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Delegate Kimberly Pope Adams urges faster broadband fixes, highlights new bills
Summary
Delegate Kimberly Pope Adams told the Dinwiddie County Board she sponsored 12 bills this session, nine of which were signed and take effect July 1, and urged more aggressive action on rural broadband; she flagged HB 317 to criminalize intentional damage to communications infrastructure and HB 1316 to clarify clutter enforcement on agricultural parcels.
Delegate Kimberly Pope Adams (House District 82) addressed the Dinwiddie County Board during a May 5 special meeting to give a legislative update and press for faster broadband deployment in rural areas. "I fully intend to to keep my foot on the gas, and, and make sure that they understand that this is non negotiable," she said, adding that nine of the 12 bills she sponsored were signed by the governor and will become law on July 1.
Pope Adams outlined her committee and commission assignments for the 2026 session — Transportation, Finance and Agriculture committees; the Tobacco Region Revitalization Commission (she was named chair of its strategic planning committee); the FOIA Council; and the Unemployment Compensation Commission — and said she was using those roles to press state agencies on broadband delivery. She told the board that the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) required River Street to submit a corrective action plan related to local broadband work, that the plan was due May 4, and that DHCD informed her the plan was filed. "DHCD reached out to me today to inform me that River Street did, in fact, submit that corrective action plan on yesterday," she said, adding she had not yet reviewed it.
Pope Adams highlighted two bills by number. She described HB 317 as strengthening the criminal code so that "anyone who intentionally damages broadband or communication infrastructure ... it would be a felony," intended to address gaps in older code language that still referred to telegraph infrastructure. She also noted HB 1316 (referred to in the meeting as the "clutter bill"), which she said will make it clearer when land zoned agricultural is effectively being used for residential purposes and therefore subject to code enforcement. The delegate encouraged residents and supervisors to review her legislation on the Virginia Legislative Information System (lis.virginia.gov) and said she would continue to report back to the county on DHCD responses and benchmarks.
