The clock is ticking on the Virginia General Assembly as lawmakers scramble to pass a budget before July first. – The clock is ticking on the Virginia General Assembly as lawmakers scramble to pass a budget before July first.
The sticking point remains tax breaks for data centers.
But Senate leaders are now saying a budget deal is within reach and could come as soon as Thursday or Friday.
“The real loser in all of this is the Virginia taxpayer,” Senator David Suetterlein (R) said.
Suetterlein says the months-long budget stalemate continues to center on data centers.
“I think there’s something fundamentally wrong about offering huge tax relief to the largest corporations, and none to working Virginians,” he said.
At the heart of the debate are tax breaks for data centers. Currently, the incentives are worth nearly two billion dollars a year.
“We oppose the data center exemption, and we believe there should be tax relief for working Virginians,” Suetterlein said.
This isn’t a straight party-line issue. Democratic Representative Sam Rasoul also opposes the data center tax breaks.
“Many of them were developed with the promise that if they come here they would get these tax breaks. So, I can see both sides, but the reality is the price tag is way bigger than we ever thought,” Rasoul said.
But Rasoul says a compromise may be on the horizon.
“The House and Senate could agree to some kind of fee that they would be paying to pay their fair share, based upon the amount of electricity they’re using, so hopefully that will be the deal that’s struck here very shortly,” he said.
Virginia Senate President Pro Tempore, Democrat Louise Lucas, echoing optimism about a possible deal Thursday afternoon on the social media platform X.
Saying in part, “We will get a budget deal done, hopefully today but definitely by tomorrow! There will not be a shutdown!”
But Suetterlein says it shouldn’t have gone on this long to begin with.
“It’s a disaster. It’s very bad that it’s gone this long. This is not good when we’re trying to get folks to invest in Virginia,” he said.
Suetterlein tells me the Senate returns on Monday, while Rasoul tells us he’s hopeful for the House to return around the same time.