By Faith Redd, Capital News Service

RICHMOND, Va. -- Creativity should be valued as an important part of the Virginia economy, said the state lawmaker behind legislation to create the Virginia Creative Economy Grant Program.

Del. Jackie Glass, D-Norfolk, introduced House Bill 2376 to establish a dedicated funding source for grant awards no more than $20,000 each to independent content creators and creative entrepreneurs. 

The program would be managed by the Virginia Economic Development Partnership Authority. VEDP collaborates with local and regional partners to encourage expansion and diversification of Virginia's economy, according to its website.

A creative worker is considered anyone that produces and distributes creativity and arts-based goods and services, according to a handout from Glass.

Virginia's creative workers produce film, art, music, software, video games, television and radio, according to the bill.

The U.S. creative economy annually generates over $900 billion, according to Glass. Almost $18 billion of that is generated in Virginia. The creative economy businesses in Virginia lost at least $2.6 billion in revenue in 2020, according to Glass. 

Noah "Noah-O" Oddo is a local entrepreneur. Oddo owns Charged Up ENT, a record label that has been around since 2002. He opened the flagship store of Charged up ENT in Richmond's downtown Art's District.

Oddo would put the money directly into his business if there was grant funding, he said. 

 "We can't exist without the people's support," Oddo said. "If you would like to see more of this and Virginia to continue to grow in this direction, that's what's needed, support in the form of dollars."

The bill did not have enough support to make it through the House General Laws subcommittee, where it was tabled on a 4-2 vote. However, there was support for the idea, Glass said.

Glass said people from the other side of the aisle approached her to discuss further action, including Del. James Morefield, R-Tazewell.

Glass and Morefield will work alongside the VEDP after the General Assembly session ends, to try and secure funding, Glass said.

"It's not dead, I mean, it's dead as far as a piece of legislation, but it's not dead administratively," Glass said.

There is also the Virginia Commission for the Arts, a state agency that offers creative grants. The VCA invests in arts leaders, arts educators, and arts practitioners, according to its website.

The creative industry is among the most impacted due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing economic drain on nonprofits and other funding sources, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Brent Royal is a Richmond entrepreneur who owns the Good Money Counting Kit clothing brand. He sells products through social media and his website. Royal said he was discouraged to hear that the bill failed. He thinks the bill could have helped small businesses struggling from inflation and the economic impacts of COVID-19.

Royal worked two jobs to start his businesses, he said. He also launched the nonprofit Good Money Give Back and he puts 10% of his profits into it, to help the community. For example, Royal gave flowers to teachers for Valentine's Day, has held clothing and backpack drives for children, and is working on a mentoring program for young men.

Royal previously received grant funding and would apply for potential VEDP funding if the process moved forward. He would reinvest in the community by opening a clothing store, creating jobs for locals and using profits to reinvest in his nonprofit, he said.

The main focus for his brand is to inspire entrepreneurship, according to Royal. The state could do a better job at maintaining relationships with entrepreneurs, he said.

"It's kind of hard to be an entrepreneur in Virginia, just because there's so many different tax things you have to deal with federally, locally," Royal said.

Glass introduced the bill because she is a creative entrepreneur herself, she said. She has a podcast called "Your Neighbor's Hood," where she discusses uncomfortable cultural conversations with content creator Christina Kimbrough, according to the website. Glass monetized the venture, she said.

Creative entrepreneurs have the heart to create work but struggle to make a living out of what they do, Glass said.

"We don't have that creative infrastructure here," Glass said. 

The funding for creatives is considered sustainable, because 83 cents of every $1 invested in a creative worker is reinvested locally, according to a handout from Glass. The creative sector also increases travel and tourism to improve the economy.

"This is another industry of economics that can drive and bring dollars to the commonwealth," Glass said.

Oddo visited the state Capitol with Creatives for Virginia on Jan. 24 to lobby for the bill. 

"I'm trying to let people know in our generation these are the things that matter," Oddo said. "If you don't organize, if you don't speak out in order to change these things, there's not going to be the things you want to see done in our society and you'll just constantly be in the state of reaction toward what's going on." 

By Adrianna Lawrence, Capital News Service

RICHMOND, Va. -- Virginia lawmakers this week shot down the last bill of seven introduced to reverse the adopted California standard on electric vehicles Tuesday afternoon.

Del. Tony Wilt, R-Rockingham, proposed House Bill 1378 to repeal the 2021 law allowing the Virginia State Air Pollution Control Board to implement emission standards for vehicles with a 2025 or later model year.

The current Clean Car law, adopted from California and soon to be implemented in Virginia, states 35% of all new cars and trucks sold in Virginia with a 2025 model year must be electric. By 2035, 100% of new models on the market must be electric, according to California's final regulation order.

Wilt introduced the bill for several reasons, he said. He questioned whether Virginia's infrastructure can withstand 100% electrical powered cars in 12 years, Wilt said.

"In such a short period of time, we start putting these demands on electric grids of having the capabilities to keep up with electric generation," Wilt said. 

The bill passed in the House with a party-line vote of 52-48. 

Ahead of the final House vote, Wilt expressed concern over the cost of electric vehicles and said "they still cost significantly more upfront." 

"Which can make them unattainable," Wilt said.

Wilt's bill died in the Senate Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources committee on a party-line 8-7 vote to pass by indefinitely. Other similar measures introduced in the Senate were incorporated into one bill that met the same outcome in the same committee.

Virginia residents will look to surrounding states to buy combustion engine vehicles because of the decrease of those available cars and the expensive costs of electric vehicles, according to Wilt. 

"And so we're actually taking the revenues out of the state of Virginia," Wilt said.

Wilt believes in a renewable energy future but said it should be done incrementally. 

"Instead of these heavy-handed governmental mandates to meet these deadlines and so forth, let the free market dictate that," Wilt said.

Natural consumer demand for electric vehicles is what should drive the market to go green, according to Wilt.

Virginia needs to "decouple" from California and establish standards unique to Virginia, according to Wilt and other Republicans who have spoken against the measure. 

Trip Pollard, senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center, said it is not legally possible to create a Virginia-specific standard.

States either accept the required Clean Air Act federal regulation or choose the more protective standard introduced by California. 

"The General Assembly decided in '21 that we want to choose the more protective option," Pollard said. "We can't set our own standards."

The reasoning behind this is simple, Pollard said: Car manufacturers cannot meet 50 different state regulations. 

"The manufacturers got that written into the Clean Air Act decades ago because they don't want to have to produce 50 different models of vehicles for different states," Pollard said.

California sought a waiver from the EPA to create its own standards, which now allows states to also choose California's stricter standards. 

So far, 17 other states have adopted California's clean car standards, according to the California Air Resources Board.

Many advocates for the Clean Car law, including Pollard, point out these next few years in the General Assembly are crucial for prepping the state's infrastructure for electric cars. 

Along with legislative action, Virginia has already begun receiving incremental funding that will be over $100 million through the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure, according to Pollard. Private companies, such as Tesla, are distributing electric car chargers as well, he said.

Even with these initiatives, some legislators are already giving up on the law before it has even taken effect, according to Pollard. 

"To me it makes no sense to repeal these standards now, when they offer such enormous health and environmental benefits," Pollard said.

Lawmakers can ditch the adopted California standard and go back to the less protective federal one if the Clean Car law does not work out, according to Pollard.

Environmental organizations, like the Virginia League of Conservation Voters, strongly believe in keeping the Clean Car law in place due to the harm combustion engine vehicles bring to Virginia's air quality.

"Transportation emissions are Virginia's largest driver of climate change," said VLCV deputy director Lee Francis. "They make up about half of our total carbon pollution."

Electric vehicles are popular right now and there is a fast growing shift toward electric vehicles, according to Francis. 

"A lot of it is driven by the auto manufacturers themselves," Francis said.

General Motors, Ford, BMW and Honda are just some of the car manufacturers shifting toward zero emission vehicles, according to Forbes.

Lawmakers, lobbyists and Gov. Glenn Youngkin have attempted to repeal the Clean Car law since 2021. Citizens question what the state's future of electric vehicles will look like by 2026.

The effort to overturn the Clean Car law could be a factor in the upcoming November election, according to Stephen Farnsworth, director of the Center for Leadership and Media Studies at the University of Mary Washington and a political science professor.

All seats are up for reelection in the currently Republican-majority House and the Democratic-majority Senate. 

Candidates will compete for Senate and House seats in new districts recently redrawn to keep up with population changes. The redistricting could favor Democrats more since the population changes across Virginia put more districts in Democratic-leaning areas, Farnsworth said.

House Republicans will use the Clean Car law as a part of their campaign to be reelected, he said.

"Republicans often run on issues of individual freedoms and a bill that comes out of California and shapes public preferences in a liberal direction is a useful thing for Republican candidates to talk about," Farnsworth said.

The Air Pollution Control Board will implement the standard shortly after Jan. 1, 2024 and auto manufacturers will have to abide by it to sell their vehicles in Virginia, according to the board's vehicle standards.