The Virginia First Cities Coalition is very supportive of SB 1285 and all the legislation this year that deals with issues of blight and derelict buildings. Our 16 older, core Virginia cities have varying degrees of issues with blight and unattended buildings. However, we are united in the belief that, when we hear from our citizens year after year about spot blight in some of our neighborhoods, we should have the ability to responsibly remediate the situation for the greater good. We are grateful to the General Assembly for providing us all possible tools to deal with these issues and raise up our neighborhoods and ask for your support of HB 1285.

Verizon respectively request adoption of the amendments being offered by Delegate Heretick. These amendments are to be considered as clarifying amendments and mean no harm to the bill. Verizon is not a regulated rate of return company. We are a competitive company and as such, we can not afford to accept as compensation anything less than the full costs for any such traffic corridors. The cost that is to be compensated must be complete otherwise we must pass the costs along to our customers and in a competitive company such as ours places us at a competitive disadvantage. There can not be any negotiation over compensation for our cost for participating in any traffic improvement corridor.