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No Bail for Criminal Illegal Aliens in Virginia--Sponsored and passed legislation in 2008 that denies bail to illegal aliens who commit serious crimes. This law helps ensure these accused criminals are held in jail until they have their day in court. Illegal aliens clearly represent a serious flight risk when they are charged with crimes that could land them behind bars. When granted bail, many flee to their native countries to escape justice, while others simply return to their life of crime. This law ensures these criminals are presumed by judges to be a risk of flight and a danger to the community and will help keep our neighborhoods and families safe. |
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 Restored Interstate 81 Tolling Authority to the People of Virginia--Sponsored and passed legislation in 2008 that limits the authority of the Department of Transportation to impose tolls on cars and trucks on Interstate 81. VDOT has long planned an expansion of I-81 that would widen the road to eight lanes or more. This one-size-fits-all approach could have a devastating and permanent impact on our quality of life in the Shenandoah Valley and harm family farms, battlefields, homes, businesses and the environment. The only immediate way to pay for such a massive project has been through the imposition of tolls on cars and trucks which VDOT once had the authority to impose. Tolls would harm folks who use I-81 to commute to work and businesses that use it to get their goods to market. This new law ensures that the representatives of the people of Virginia, not an unelected bureaucracy, will decide an issue that so seriously impacts the citizens of the Interstate 81 corridor. |
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Tax Relief for Farmers, Hunters & Their Fellow Citizens--In 2009, the Virginia Department of Taxation inexplicably began to apply a long-standing definition of the term fabrication to food products. Under the definition, raw materials which are supplied by the consumer and later turned into finished products by a business must be taxed the same as finished goods. Hence, a consumer who takes fabric to a seamstress to have it made into a dress must pay sales tax on the cost of the service. However, Delegate Gilbert felt the sudden move to apply this rule to meat and other foods was an undue burden on farmers, hunters and other citizens. The rule even applied if a hunter wanted to donate his processed deer meat to charitable organizations like Hunters for the Hungry. So, in 2009 he sponsored legislation that would exempt food products from Virginia sales tax when they are supplied by the consumer for further processing. The bill passed the House and the Senate unanimously and the law of Virginia now protects these consumers from paying sales tax on food they already own.
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