through 12th-grade education, U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine told educators Friday in Alexandria. Speaking to local school officials and state education advocates at the Campagna Center in Old Town, Kaine, a Democrat, said the cuts would also eliminate 7,000 Head Start slots in the state. If the March 1 sequester goes through, 10,000 teacher jobs would be at risk nationwide, as well as funding for up to 7,200 special education teachers, aides and staff, according to Kaine’s office. Kaine, a member of the Senate Budget Committee, said he maintained hope sequestration could be avoided. “I …
Saturday, February 9, 2013
Virginia Sens. Warner and Kaine warn about sequestration's effects on the economy and national security.
If sequestration goes into effect in March, it will be "worse than you can imagine," U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., told a group of mostly government contractors at a Reston breakfast event Friday organized by the Northern Virginia Technology Council. Warner, along with fellow Democrat and Virginia's junior senator, Tim Kaine, spoke about the short- and long-term impact of the potential $1.2 trillion federal budget cuts that would happen March 1 if Congress doesn't reach a compromise. Half of that would affect the defense industry, which some estimates say could cost Virginia more than 207,000 jobs. Sequestration could have a large impact in Arlington, where plenty of small, medium and large firms depend on government contracting, and …
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Defense contractors speaking with Sen. Tim Kaine on Monday say federal agencies are preparing for potential cuts and acting as if they've already happened.
About 30 representatives of defense contractors from Northern Virginia met with Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine on Monday for a roundtable discussion and agreed on one fairly simple message to Congress: Make a decision. It might be funny if nearly 200,000 Virginia jobs weren't on the line and the very idea of sequestration hadn't come to epitomize the dysfunction on Capitol Hill. If lawmakers fail to reach a compromise, then $1.2 trillion in automatic cuts, half to the defense industry, will go into effect. The latest deadline is March 1. The contractors talked about the various ways the threat of sequestration was "paralyzing" the industry: Companies are delaying orders whenever they can. They aren't hiring to fill vacant positions. They aren't…
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Monday, January 21, 2013
No rest for the weary: Democrats gear up for tough 2013 state races.
An estimated 1,100 people attended the Virginia Inaugural Ball on Sunday at the Westin Arlington Gateway to celebrate the second inauguration of President Barack Obama — and gear up for key statewide elections in 2013. "Everybody is happy. Everybody is excited. It's a feel-good moment for everyone who worked on a campaign," Arlington County Democratic Chairman Mike Lieberman told Patch before speaking to the crowd. "The president is right to feel good about this weekend. You can't help but be optimistic. There's a lot of criticism of our government out there, and some of it is deserved. But there's also a lot of reason for optimism. And coming out of the last election, we see a lot of opportunities." [See photos from the Virginia Inaugural…
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Kaine said he is 'rested and ready.'
Tim Kaine was sworn in as the newest senator from Virginia this week. Vice President Joe Biden presided over a mock ceremony after the official one on the Senate floor, and Anne Holton, Kaine's wife, proudly held a Bible as her husband was sworn in as Virginia's junior senator at the U.S. Capitol in Washington. "I feel wonderful — rested and ready," Kaine said at a reception in his honor at the Hart Senate Office Building. "Life doesn't happen unless you are able to listen and compromise. With this beginning of the 113th Congress, the Senate has 15 newcomers... and I've watched group dynamics just as you have, and when you have that much change it opens the windows and rescrambles assumptions." Kaine, a former Virginia governor, then …
Bill Sweet
9:20 am on Monday, April 22, 2013
Governor, I don’t doubt that there will be some difficulty and setbacks in Virginia over sequestration but to say that it would “put Virginia into recession” is over the top. Where are the adults in this conversation? more ›