BLOG UPDATE

Check out the new and improve Dave Albo blog:

http://delegatedavealbo.wordpress.com/

"Traffic Alert"

The Virginia Department of Transportation has announced roadwork on I-95 in from the Fairfax County Parkway up to Lorton.  I-95 will be widened to four lanes between the Fairfax County Parkway and Route 123.  With progress there’s always a little pain and, unfortunately, there will be a lot of the “stop and go” traffic that we saw when the “Mixing Bowl” was built.  The project should be completed in the fall of 2011.  This fall there will be single lane closures during the weekday on both north and south I-95.  Here’s what else to look out for:

Monday, September 21 and Tuesday, September 22-

VDOT will be replacing overhead signs between Route 1 and Lorton Road.  Two out of the three lanes will be closed starting at 10:30 p.m.  Then at midnight, all lanes will be stopped for at least a half an hour.  This will happen again at 1 a.m. and 2:30 a.m.

Wednesday, September 23 and Thursday, September 24-

    
        Southbound I-95 will have major delays for bridge widening 
        at Accotink Creek from 9:30 p.m. to  5 a.m.

Monday, September 28 and Tuesday, September 29-

One or more lanes will be closed on I-95 northbound for a traffic shift at Lorton Road and Pohick Creek from 9:30 p.m. to 5 a.m.  Thirty minute delays are expected. 

Wednesday, September 30 and Thursday, October 1-

A traffic shift will occur on northbound I-95 to work on a retaining wall and road widening between Pohick Creek and Accotink Creek.   This will take place from 9:30 p.m. until 5 a.m.  The shift will stay for an estimated seven months.  Thirty minute delays are expected and one or more lanes will be closed.

The Schedule for Lane Widening on I-951:

Segment	Open
I-95 north, Route 1 to Fairfax County Parkway	December 2009
I-95 south, Fairfax County Parkway to Route 1	fall 2010
I-95 north and south, Route 1 to Route 123	fall 2011

For any questions or comments, please contact Delegate Dave Albo at (703) 451-3555 or visit www.davealbo.com.

 1.  http://www.vamegaprojects.com/tasks/sites/default/assets/File/pdf/95widen/2009_Complete_Closure_FL94_Work_on_I-95.pdf

               

“Delegate Dave Albo: School Funding”

School funding in the Commonwealth of Virginia is determined by the Local Composite Index, or LCI. The LCI is a result of a Supreme Court of Virginia ruling which stated that the Virginia Constitution requires all children to receive, to the extent practicable, and equivalent education. Thus, the Court ruled that some funding formula must be used to direct money to areas that can't afford to educate children. (The Court did not say what the formula has to be only that some redistribution must occur). Consequently, the purpose of the LCI is to ensure less affluent localities are able to provide for their students. The LCI is a figure that determines how much a school system must pay for its own basic education. ("Basic Education" is a set of minimum standards. For example, math must be taught, but band does not.) The LCI, has a cap of .8000 (a locality must pay 80% of its own basic education) but has no minimum. Only 27 out of 136 schools are required to pay more than 50% of their basic education (e.g. have above a .5000 LCI).

The LCI is calculated through a complicated formula. The formula attempts to determine which school systems can afford to may more of their own basic education, and which systems cannot afford to pay. In determining who can pay, a formula has been developed which considers a bunch of different variables.

It's complicated, but here it is: to calculate the LCI, fifty percent of the true value of real property, forty percent of the gross income, and ten percent of sales tax collections of each locality are totaled and then weighted two-thirds by average daily membership and one-third by population.


Average Daily Student Membership Component= 


 .5 [((Local True Property Value)/(Local ADM))/ ((Total Statewide True Property Values)/ (Statewide ADM))]



 +.4 [((Adjusted Gross Income)/ (Local ADM))/ ((Total Statewide AGI)/ (Statewide ADM))]



 +.1 [((Local Taxable Retail Sales)/ (Local ADM))/ ((Total Statewide Taxable Retail Sales)/ (Statewide ADM))]



Overall Local Population Component=

.5 [((Local True Property Values)/ (Local Population))/ ((Total Statewide True Property Values)/ (Statewide Population))]



+.4 [((Adjusted Gross Income)/ (Local Population))/ ((Total Statewide AGI)/ (Statewide Population))]



+.1 [((Local Taxable Retail Sales)/ (Local Population))/ ((Total Statewide Taxable Retail Sales)/ (Statewide Population))]



Every two years the LCI is recalculated as all of the information can change. The LCI for Fairfax County Public School for 2008-2010 is .7657. This means that Fairfax County must pay 76.57% of its own basic education. Or, in other words, out of every $100 in public education costs, Fairfax County pays $76.57 while the state pays $23.43 for public education. There are 136 localities and out of all of those only 10 have an LCI higher than Fairfax County. These ten are Arlington (.8000), Bath (.8000), Goochland (.8000), Rappahannock (.8000), Alexandria (.8000), Falls Church (.8000), Fredericksburg (.7943), Williamsburg (.8000), Fairfax City (.8000), and Lancaster (.7824). On the other end, Lee county has an LCI of .1552 (only has to pay 15.52% of its own basic education), Sussex County has an LCI of .2799 (only has to pay 27.99% of its own basic education), Danville has an LCI of .2394 (paying 23.94% of its own basic education.         



The total LCI list for 2008-2010 can be found at http://www.doe.virginia.gov/VDOE/Finance/Budget/composite.html. To see a map of all localities and the range of Local Composite Indexes, check out http://www.doe.virginia.gov/VDOE/Finance/Budget/2008-2010CompositeMap.pdf.

Press Release: Del. Albo Outraged over College's Actions

For Immediate Release
Contact: Dave Albo
(703) 451-3555


Delegate is Outraged over College’s Actions

SPRINGFIELD – In the latest effort by Delegate Dave Albo to encourage more instate slots to Virginia’s universities and colleges, Delegate Albo has expressed his outrage on the recent addition to the College of William and Mary’s staff.

The college created a new position of the Assistant President of Diversity to continue the spread of diversity on the campus. While it should be applauded that the school is reaching out to all of its students and making sure every voice is heard, it is extremely disappointing when this money could have been used for our in-state students. Delegate Albo has estimated that the cost of this new position is $200,000 once salary and benefits are added into the equation. This number is same as 10 in-state slots for students.

During the 2009 session, Delegate Albo introduced House Bill 1696, to increase the number of Virginia slots. The original bill asked for a ratio of 80 percent in-state and 20 percent out-of-state. In the end, Delegate Albo agreed to a compromise of 75 percent to 25 percent. However, William and Mary came forward and stated they did not have enough money to operate by lowering their out-of-state students and admitted out-of-state students pay $20,000 more to attend.

This story is an example of how public higher education institutions are not helping out students. Creating such a position as the Assistant President of Diversity continues to perpetuate the problem our students are facing.

Some of Delegate Albo’s constituents are feeling the strain. A recent high school graduate received the cum laude honor and yet must attend college outside of Virginia as the student was not accepted to any public colleges or universities in the Commonwealth.

“I have an election in November and if I win, this will be the first bill I will pre-file,” stated Delegate Albo, in reference to increasing in-state slots. “It isn’t right that our colleges are stating they can’t afford in-state spots but, meanwhile, they are creating positions within the school.”

The delegate has repeatedly mentioned that his issue is not just with high ranking colleges and universities like William and Mary and his alma mater, the University of Virginia. “Unfortunately, students now have to get above a 4.0 to get into either of these schools and those who get 3.8 GPAs go to Virginia Tech and JMU. What happens to those kids who did well in school but only got 3.3 GPAs? Where do they go? There has to be a way to keep the high reputation of our schools and yet, also allow for our bright students to attend.”

To find out more information about this, visit www.davealbo.com. The article on William and Mary’s Assistant President of Diversity can be located at http://www.dailypress.com/news/dp-local_wmdiversity_0828aug28,0,5370685.story
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"Transportation in Delegate Albo's District"

August 17, 2009


Dear Virginia Department of Transportation,

It has been brought to my attention that the repaving along Route 123 has been causing some problems for my constituents. The road’s current condition is more “rough” than I have seen in other paving jobs. Also, the sides were done with what looks like a different pavement type. Was this done on purpose? However, the main reason I wrote this is because Route 123 does not have the safety lines drawn. I live on Ox Road and these lines are needed to show drivers where the travel lines are located. Getting my mail is scary!

I am asking for your assistance in addressing this issue. If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Sincerely,

David B. Albo

We received a response from VDOT and the pavement markings should have already been added. If you have any questions or comments, please contact Delegate Dave Albo at (703) 451-3555.

"Albo on Smoking Ban"

Many of you have asked about the smoking ban so here it is:

Dear Constituents,

Thanks for writing me about the smoking ban.

First, let me explain how we got here. I have been one of four Republicans who in Sub-Committee year after year killed these smoking ban bills. I did so because I believe that a business owner should be able to decide what he wants in his own business. And many of these smoking ban bills were not just bans of smoking in restaurants, but also bans in all public places, including offices. So people like me who pay a lot of money in rent for my law office in Springfield and Arlington, could not even smoke a cigar in the privacy of my own office. Moreover, and most offensively, they wanted to ban smoking in private clubs! So a guy, who fought in the Battle of the Bulge, could not smoke a cigar in his own American Legion Hall, even if the majority of the members wanted to allow smoking.

Now, let’s talk politics.

I do not go to Richmond to “do what Dave Albo wants to do,” rather; I go to Richmond to do what my constituents want me to do. Over the years, I have received hundreds of e-mails, calls and letters asking for a smoking ban. On the other side of the issue, I have received just three calls and four e-mails asking me to preserve smoking. As such, I began looking to form a compromise solution that did not offend my sense of personal property rights, but did establish some controls over smoking in restaurants.

The bill that I wrote, which is now the basis of the compromise, bans smoking in restaurants, but allows for some exceptions. The exceptions include restaurants with a designated smoking room that is physically separated and independently ventilated from non-smoking dining areas, any permanent outdoor patio area of a restaurant, any private club and street-side “hotdog” stands and other mobile points of food service.

This legislation addressed many of the concerns I had with previous attempts to ban smoking, but I am pleased with the outcome.

I hope you all like this compromise. A “compromise” means that I get things that I like, but have to accept some things I don’t like. At least this bill enables restaurants that want smoking a way to provide this service to patrons.


Regards,

Dave Albo

If you have any questions or concerns, please call Delegate Dave Albo at (703) 451-3555 or look at the smoking section on my website.

"Albo on Illegal Aliens: A Study"

The argument that we hear a lot is that illegal aliens do the work that citizens and legal immigrants don’t want to do. However, a study done by the Center for Immigration Studies about the 2006 raids at six different Swift meatpacking plants shows a different story.

Swift & Co. operates meatpacking plants in Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Texas, Colorado and Utah. The work is difficult and dangerous due in part to fast line speeds. The work is, as you can imagine, also quite unpleasant.

U.S. immigration officials raided all six Swift plants on December 12, 2006. The raids, known as Operation Wagon Train, were “the largest single worksite enforcement action in U.S. history.” As a result, 1,287 arrests were made which equaled about 10 percent of Swift’s workers. The raid was conducted during the first shift of work and, by the second shift, many employees did not turn up for work, as the word had spread.

The pork plants took four months to get back to full production while the beef plants took five months. In the meantime, the company placed ads and provided incentives to recruit legal citizens to work. These incentives included a higher pay than previously employed workers, signing bonuses, and bonuses to those who could bring in other employees.

In summary, within 5 months, the Swift plants were up and running with legal immigrant and citizen workers. The bottom line, there were legal immigrants and citizens willing to do the work.

Background

Prior to this raid, because of low pay, there is a huge turnover rate at all of the factories because of the conditions and low pay. The different plant locations have different turnover rates. In Texas, the turnover rate was 42 percent or 100 replacement workers each month. In Utah, the rate was 40 percent, or 440 replacements. Nebraska’s plant has a 70 percent turnover rate.

Back in 1980, workers were paid what would be $21.75 per hour in 2009 dollars. However, in 2007 workers were paid what would be $12.03 per hour in 2009 dollars. This large difference in wages makes the incentive to work at the factories very low. The work is already unpleasant but lowering wages only discourages potential employees even more.

The study showed that in order for legal immigrants and U.S. citizens to work at these factories, the incentives must be higher to keep them employed. In other words, citizens and legal immigrants were not unwilling to do the job, rather, they were unwilling to do the job at depressed wages acceptable to illegal aliens.


Conclusion

Months after the raids took place, the six Swift factories had started up production again and were employing legal residents and citizens of the U.S. One of the things that can be learned from this is that wages were indeed lowered by the presence of illegal aliens. Illegal aliens were willing to do the work for a lower pay. And, Swift was willing to employ illegal aliens because it meant saving money. By doing this, native-born workers were less interested in working in conditions where they weren’t as highly compensated as the workers had once been. Additionally, once the raids were over, the employees were legal residents and, therefore, showing that the statement, illegal aliens are willing to do the work citizens won’t do, is simply not true.

If you have any questions or concerns, please call Delegate Dave Albo at (703) 451-3555 or my website at davealbo.com