2001 General Assembly — Legislators to Watch

Senate Finance Chairman
John H. Chichester,
R-Fredericksburg,
took over as sole chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee last year when the state was taking in revenue hand over fist. Now he's in for a wake-up call. Chichester leads the group of budget writers who find out what it's like to call the shots for state spending in a slowing economy. The fiscally conservative Chichester will be pressed from all sides to refine the second year of the state's spending plan to satisfy a host of constituencies. He will be the key to navigating the building budget battles such as the fate of the politically popular car-tax rollback and any future tax changes that would help localities and fast-growing regions like Northern Virginia. Localities that want a debate over the state's tax structure fear Chichester will use the slowing budget revenues as reason to shelve any substantive discussion on one of their leading issues this year.