On Thursday, Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin signed a bill to strengthen Virginia’s Name Image and Likeness procedures for the state’s college athletes.

House Bill 1505 was supported by Del. Terry Austin. The bill allows Virginia universities to provide their athletes with name, image, and likeness compensation and prevents an outside agency, including the NCAA, from being able to restrict it.

Governor Youngkin says the bill strengthens the competitiveness of Virginia’s universities.

“This bill takes a most important step that we in fact are first going to make sure that our colleges and universities are at the forefront with policies and procedures that they will review and approve. That they in fact can help manage this, which is so important and that in fact this going to be a program that is going to be managed by Virginia’s colleges and universities and not by outside institutions and associations. It enables us to be competitive across the nation with other power five conferences, other major universities,” said Youngkin.

The bill will go into effect on July 1.