HB 547 — Private companies providing public transportation services; employee protections.
VA 20261 session
Private companies providing public transportation services; employee protections; report. Requires the governing body of any county or city that contracts with a private company to provide transportation services to (i) require such company to provide any employee of such company providing such services compensation and benefits that are, at a minimum, equivalent to the compensation and benefits provided to a public employee, as defined in the bill, with a position requiring equivalent qualifications and years of service; (ii) provide transportation services through such company's own employees; and (iii) if such county or city subsequently elects to provide its own system of public transportation, adopt an ordinance or resolution providing for collective bargaining and ensure all employees of such private company are offered employment with such subsequent public transportation system without loss of compensation or benefits. The bill clarifies that the bill only applies to actions occurring on or after the effective date and excludes any action taken, contract signed, liability incurred, or right accrued prior to July 1, 2026, from the requirements. Finally, the bill directs the Director of the Department of Rail and Public Transportation to convene a work group to develop recommendations on how to implement the provisions of the bill and requires the work group to report its findings and recommendations to the Chairs of the House Committee on Labor and Commerce and Senate Committee on Local Government by November 1, 2026. This bill is identical to SB 731.
Latest action: — Acts of Assembly Chapter
Sponsors (4)
- Dan I. Helmer (D, VA) — sponsor
- Rae Cousins (D, VA) — cosponsor
- Virgil Thornton (D, VA) — cosponsor
- Kathy K.L. Tran (D, VA) — cosponsor
Action timeline (41)
- · house · H4020 —
- · house · H1401 —
- · house · H8500 —
- · house · H1412 —
- · house · H1416 —
- · house · H1405 —
- · house · H4110 —
- · house · H4122 —
- · house · H5000 —
- · senate · S4140 —
- · senate · S0701 —
- · senate · S0708 —
- · senate · S4640 —
- · senate · S0505 —
- · senate · S4150 —
- · senate · S4145 —
- · senate · S4150 —
- · senate · S4160 —
- · senate · S4160 —
- · senate · S4130 —
- · senate · S4130 —
- · senate · S4410 —
- · senate · S4601 —
- · senate · S5022 —
- · house · H5432 —
- · house · H5610 —
- · house · H5620 —
- · senate · S5620 —
- · house · H5610 —
- · house · H7010 —
- · G7010 —
- · G7210 —
- · house · H7300 —
- · senate · S7300 —
- · G7320 —
- · house · H5615 —
- · house · H5602 —
- · house · H5620 —
- · senate · S5620 —
- · G7050 —
- · G9998 —
Text versions (0)
No text versions on file yet — same ingest as the action timeline populates these. Each version has direct links to the XML / HTML / PDF at govinfo.gov.
Bill text (extracted)
Amendments
Congressional Research Service briefs (0)
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Who matters on this bill
Who matters
Members ranked by combined influence on this bill: role (sponsor 5 / cosponsor 1), capped speech count from the Congressional Record, and recorded-vote engagement.
| # | Member | Role | Speeches | Voted | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dan I. Helmer (D, state_lower VA) | sponsor | 0 | — | 5 |
| 2 | Kathy K.L. Tran (D, state_lower VA) | cosponsor | 0 | — | 1 |
| 3 | Rae Cousins (D, state_lower VA) | cosponsor | 0 | — | 1 |
| 4 | Virgil Thornton (D, state_lower VA) | cosponsor | 0 | — | 1 |
Stance (positions taken)
Predicted vote
Aggregated from: actual roll-call votes (when present) → sponsor → cosponsor → party median (predicts YES when ≥25% of the caucus sponsored/cosponsored). Each row labels its confidence tier so you can see why a position was predicted.
0 predicted yes (0%) · 543 predicted no (100%) · 0 unknown (0%)
By party: · R: 0 yes / 277 no · D: 0 yes / 263 no · I: 0 yes / 3 no