Delegates to meet at Richmond’s Siegel Center

Aug. 18 special session is set to be live-streamed

Published August 5, 2020 by Kate Andrews

Update, Aug. 7: The Virginia State Senate will return to the Science Museum of Virginia, a staffer in Senate Majority Leader Richard “Dick” Saslaw’s office confirmed Friday.

Earlier:

Leaving the big tent behind, the Virginia House of Delegates will meet at the Stuart C. Siegel Center at Virginia Commonwealth University at its Aug. 18 special session, Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn announced Wednesday.

The House and state Senate are set to reconvene in Richmond this month to finalize the state’s biennial budget and also address policing reforms, but just as in April, delegates will not meet in their usual quarters at the Virginia State Capitol due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In April, delegates met under a giant tent on the Capitol grounds, while state senators gathered in a large room at the Science Museum of Virginia.

The Siegel Center, where the VCU Rams basketball teams play, will not be open to the public during the session, Filler-Corn’s news release says, but the special session will be live-streamed. The Virginia Department of Health advised the House leadership on the location, which will allow enough social distancing.