IN THE NEWS:

Almost a dozen House members are running for the Senate, so they are not running for reelection in their House districts. And more than a handful of other House members are not seeking reelection at all.

When the House and Senate have different versions of the same bill, they send it into a committee of conference -- a way to get all the key players together and resolve differences. Those conference committees happen in secret. They are not open to the public or the press, and that's a lack of transparency that's worrisome to many.

Delegate Ken Plum of Reston has seen it all, literally as the longest serving member of the House of Delegates. He’s seen Democrats in power, Republicans in power and he even was around to witness the last gasp of the Byrd Machine. Michael had a chance to talk with Delegate Plum about his career before he retires.



At the Watercooler:

The firehouse primary for Jennifer McClellan’s Senate seat, which features Dawn Adams, Alexsis Rodgers and Lamont Bagby
New leadership for the Virginia Capitol Correspondents Association

Trivia: How many Confederate statues are CURRENTLY in Capitol Square?

Episode Transcript

Michael Pope

On this episode of Pod Virginia.

Thomas Bowman

A wave of retirements, how do you feel about leaving?

Michael Pope

Secret closed-door conference committees.

Thomas Bowman

And a special tribute to number one Delegate, Ken Plum.

Michael Pope

Plus, we play around a trivia and read your tweets.

Thomas Bowman

This is Pod Virginia; stick around.

Michael Pope

I'm Michael Pope.

Thomas Bowman

I'm Thomas Bowman.

Michael Pope

And this is Pod Virginia, a podcast that stays in session even when members of the General Assembly head out of town. So, Thomas, you, and I are still in session. Pod Virginia is still in session and will remain that way. But the session is kind of over.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah. Do you remember when we first started doing this? And we had really long episodes, Michael? Because I'm pretty sure we had episodes longer than the short session and Virginia's legislature.

Michael Pope

Short session that's saying something. Alright, well, let's get to the news.

Michael Pope

Almost a dozen House members are running for the Senate. So they're not running for reelection in their current House districts. And more than a handful of other House members are not seeking reelection at all. Senate Majority Leader Dick Saslaw won't be coming back, and Senator Jennifer McClellan was recently elected to Congress. Senator Jill Vogel is a Republican from Fauquier County, and she's also leaving office.

Jill Vogel

I will be very sad to leave. However, I think it's important to have a sense of timing and a sense of your own limitations and know that once you've done this job for 16 years, that's a good long time. And I think it's an appropriate time for me to step down while I still have time to do other things in life.

Thomas Bowman

Delegate Jeff Bourne is a Democrat from Richmond who says he wants to spend more time with his family.

Jeff Bourne

For me, it really boiled down to just really wanting to have more quality time with my family and my kids. Especially as my son enters middle school and my daughter matriculates through high school and onto college, I just want to be there for all the moments.

Michael Pope

This is a grueling job.

Jeff Bourne

It is a very grueling job and one that also requires you to have a full-time job because this is, quote-unquote, part-time.

Michael Pope

You know, Thomas, all these retirements. There's a very long list here of people who are not seeking reelection and will not be back for the next general assembly session. And it's a long list, and there are some really big names on it. Spoiler alert later in this episode, we will be talking about Delegate Plum, who says he won't be seeking reelection. You got Dick Saslaw and Jill Vogel. The next General Assembly is gonna have a lot of new faces.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah, I think something like a third of the Virginia General Assembly is turning over. That's according to VPAP; they just put out something at the end of last week. It's a really great resource. They're tracking all these retirements. But, Michael, the point is so many people that we've gotten to know love you mentioned Delegate Plum, Dick Saslaw is leaving, you've got a lot of people leaving to run for higher office who may or may not win their elections, and then completely be out of politics entirely.

Michael Pope

Yeah. And then you had all those speeches that happened in the final hours, which were heartfelt, and there was a lot of crying. And one of the Republican Delegates was so overwrought he just sat down in the middle of his speech, and everybody started applauding, and then it moved on. It was a lot of tear-jerking moments there on the floor of the House and the floor of the Senate, because people will not be returning, and the next general assembly will be something very different, much like our next segment.

Michael Pope

Secret closed-door conference committees now, when the House and Senate have different versions of the same bill, send it to a committee of conference. That's a way to get all the key players together to resolve differences. Those conference committees happen in secret. They're not open to the public. They're not open to the press. And that's a lack of transparency that's worrisome to Delegate Alfonso Lopez, a Democrat from Arlington.

Alfonso Lopez

A lot of stuff gets done in private, and that way, you can actually have an open and honest dialogue with somebody. But I'm also very open and supportive of having the public be able to sort of watch all of these conversations.

Thomas Bowman

That'd be a hell of a reality show. Senator Mark Peek is a Republican from Lynchburg, who says what the conference committees lack and transparency, they make up for efficiency.

Mark Peek

I'll tell you what, though, when we have as many bills as we have to go to a conference, a committee, there aren't enough rooms, and there isn't enough time to get us out here in 45 days if we had open public hearings on the conference committees.

Thomas Bowman

Hey, I actually agree with Senator Peek. It would be inefficient; there isn't enough time. And that's a case in point, Michael, for why we need longer legislative sessions.

Michael Pope

I would disagree that efficiency is a good argument for saying you should not have transparency with this part of the process. Flashback to our very first episode, Thomas, the very first episode of Pod Virginia, then called Transition Virginia. I went on a huge speech about how much I hated the conference committees, and I hated how they were not open to the public and not open to the press. And so that has actually been a theme of our podcast is the ridiculous lack of transparency here, where you've got senior people on the budget committees who are making all these decisions in secret without any transparency. And nobody knows the deals that they're making. And we will continue to talk about that on this podcast. But so far, no one is really interested in making any changes. However, you did hear Alfonso Lopez actually saying that he kind of agreed in principle with the idea.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah, Michael, look, I think most people are on the same page. And in that building, they also acknowledged that the way conference committees get done and are handled is not ideal, and in the spirit of public government on behalf of and for the people. And once again, they're forced into this artifact; it's just an artifact of not having enough time; they have to go in and give themselves an automatic 15 day extension already every year because it's actually supposed to be 30 days, not 45 days. That's a fun trivia question in the future. But look, I think the secret conference committee, which you feel much more strongly about than I do. But you know, sausage just has to get made sometimes. The reality is that if we did want to slow down and do this right and transparently, it would require a much-needed and significant overhaul of the way the legislature conducts its business. And you heard Jeff Bourne say exactly what that was.

Michael Pope

All right. Well, let's move on to our next story.

Michael Pope

Tribute to Delegate Ken Plum, now Ken Plumof Reston. He's seen it all literally as the longest-serving member of the House of Delegates. He's seen Democrats in power, he's seen Republicans in power. And he was even around to witness the last gasp of the Bryd machine.

Thomas Bowman

Michael had a chance to sit down with Delegate plum this week. And you got to talk to him about his career, Michael.

Ken Plum

My dad had no formal education. My Mom had just elementary education. And I went to a very small rural school but still yet the study of history, which was fascinating to me. And that stuck with me until I went to college. I majored in history, history, and political science and worked in campaigns where I came to realize that I'm smart as the candidates and decided to throw my hat in the ring.

Michael Pope

I'm as smart as the candidates. Now, that's something I think a lot of our listeners have probably said to themselves. And this is what a young Ken Plum was thinking. Like many people of that generation, he was inspired by something that happened on a very cold day in Washington, DC, in January of 1961.

Ken Plum

I put on all the clothing that I owned in my life and trip through two feet of snow. And heard the plee, "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country." I was there. And I can't describe to you how passionate I was about that. And how meaningful that was to me.

Thomas Bowman

Taking that experience with him into politics. Ken Plum launched a career in politics that spanned decades, even generations.

Ken Plum

I counted that count them up the other day. I've run in 29 elections. I've won 20. These are primaries and general elections, 20 in total, and I won 26 of them.

Michael Pope

Alright, so important to point out that Ken plum did not win his first race for the House of Delegates in 1973. And he did not win his second race for the House of Delegates in 1975. Part of that was because of the dynamics of winning and multi-member districts, and at the time, this district that he was running for had five delegates, and they represented a huge chunk of Northern Virginia.

Ken Plum

Campaigns were $5,000 operations in a district five times the size of a regular district. So it's an uphill battle. But those excuses aside, I continue to hang in there. And so, in 1977, I hit the jackpot. I won. Unfortunately, in 1979, I lost.

Thomas Bowman

Alright, Michael, I'd like to focus on that Ken plum here, a retired teacher; he was progressive before progressive was cool. In fact, he spent his early years in the General Assembly fighting against the Bryd machine.

Ken Plum

I don't have to tell you about this, because you've studied the Bryd machine. And you know, that circuit court judges were key to the way the machine operates. Patronage. And they appointed a number of people that constituted the framework of the machine. I needed a way to dismantle a machine that was dismantled piece of it. But the problem was, I went to the people who were in the machine running this thing to ask them to change it.

Michael Pope

But those old Bryd machine Democrats were eventually overthrown by anti-machine Democrats. And Delegate Ken Plum started to look in the mirror and see a potential run for the Speaker of the House. So when a Senate seat opened up, he said, thanks, but no, thanks.

Ken Plum

I decided that since I'm going up in seniority, I'm on the Appropriations Committee. My god, I an I'm a chair of the Appropriations Committee, or maybe be Speaker. So I declined the opportunity to jump to the Senate. My aide, however, Janet Howell, decided to make that run. And the rest is history.

Thomas Bowman

Wow, how about that? Ken Plum, of course, never became appropriations chairman. Neither did he become Speaker of the House because Republicans took control. This is how he describes dealing with Republican Speaker of the House, Vance Wilkins.

Ken Plum

Vance Wilkins said to give me a list of the committee you want to serve on. And it was only later that I realized what he did was he inverted your list and put you on what you least wanted to be on. I'm telling you, this is the truth. So now, I've lost Appropriations. All this thought about me building seniority to lead to the chairmanship is down the tubes. And that senate district has failed. Oh, woe is me.

Michael Pope

Oh, woe is me, says Ken Plum. But he's stuck around long enough to see Democrats take control of the General Assembly and change everything.

Ken Plum

Here is the apex of progressive democratic politics in Virginia. This is the most transformative period of my years of being here. The issues that I had worked on for years suddenly were coming about.

Michael Pope

It's really interesting how Ken Plum has been around for so long that he has seen something so extreme as the last gasp of the Bryd machine. And then also the Speakership of Eileen Filler-Corn, he's been around for both of those things. And for Ken Plum not to be around is certainly an absence that I know I personally will miss because I always ask him questions about stuff that happened ten years ago, twenty years ago, and so Ken Plum leaving the Virginia General Assembly is a really big deal.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah, and Michael, I don't know if you remember this or not, but my General Assembly office in the Pocahontas building, of course, is the temporary GAB. Ken Plum's office was right there in the corner across from my office. So I got to see Ken, and his wonderful L.A., Christie, all the time. And we had a great working relationship. And Ken is just one of the genuinely nice people that I've ever encountered in this business. And I'm definitely not going to feel at home in the next General Assembly building without at least Ken there. He has an institution.

Michael Pope

Yeah, that corner office in the Pocahontas building that you're talking about, Thomas, that is where I conducted this interview with Ken Plum, and all the audio that we were just here, and actually, it took place right there in that corner office and the Pocahontas building, which by the way, has a great view of the Capitol. So I guess you get something with seniority. You get an office with a nice view at least.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah, public servitude can come in many forms, Michael, but delegate Plums decades dedicated to progress. And a big thing for him is, of course, writing about societal wrongs and combating injustice through the legislative process. Look, Ken Plum is pivotal to helping move Virginia out of the Bryd era legacy into what it is today. And for our Northern Virginia listeners, Delegate Plum is one of the main reasons you got that silver line expansion out and Reston and now Loudoun.

Michael Pope

Alright. Well, before we wrap up, let's play a round of trivia. Last week, we asked you about the phrase "sine die."

Thomas Bowman

Yeah. And because this was such an easy answer to look up. We said on Twitter that the wrong answers were home. So, of course, Jordan Miles said it, "a journey with no future date to return". But both Houses are returning in the spring to talk money. So that's true. Without a day, right?

Michael Pope

The literal translation is without a day, as in, there's no set date for the return of the General Assembly. But that did not stop our listeners from giving us some great feedback.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah, Jay Speer @jayspeer2 says, it means "the end of session except for reconvene session budget negotiations, Special Session, studies, commissions and committee meetings with no additional pay."

Michael Pope

Yeah, good point. Jay Speer. Sean Weneta @ShawnWeneta, of the ACLU, says it means a pilgrimage to NoLA, as in New Orleans, or let the good times roll as a bon temps rouler. I think I'm not really good with the pronunciation there. But I'm sure Shawn Weneta is having a great time in New Orleans.

Thomas Bowman

Man, I'm glad you picked that one up because I could have not pronounced a single word of that.

Michael Pope

Oui Oui.

Thomas Bowman

RaeAnn Pickett @RaeRica, said it's pronounced Pronounced "Sine-Die, as in Cindy, the person who comes through to check and make sure everyone's out of the building and turns off the lights on the last day of the session."

Michael Pope

Sounds like a horror movie. All right, Chris Sigler @ChrisSigler6 says it means quote, my mental anguish is coming to an end.

Thomas Bowman

Oh, that's the best one yet, but I think I've got one better here from RVA Politics @rjmarr, who says, "Sine Die means legislators and staffers have to wait until next session for another Brunswick Stew Day."

Michael Pope

Andrew Millin @ajm0614, says Sine Die Roughly translates to "you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here."

Thomas Bowman

I like that one too.

Michael Pope

Yeah, that's a good one.

Thomas Bowman

Michael, let's move on to next week's trivia question. What are you got for us this time?

Michael Pope

Alright. Okay, so our next trivia question is about Confederate statues. Now, everybody knows that Confederate statues have been systematically removed from monument Avenue. But Capitol Square is a separate issue altogether. How many Confederate statues are currently in Capitol Square?

Thomas Bowman

Man, I'm surprised there are still some, but I guess I shouldn't be.

Michael Pope

I probably shouldn't say more than one. Because I guess that's kind of tipping off the answer a little bit, but it is more than one answer.

Thomas Bowman

Not one. There's your hint.

Michael Pope

let's head over to the water cooler. Hey, Thomas, what's the latest? What are you hearing around the water cooler?

Thomas Bowman

Well, Michael, the firehouse primary for Jennifer McClellan's seat is heating up, and it's got another new entry. Granted, some of this is expected, but you got Delegate Don Adams, Alexis Rogers, and Delegate Lamont Bagby. So Alexis Rodgers, of course, has picked up a number of big endorsements. And Lamont Bagby, the latest entrant into this

Michael Pope

Bagby's picking up a lot of endorsements as well. Right?

Thomas Bowman

Lamont Bagby got not only IBEW Local 666 down here in Richmond. He also got the Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 10 ironworkers, Mid Atlantic States District Council, as well. So that's just some of the labor endorsements that did not go to Alexis Rogers.

Michael Pope

We talked about this primary, this potential firehouse primary, in a previous episode where we talked about the potential dynamics between Lamont Bagby and Alexis Rogers; we did not talk about Don Adams joining this race; Thomas, how does this three-way dynamic play out in the selection?

Thomas Bowman

It's a good question and remains to be seen. Don kind of had to do it; she and Jeff Bourne, neither one of them wanted to go up against Betsy Carr in a district with new lines that were ideal for Betsy Carr to win. That would have been a very tough and expensive primary against somebody that, frankly, they didn't want to not serve with. And so in order to stay in government, she's moving up for Senate. And I think it makes sense. Alexis Rogers is certainly not a newcomer to politics, but she would be a newcomer to elected office. And there are people waiting in line, which is probably not a good strategy. Don't do that. Don't wait in line. Just run. That's the lesson of 2017 and 2019. But Michael, she's got to do this. I heard she's trying to push a few LGBT organizations into endorsing her as one of the out candidates in this race. But, the reality is, they seem to be rolling out the red carpet for Alexis Rogers down here. I mean, good for her. What about you, Michael? What are you hearing?

Michael Pope

Well, I want to do a special shout-out to the Virginia Capitol Correspondents Association. So the point of personal privilege, Thomas, I'm a former president of this association. And during the session, I handed the crown over to Sarah Rankin of the Associated Press. So if you have any issues with the Virginia press corps, please send them to Sarah Rankin, of the Associated Press, who is now in charge of the association. Also, Marcus Schmidt of Cardinal news is the Vice President, and Chad Khalil, VPM, is the treasurer. So new leadership with the Virginia Capitol Correspondents Association and I left this organization in great hands, Thomas; these are really amazing people that make up the new board of the VCCA. So it was a pleasure to hand it off to them.

Thomas Bowman

So Michael, what you're saying is here has been now.

Michael Pope

Has been, yes, former presidents who still have opinions. There is a former VCCA President by the name of Patrick Wilson, who sometimes thinks that he runs the place. But there is definitely a role for the former presidents in the future of the Capitol press core, which is important because there's this new building, the General Assembly building, that has a press room. And there has been some talk about not having press availability space, that's available to the press in the Capitol building itself. And why is it possible that the press corps doesn't need two press rooms, one in the GAB and one in the Capitol building? And so this is an issue, actually, that Sarah Rankin and her colleagues are going to have to work out. Because I know that the press corps definitely wants space in the Capitol building for all of the television cameras and the lights and the journalists and the people, and doing this stuff actually takes manpower and people. And if you want to kick the press out of the Capitol building, well, you want to think about how that's going to look because people are going to ask questions about not having a presence for the press corps inside of the Capitol of Virginia.

Thomas Bowman

Wait, are they kicking the press out of the Capitol building?

Michael Pope

No, they're not. But there is currently space for the media in the Capitol building. And there has been talk that once the new General Assembly Building opens, the new GAB will have a press room. And does the press really need two rooms, one in the GAB and one in the Capitol building itself? And so there has been a debate about the use of space in and around the new capitol building once it opens with the tunnel and the new GAB.

Thomas Bowman

Alright, well, I guess we'll have to hold on tight for that. Drama to play out.

Michael Pope

Thomas. Let's go over and open up that Pod Virginia mailbag. What are our listeners talking about?

Thomas Bowman

Buckingham County Supervisor, Jordan Miles, heard our game show segment on the use of cyanide in mineral mining and said, "sad house R's killed a bill to ban cyanide and Virginia. Could have solved this gold mine matter lickety-split".

Michael Pope

Alexandria assistant manager Sarah Taylor was on Twitter promoting our game show, buy, sell, or hold. So she wrote cyanide mining corporate tax cuts secretly recording committee chairs. More importantly, though, would you buy, sell or hold on to Marcus Simon, Alfonso Lopez, or Sarah Taylor? Thomas, I would interject here to say strong buy on all of those, strong buy on Sarah Taylor, and strong by on Marcus Simon and Alfonso Lopez for agreeing to do the game show, which was admittedly a little quirky, but we had a great time doing it. So we really appreciate their cooperation on that.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah, I don't know if I would buy, sell or hold Michael; I think it's a mixed bag. But Wyatt Gordon liked our discussion about the Idaho stop. And he quoted your prediction that cyclists will continue to slow down at stop signs instead of coming to a complete stop because nobody wants that to happen. Cyclists don't want it to happen, and drivers don't want that to happen because it slows everything down.

Michael Pope

Matthew Larson responded to that tweet from Wyatt Gordon by saying, "Fact. I've lost count of the number of times I've been waved through by motorists for that reason".

Thomas Bowman

You know, the Shenandoah Valley Bicycle Coalition even heard that discussion of the Idaho stop and said, "BUY BUY BUY!!! Permit people on bikes to yield at stop signs", adding a thank you to the podcast for our coverage of the GA session.

Michael Pope

I think I respond to that on Twitter. And I said, the next time that we play this game, we really need to add a sad trombone sound for every time somebody says hold. So if you think about the way that game show where the buy or the sell was, maybe perhaps more controversial positions. So you heard a lot of people say hold on to that podcast, which was not really taking the most important stands on the issues of the day.

Thomas Bowman

I think we should get to some birthdays because we got some big ones this week.

Michael Pope

Yes. Let's celebrate some birthdays this week. So Tuesday, February 28th, is the birthday of Delegate John Avoli of Staunton. Now, if 2023 had a February 29th, it would be the birthday of leap year baby, Congressman Ben Cline. So Ben Cline’s birthday actually does not appear on the calendar of most years. And so, was he even eligible to run for Congress? I don't know.

Thomas Bowman

Isn't he Like 10?

Michael Pope

Friday, March 3rd, is the birthday of Delegate Karen Greenhalgh of Virginia Beach. And then there are two birthdays on Sunday, March 5th, Delegate Israel O'Quinn of Washington County and House Minority leader Don Scott. So happy birthday all around.

Thomas Bowman

Great. Well, let's leave it here. That's it for this week's episode of pod Virginia. Check out our website and follow us on social media for more updates and discussions on Virginia politics.