Richmond, Virginia—As the General Assembly session convenes for 2020, Progress Virginia is proud to continue its award-winning Eyes on Richmond program to bring transparency and accountability to the General Assembly. Progress Virginia and a cohort of 12 fellows will film and livestream the majority of the subcommittee hearings of both the House of Delegates and the Senate.

After the first year of the program in 2017, the General Assembly decided to take on the work of recording and streaming full committee meetings. Unfortunately, they still do not record subcommittee meetings, which is where much of the real work of the General Assembly happens. Eyes On Richmond will continue to operate until they do. Live footage and a schedule of upcoming streams are available at eyesonrichmond.org. After the streams end, the footage will be archived and available upon request. 

“Legislators are elected to represent our communities, so it is critical that community members are able to see what their legislators are up to when doing the people’s business in Richmond,” Anna Scholl, Executive Director of Progress Virginia said. “When we started Eyes on Richmond, it was standard for bills to pass or fail on unrecorded voice votes and it was often impossible to know how a particular legislator voted on important bills unless you were in the room when it happened. Eyes on Richmond allows people across the commonwealth to be in the room where it happens and hold their legislators accountable for the votes they take during the legislative session.”

Progress Virginia started Eyes on Richmond in 2017. This year, we will film the majority of the subcommittee hearings. The livestream can be found at eyesonrichmond.org.