State Sen. Lashrecse Aird, D-Petersburg, says she plans to introduce several General Assembly bills this year with implications for Surry County, including one that would revive the idea of a bridge connecting Surry to James City County across the James River.

Aird represents Senate District 13, which includes Surry, Sussex, Prince George and Charles City counties, the cities of Petersburg and Hopewell, and parts of Dinwiddie and Henrico counties.

Del. Kim Taylor, R-Petersburg, whose 82nd House District also encompasses Surry, last year introduced House Joint Resolution No. 5, which would have directed the Virginia Department of Transportation to, within a year, study the need and options for a bridge connecting Surry and James City counties. 

Taylor’s proposal, which died in the House of Delegates’ Committee on Rules last year, had called for the bridge’s Surry side to begin at Hog Island, a state wildlife management area near Dominion Energy’s nuclear power plant. The proposal had garnered the support of Surry County’s Economic Development Department and at least one member of its Board of Supervisors last year.

“This session, I am going to try my hand at introducing it,” Aird said in a Jan. 8 interview with The Smithfield Times. “I have been in conversation with local leaders about the bridge.”

Aird said her proposal, like Taylor’s, would direct VDOT to complete a feasibility study.

“It’s a significant infrastructural project and the study, we hope, will give us insight into what those costs will be,” Aird said.

Surry drivers have long relied on the Jamestown-Scotland Ferry for transit across the river. VDOT operates the ferry around the clock at no cost to motorists. There are four ferries, two with a 50-car capacity and two that will hold up to 70 cars.

Aird said she plans to introduce another bill that would establish a “secretary of rural affairs” as a member of the governor’s cabinet. Such a position could go a long way toward making the case for the proposed bridge.

“A lot of people that I have talked to, a lot of other legislators, they’re curious about the need for a bridge at this stage in Surry’s existence,” Aird said.

Aird contends rural, sparsely populated areas like Surry, which is home to roughly 6,500 residents, are often “an afterthought” compared to more populous localities.

“I continue to believe that there are unique needs in our rural communities that deserve specific attention,” Aird said.

 

Supporting data centers

Aird said the legislature is also working to incentivize data center developers to look outside northern Virginia, which is where many of the state’s more than 300 data centers are currently housed. A December Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee, or JLARC, report to the General Assembly links the proliferation of data centers to increased demand for electricity across the state.

Aird said all but two of the eight localities forming the 13th District, including Surry, have proposed data centers in the works. Surry supervisors approved a new “emerging technologies” zoning district and rezoned roughly 600 acres for Middleburg-based Green Energy partners’ proposed first-in-the-nation combination data center and hydrogen fuel hub, which has promised to bring more than 1,300 permanent jobs to Surry by 2036. Green Energy’s proposal calls for the 19 data centers spread across a 3-million-square-foot campus to eventually be powered by small, modular nuclear reactors, or SMRs.

“Virginia has more data centers than anywhere else in the country and the most challenging part of continuing to bring more data centers online will be the energy consumption and how to balance the energy usage these data centers require without having an adverse effect on ratepayers,” Aird said.

Despite the need for more power, Aird said she’s not in favor of taking away the authority of localities to make zoning decisions when it comes to renewable energy projects like solar farms. Aird said she’s been made aware of opposition from Surry, Dinwiddie, Prince George and Sussex counties to a trio of stalled 2024 bills that could have allowed solar developers to appeal local denials to the state and nullified the 10% acreage cap on energy projects Surry adopted in 2023.

The Virginia Commission on Electric Utility Regulation, or CEUR, has since recommended creating a “Virginia Solar Energy and Energy Storage Siting Advisory Board” that would have a role in the local siting process.

The rural localities in the 13th District “would like to keep as much of that  authority” as they can, and “it’s going to be my intention to support that position,” Aird said.

 

School-related legislation

Aird said state Sen. Ghazala Hashmi, D-Richmond, is introducing a bill that would delay implementation of Virginia’s new school ranking system, which places a higher emphasis than the methodology in place since 2018 on a school’s performance on the Standards of Learning tests. The Virginia Department of Education, which developed the new point-based ranking system last year, contends it will provide greater transparency given the number of schools reaccredited under the 2018 methodology despite having yet to return to their pre-pandemic SOL pass rates.

Two of Surry’s three schools would be rated as “on track” under the new system based on preliminary rankings the VDOE released in November based on 2023-24 data, while a third would be rated “distinguished.”

“Surry frankly seems to be doing very well and would not be negatively impacted” should the new system take effect at the start of the 2025-26 school year as scheduled, but “in my other jurisdictions like Prince George and Petersburg and Hopewell they are concerned,” Aird said, adding she expected “a lot of support” for Hashmi’s bill.

Aird said she’s also proposing a $300 one-time tax credit for parents of children ages 12 and under funded from the $1.2 million surplus Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced in July.

She’s also proposing legislation that would allow schools to retain long-term substitute teachers for longer than the 180-day limit currently in place.