Del. Mark Downey, D-York, is the only doctor in the House of Delegates. Health and education are top priorities in his first General Assembly session.
One bill he’s introduced this year is legislation that would move the distribution of nursing scholarships under the Nursing Workforce Center. It’s a change he said could make it easier to award the scholarships, and in turn promote nursing career opportunities in the state.
“This nursing scholarship program has been in place for a while,” said Downey who represents District 69, which includes most of York County and parts of James City County. “It was initially run through the Virginia Department of Health, but with all the additional red tape, they found that they weren’t getting the money that was already allocated for these scholarship funds to the nursing students that need it.”
Nursing school scholarship recipients can get $2,000 a year at the undergraduate level and $4,000 a year at the graduate level. Downey said the Nursing Workforce Center, under the Virginia Health Workforce Development Authority, would be better equipped to administer nursing scholarships than VDH, which is also tasked with things like managing outbreaks.
The goal is to address the statewide nursing shortage by increasing the number of nursing students. Recipients of the scholarship would be obligated to work for a year after graduation in medically underserved areas in Virginia or in long-term care facilities such as nursing homes. That could help address nursing home concerns, Downey said.
Downey is among the 13 seats Democrats picked up this fall. He defeated Republican incumbent Chad Green in November.
“One I’m hoping to get across the finish line this year is expanding opportunities in the Reach Out and Read program, which is, if we provide state funds, we’ll get matching federal funds to actually provide books for doctors like myself — pediatricians or family physicians — to give out to kids from 0 to 5 at every one of their well-visits,” he said.
Other bills would add dry needling to the state’s definition of athletic training and remove residence requirements for people serving on the state Board of Medicine. Downey is also carrying a bill that would require gun owners with children in the house to lock up their firearms.
He said he’s learned to be prepared to speak on his bills at any time.
“I think being a physician, I’m kind of used to that,” he said. “Every day, I have a schedule of 20 or 25 patients, and what is said an appointment is for doesn’t always end up that way. Same thing here, like going into a committee meeting, and it’s supposed to go one way and you find out it’s going to go another way.”
Kate Seltzer, (757)713-7881, kate.seltzer@virginiamedia.com
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