State lawmakers will return to Richmond next week knowing that a deal has been reached on the state's next budget. The agreement brokered yesterday reportedly keeps several legislative priorities intact, including an increase in state education spending as well as raises for teachers and state employees. Lawmakers are also compromising with the governor by stripping all tax increases from the budget. The General Assembly will meet Monday to finalize the budget before sending it to the governor for his signature.
As the feds announce plans to reclassify cannabis to a lower tier allowing Virginia pharmacies to more freely dispense medical marijuana to patients, but one doctor says it needs to be classified even lower. Dr. Cecil [[sess-el]] Bennett says marijuana is not as dangerous as tobacco, which is available at almost every gas station.Preview: He says addictive prescription drugs are classified as a Schedule 4, which is one step lower than the proposed reclassification of pot. He says hundreds of studies have shown the medical benefits of marijuana and Americans want to embrace those benefits.
Virginia is getting a cut of a nationwide settlement over deceptive advertising practices by cell phone companies. The agreement announced this week will see companies like Verizon, AT&T, Cricket, T-Mobile and TracFone pay over ten-million dollars to settle the case. Attorney General Jason Miyares said the state will receive just over 192-thousand dollars from the settlement. The companies have also agreed to stop using misleading information about offers for free phones, unlimited mobile data plans and paying to have a customer switch carriers.