Virginia General Assembly – Construction Law Musings- Richmond, VA

One More Statutory Tweak of Interest to VA Construction Pros

Originally posted 2022-04-13 11:15:19.

While I have focussed on the recent “pay if paid” legislation in recent posts, the Virginia General Assembly has taken other action that is of interest to those of us that represent construction professionals in Virginia.

One such action is yet another tweak to the so-called “wage theft” statute that essentially made a general contractor the guarantor of all wage payments of its downstream construction partners. The first of the tweaks to the statute passed in 2020 was to create a defense for a general contractor if it obtained a written certification of wage payment from its immediate downstream subcontractor. This year, the General Assembly expanded the protection provided by such certification to all subcontractors. In other words, any contractor or subcontractor can now protect itself from wage theft claims by the use of a certification that all wages were paid from its immediate downstream partner. The text of the changes can be found here. [note that the Governor has sent suggested grammatical amendments that did not affect the substance]

While I am fully behind the legislature adding these protections, I still find it interesting that it is only the construction industry that has been targeted. As I’ve stated many times, I truly enjoy representing construction professionals in Virginia and cannot help but wonder why the requirement was not made more general.

I welcome your comments below. Please subscribe to keep up with this and other Construction Law Musings.

Virginia General Assembly Tweaks Pay-if-Paid Ban

Last year, the Virginia General Assembly passed into law a ban on the so-called pay-if-paid clauses, effective January 1, 2023. I shared my thoughts and concerns with the legislation as drafted at the time of its passage. During this most recent legislative session, and among some other construction-related bills, the General Assembly sought to clarify its past enactment. Continue reading Virginia General Assembly Tweaks Pay-if-Paid Ban

Mechanic’s Liens and Legislative Sausage

Originally posted 2016-12-19 10:00:35.

English: Virginia state capitol in Richmond. F... — Image via Wikipedia

Over the past week or two I’ve been covering HB 1265, a bill that was working its way through the Virginia General Assembly legislative sausage making process. I gave you my thoughts on the original bill as written and then on the somewhat better (though far from perfect) amended bill.

Well, this past Monday I had the opportunity to take part in the hearing on the bill before the Virginia Senate committee that was considering whether to recommend the amended bill to the entire Senate for a vote.

Continue reading Mechanic’s Liens and Legislative Sausage

Thoughts on New Pay if Paid Legislation (UPDATED with Final Text)

Originally posted 2022-03-23 10:54:51.

Recently, the Virginia General Assembly closed its session having passed legislation essentially banning “pay if paid” clauses in construction contracts, both public and private. Assuming that Governor Youngkin signs the bill into law on or before his deadline of April 11, 2022, the following new requirement will be grafted into any Virginia construction contract:

Such contract shall require such higher-tier contractor to pay such lower-tier subcontractor within the earlier of (i) 45 days of the satisfactory completion of the portion of the work for which the subcontractor has invoiced or (ii) seven days after receipt of amounts paid by the owner to the general contractor or by the higher-tier contractor to the lower-tier contractor for work performed by a subcontractor pursuant to the terms of the contract.

This is the main operative language (the 45-day payment requirement is also applied to project owners), but the legislation also imposes certain other notice duties upon both the owner and any higher-tier contractor on a construction project. Interestingly, the legislation does not include a provision making it only effective for those contracts entered into after its effective date. More on that later. Continue reading Thoughts on New Pay if Paid Legislation (UPDATED with Final Text)

A Lien Change for the Better (Guest Post at ZLien)

Originally posted 2017-04-10 11:00:41.

During the recent General Assembly session, the Virginia legislature made a great change to the Virginia mechanic’s lien statute. I blog about it at the Zlien Blog.

Here’s an excerpt of my post.

The recent changes to Va. Code §43-3 (effective July 1, 2012) clarify several points regarding the allocation of lien amounts to individual lots. The main points of clarification are as follows:

Common areas are explicitly excluded from the “denominator” of the lien allocation equation. In other words, where there are 10 home sites and one common area, a site or utility contractor no longer needs to worry if it should allocate part of its lien amount to the common area and can safely allocate the amount owed to the ten home sites.

Traffic signalization, and installation of electric, gas, cable, or other utilities are explicitly included in the definition of “site development improvements

Any payments to the contractor for which the owner/developer does not designate a particular lot will apply to any previously sold lot and the remaining lots will continue to bear their share of the liability.

Check out the entire post and thanks to Scott Wolfe for giving me the opportunity, yet again, to post at his great mechanic’s lien resource.

As always, I welcome and encourage your comments below, please share your thoughts. Also, please subscribe to keep up with the latest Construction Law Musings.