Governor Glenn Youngkin is still considering how he wants to handle dozens of bills on his desk.
One of them involves social media — which is addictive and potentially even harmful to children, says Senator Schuyler VanValkenburg, a Democrat from Henrico County. That's why he introduced a bill to do something about it. The governor amended his bill to allow parents to disable what’s known as infinite scroll.
"On this issue, the governor and I are pretty aligned. And, I and the Senate was comfortable with his amendments because two years in a row, we have voted to ban addictive feeds altogether," VanValkenburg says. "And, his amendment was just to allow parents to toggle them off."
But the House of Delegates rejected the governor's amendments. So now, he can either sign the unamended bill or veto it all together. That bill sets a one-hour time limit for children 16 and under, and it allows parents to change the time limits. Marissa Edmund at the Family Online Safety Institute says she has concerns about the effectiveness and implementation of the bill.
"And a one-hour time limit seems a bit arbitrary, and parents would need to adjust each time limit across the dozens of apps that their kid has," Edmund says. "We've heard that parents are already overwhelmed by the number of parental controls that exist online, and we feel that this could put the onus on parents to do more."
VanValkenburg says he hopes the governor will sign the version of the bill that's on his desk right now. Youngkin is expected to make a decision in the next few weeks.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.
