Block · one region of the page, as the scanner read it. It may hold a whole story, part of one, several, or an advertisement; stitching blocks into articles is the next step. Text is supplied OCR.
Page 4 · column 1 of 9 · from the scan, no model involved
By BOB BUNNELL
Arundrl VttN|Mpm Staff
RICHMOND—Twas two days before the opening ol the Virginia General Assembly’s 1981 session, and all through the House—and Senate—barely a creature was stirring.
Through the halls of th^ Generaly Assembly Building, the lights were off, secretaries’ desks empty and mounds of mail—the only harbinger of imminent activity—left unopened by legislators' doors.
"I think of it like calm before the storm,” said a House secretary who came in a day early. Unlike secretaries for senators, who started work Monday, House of Delegates secretaries were scheduled to start on Tuesday.
“I have the feeling it’s going to happen all at once on Wednesday,” she said. In the Capitol building across, the street there were more signs of life. The Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission composed of senators and delegates, studying the state’s social services programs and the state highway department this year, attracted a dozen or so legislators for sessions running from 9 a.m. to early afternoon. Journalists in the Capitol’s tiny press room were attacking their typewriter keys with usual vigor, and the wire services’ teletype machines banged out their customary din of stories.
Yet there was general consensus that Monday’s level of activity would bear little resemblance to the hoopla and hubbub of Wednesday’s, when the 1981 session was scheduled to open with an address at noon by Republican Gov. John N. Dalton.
Capitol Police, who keep the peace on the grounds of Capitol Square, the General Assembly Building and nearby buddings in Richmond’s state government district, say there will be an estimated 1,500 additional persons stationed in or near the area for the
80.0%