CHILDREN + FAMILIES

Help wanted: Women needed for U.S. chips manufacturing plan to succeed

BY: - March 28, 2023

Natalie Bell was thinking about a career in art after college when a welding class and a delivery of four pizzas changed her career trajectory.  “I was taking a delivery out to a construction site and I met an ironworker who I was taking the delivery to,” said Bell, who lives in Columbus, Ohio. “I […]

COMMENTARY

A meritorious bill to curb kids’ access to online porn has limitations, downsides

BY: - March 13, 2023

It’s a good bet that an election-year bill to crack down on juvenile access to online pornography, which elected legislators of both parties passed overwhelmingly, will become law in Virginia. Penalizing smut purveyors plays well on campaign brochures, ads and websites. Political cynicism aside, however, there is meritorious intent behind Sen. Bill Stanley’s bill to […]

COMMENTARY

The correlation between guns, school violence and the erosion of American families

BY: - March 10, 2023

By Bill Pike In August of 1975, I started my first teaching job at Martinsville Junior High School in Martinsville, Virginia. Nothing in my education classes, student teaching, or orientation to the school system communicated, “Look out for students who might have a gun.” Almost fifty years later, school systems across Virginia and America are […]

Bill to require additional proof of age for porn sites in Virginia heads to Youngkin’s desk

BY: - March 9, 2023

Virginia lawmakers recently passed a bill with near-unanimous support that would require pornograpy websites to more stringently verify whether a person is 18 before allowing them access to the site. However, some say the legislation raises data privacy concerns while doing little to keep minors out of pornographic websites. Under the bill, verifying the age […]

Families are taking a hit as pandemic aid ends, inflation continues

BY: - March 3, 2023

Forty million people in the U.S. are having difficulty affording household expenses, and a little more than 25 million people say they sometimes or often do not have enough to eat, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s most recent Household Pulse survey data.  The survey is designed to collect data on household experiences during the […]

Virginia lawmakers ask for study on requiring insurers to cover doula care

BY: - January 30, 2023

Two bills that would have required private insurers in Virginia to provide coverage for state-certified doula care were unanimously struck down last week by lawmakers in both chambers, who instead requested a study of the proposal.  The bills will now go before the Senate Health Insurance Reform Commission, which is charged with studying mandated health […]

Will Virginia make a bipartisan move to get rid of its antiquated same-sex marriage ban?

BY: - December 5, 2022

When a Democratic proposal to undo Virginia’s legally moot ban on same-sex marriage failed this year in a Republican-led subcommittee, some conservatives said they could potentially get behind a more stripped-down version of an idea Democrats pitched as correcting a moral wrong from 2006. Instead of replacing the constitutional ban with pro-equality language declaring marriage […]

GOP support for same-sex marriage protections builds in U.S. Senate

BY: - July 26, 2022

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate appears on track to send President Joe Biden a bill in the coming weeks that would guarantee same-sex and interracial couples can marry, even if the Supreme Court overturns the landmark cases that enshrined those rights. “I think we’re very close,” Maine Republican Sen. Susan Collins said Tuesday of efforts […]

U.S. House on bipartisan vote passes bill protecting right to same-sex marriage

BY: - July 19, 2022

WASHINGTON — Both Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. House voted Tuesday to enshrine the right to same-sex and interracial marriages in federal law, though the bill’s path forward in the Senate is unclear. The 267-157 bipartisan vote stemmed from concerns that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last month to overturn the constitutional right to an […]

COMMENTARY

Before changing abortion laws, improve state’s child support system

BY: - July 5, 2022

It’s astounding the steps and resources the government must expend to force noncustodial parents — almost always fathers – to do right by their children. I saw that up close when I rode along with sheriff’s deputies and police officers hunting down scofflaws. The debtors were frequently tens of thousands of dollars behind in payments. […]

FDA greenlights emergency use of COVID vaccines for kids under 5

BY: - June 17, 2022

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday authorized emergency use of two COVID-19 vaccines for children under 5, moving the country one step closer to having shots for all age groups. The decision leaves just one hurdle, a recommendation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, before parents can begin getting babies […]

Fourth grade survivor of Uvalde shooting tells Congress: ‘I don’t want it to happen again’

BY: and - June 9, 2022

Content Warning: This story contains graphic descriptions related to gun violence.  WASHINGTON — A fourth grader who survived the Uvalde, Texas, school shooting where 19 students and two teachers were murdered told lawmakers Wednesday that she is afraid to go back to school. “I don’t want it to happen again,” 11-year-old Miah Cerrillo said in […]