Authority: § 23-132.1 Title 23.1,Chapter 26, Article 2through § 23-132.11, Code of Virginia.
A. Appropriations for this agency shall include operating expenses for research and investigations, and the several regional and county agricultural experiment stations under its control, in accordance with law.
B.1. It is the intent of the General Assembly that the Cooperative Extension Service gives highest priority to programs and services which comprised the original mission of the Extension Service, especially agricultural programs at the local level. The university shall ensure that the service utilizes information technology to the extent possible in the delivery of programs.
2. The budget of this agency shall include and separately account for local payments. Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, in conjunction with Virginia State University, shall report, by fund source, actual expenditures for each program area and total actual expenditures for the agency, annually, by September 1, to the Department of Planning and Budget and the House Appropriations and Senate Finance Committees. The report shall include all expenditures from local support funds.
C. The Virginia Cooperative Extension and Agricultural Experiment Station shall not charge a fee for testing the soil on property used for commercial farming.
D. The appropriation for the fund source Higher Education Operating in this Item shall be considered a sum sufficient appropriation, which is an estimate of the amount of revenues to be collected for the educational and general program under the terms of the management agreement between Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and the Commonwealth, as set forth in Chapters 933 and 943, of the 2006 Acts of Assembly.
E. The agency shall study how best to leverage state investment with industry partnerships that result in the technological and scientific advancements needed to grow the state's agricultural and natural resource economy. A report shall be sent to the Chairmen of the House Appropriations and Senate Finance Committees by November 1, 2017. The findings of the study are to include short-term and long-term goals to grow the state's agricultural and natural resource economy.
F. The Virginia Cooperative Extension and Agricultural Experiment Station shall work with the Cooperative Extension and Agricultural Research Services at Virginia State University to jointly study strategies to mitigate the Commonwealth's shortage of career and technical education teachers in the fields of agricultural education, technology education, and family and consumer sciences. The study shall include an evaluation of current offerings, consideration of additional or alternative strategies, and offer recommendations, as appropriate, in a report submitted to the Chairmen of the Senate Finance and House Appropriations Committees by September 1, 2017.
G. It is the intent of the General Assembly that the general fund share of the Educational and General program for the Virginia Cooperative Extension and Agriculture Experiment Station shall be 95 percent of state funding calculations.