How to Get Information about Virginia Legislation and Legislators

You can find out a great deal of information about legislation currently being considered by going to the Virginia General Assembly website at legis.state.va.us. By going to the Legislative Information System link, you can track bills by number, subject, committee, and patrons as they go through the legislative process outlined above. For example, the page will give you various options for getting to bills. If you click on "By subject" and type in "special education" or "autism" when prompted, a list of bills about special education or autism will come up for you to explore. If you know the bill number, you can track the bill that way and look at how the bill is making its way through the legislative process.

You can also contact the legislative information service by phone or mail. Write to Legislative Information, The Clerk's Office, House of Delegates, P. O. Box 406, Richmond, Virginia, 23218, or call them at (804) 698-1500. They can send you copies of legislation that you may want. The Senate Legislative Information Office can be reached at (804) 698-7410.

Then, if you click on the Virginia Online Legislature link you will be connected to both houses of the General Assembly. By clicking on the Who’s My Legislator link, under the section marked Citizen’s Guide, you can enter your address and receive a list of your delegate, your state senator and your representative in the U.S. Congress. Following the links from that page, you can find addresses, email addresses, and telephone numbers for your representatives when the General Assembly is in session and out of session.

You can also contact your local Board of Elections to find out who represent you. Look in the blue pages (those pages devoted to government numbers) of your telephone book under Board of Elections or Voter Registration for the appropriate number.

During the legislative session, you can also call the Constituent Viewpoint operators at (800) 889-0229 to express your opinion on any legislative issue and have the operators relay those views to the proper legislators.

You can also call and write your representatives. You can contact any delegate by writing to them at this address: House of Delegates, P.O. Box 406, Richmond, Virginia, 23218. The telephone numbers of all the delegates are 804-698-10xx, where the xx are the two digits of their district number. For example, Ken Plum represents the 36th district, so his phone number is 804-698-1036. The central fax number for the House of Delegates is 804-786-6310. Write to your senator at this address: Senate, 910 Capitol Street, Richmond, Virginia, 23219. All Senators can be reached by dialing 804-698-75xx, where the xx are also the two digits of the district they represent. The central fax number for the Senate is 804-786-7640.

To contact Governor Mark Warner, you can visit his website at www.governor.state.va.us.  Follow the links to send him an email directly from the site. Or you can call his office at 804-786-2211, or write to him at the Office of the Governor, State Capitol
3rd Floor, Richmond, VA, 23219.

When you contact your legislators, be polite and clear. Ask that they support a specific piece of legislation. For example, you might say, "Hello, my name is Jane Doe and I’m calling to ask that Senator Washington support Senate Bill 123, about educating children with disabilities." Sometimes, if the office is particularly busy, the secretary will simply thank you and take down your name, address, and possibly phone number. You may also ask to speak to the delegate’s or senator’s legislative aide, and then you can enter into a longer conversation about why you want them to support the particular bill. If you have personal experiences that would shed light on the importance of the bill, talk about those experiences. Representatives remember personal experiences best. Always be polite, and thank them for taking their time (or their aide’s or secretary’s time) to listen to your concerns.

Representatives want to hear from their constituents. Delegate Jeannemarie Devolites, who represents part of Fairfax County, said, "It’s very important for parents to contact their legislators about issues that are important to them as parents. Constituents can do much to encourage legislators to support laws, but the first step is to educate legislators about the importance of those laws."

How to Contact Your Congressional Representative, Senators, and the President

On the Internet, you can find out who your representative in the United States Congress is by going to www.house.gov and following the link at the bottom of the page entitled Write Your Representative. By clicking on to your representative’s name, you will be connected to their webpage. Some representatives, such as James Moran, include forms for constituents to fill out online so that they do not need an email account to contact their representative electronically. Others post their email address and/or contact information for offices in their districts; all post their mailing addresses and phone numbers in Washington.

The two U.S. Senators representing Virginia are George Allen and John Warner. Their web pages can be found through the Senate’s website at www.senate.gov.

George Allen’s address is:
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-4024

John Warner’s address is:
225 Russell Building
Washington, DC. 20510
202-224-2023

Senator Warner also has local offices in Abingdon, Norfolk, Richmond, and Roanoke. Visit his website or look in the blue pages of the phone book for those addresses and phone numbers.

You can track bills during the current Congress at the Library of Congress’s Thomas website – thomas.loc.gov. You can search by bill number or subject matter.

You can also contact your local Board of Elections to find out who is your representative in Congress. Look in the blue pages (those pages devoted to government numbers) of your telephone book under Board of Elections or Voter Registration for the appropriate number. The main Capitol switchboard, (202) 224-3121, can also help you identify your Congressional Representative. The Capitol does not have an 800 number, but some public interest groups do on occasion provide people with 800 numbers that connect directly with the Capitol switchboard.

Information about the President of the United States, George W. Bush, is available on the White House’s website www.whitehouse.gov. You can send President Bush an email at president@whitehouse.gov.  Or you can send a letter to:

The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC, 20500

The White House can also be reached at:
202-456-1414
202-456-6213 (TTY/TDD)
202-456-2461 (FAX)