Dear Friends,

I wanted to let you know about a couple of my recent stops around the Commonwealth to deliver federal funding.

In Farmville, I toured and dropped off $949,000 for Madeline’s House, a shelter for victims of domestic violence. This funding will allow this critical facility to reopen and will ensure that women and families across six counties – Amelia, Buckingham, Cumberland, Lunenburg, Nottoway, and Prince Edward – finally have a place to go during times of crisis. Women will no longer have to uproot their entire lives while fleeing from an abusive partner. Instead, they can stay close to their own communities, schools, work, and families, while having a safe and secure place to stay.

Later in the week, I stopped in Stuart to drop off $1.1 million to improve water treatment for Patrick County. While it may not sound exciting, this project is getting ahead of a frightening potential crisis. In Patrick County, nearly all the critical infrastructure – schools, the volunteer fire department, health care facilities, the emergency shelter, and more – rely on the same water treatment center. If the town loses power, all of those facilities could lose reliable water service too. I don’t think I need to tell you that that would be a disaster, so I’m glad to see this funding go towards creating a backup power system that will ensure continuous water service, even during outages.

The funding for both of these projects is formally known as “Congressionally Directed Spending” or more informally as “earmarks.” Every year, folks across Virginia come to my office with ideas for projects in their communities, and I work with my colleagues to negotiate funding for those priorities in our annual government funding bills. I’m proud to follow the lead of my constituents and do the last stretch of work – they know what their communities need, and I’m glad to get funding to bridge the gap and make their plans a reality.

This year, Tim Kaine and I worked hard to negotiate $125 million in draft bills for more of these projects across the Commonwealth. They include everything from new police cars in Bristol to new affordable housing developments in Alexandria. You can read more about what’s included here. 

The problem is that getting these across the finish line depends on us passing full spending bills… not just wasteful temporary ones. Unfortunately, House Republicans insist on proposing extreme appropriations bills that have no chance of becoming law, forcing Congress to pass wasteful stopgap bills while negotiations drag on. Congress just passed one yesterday that will avoid a costly government shutdown, but these short-term bills never include any of these community projects.

It's time for us to move forward on these important priorities all over Virginia by passing real, full-year spending bills. I’m going to keep fighting to make it happen. If you want to reach out to me about government funding or another issue that is important to you, I encourage you to email me through my Senate website. You can also follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Threads, or Twitter. I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,