House Passes Bill Removing Obscene Matter Exemptions

Today, the House of Delegates passed eleven bills, including:

House Bill 4654 removes schools, libraries, and museums from the exemption of criminal liability for the distribution and display of obscene matter. Any individual would have to knowingly and intentionally provide minors with obscene matter.

Proponents of this bill said exemptions should have never existed. If providing obscene matter outside of these buildings is illegal, it should also be illegal inside these buildings. They stated the purpose of this bill is to protect children from seeing matter that is obscene, containing pornographic or sexually explicit material. 

Opponents stated they fear the passage of this bill could bring about costly litigation. They stated that people have varying opinions on what is obscene, which could result in a variety of books being challenged. They also fear this puts librarians and staff in danger of being arrested for having a book on a display.  

House Bill 4807 requires internet providers to credit customer’s accounts when the provider fails to provide service for five or more days. 

House Bill 4867 requires age verification for pornography sites to prevent minors from accessing the content. 

House Bill 5170 increases the matching grants for local economic developments to $50,000. 

This morning the House Rules Committee House Concurrent Resolution 6 to the House floor. The committee also moved House Bills 4809, 5137, 5345, 5354, 5022, 5441, and 5590 from the active Special Calendar to the inactive House Calendar.

The House is adjourned until Monday, February 19, 2023 at 11 a.m.

Committee Meetings, today Feb. 16
The Finance Committee will meet at 2 p.m. in Room 460.

Committee Meetings, Monday, Feb. 19
The Finance Committee will meet at 1 p.m. in Room 460. 
The Judiciary Committee will meet at 1 p.m. in Room 410. 
The Education Committee will meet at 2:30 p.m. in Room 434.
The Committee on Government Organization will meet at 3 p.m. in Room 215E.