Legislators have been working in Raleigh for slightly over two weeks and our to-do list continues to grow.
We received additional briefings on the budget this week with specific emphasis on the growing needs of our state’s mental health services and criminal justice system. These briefings will help us as we begin work in the coming weeks on drafting a two-year budget.
So far this session, close to 250 bills have been introduced in the House and Senate on a wide range of topics related to education, health care, public safety, taxes, the environment, improving our economy, and local projects across the state. I have sponsored many of the bills including: House Bills 25-Funds for Healthy Carolinians, House Bill 66-Local Option Sales Tax, House Bill 91-Registration and Voting at One-Stop Sites and House Bill 127-Clean Water Act of 2007.
On a lighter note, members of the House and Senate honored the two-time national championship Appalachian State University football team on Tuesday. The Mountaineers defeated the University of Massachusetts on December 15, 2006, by a score of 28-17. The players, coaches, athletic staff and families also attended a special celebration at the Governor’s mansion.
Please remember that you can learn more about the General Assembly by visiting www.ncleg.net. Our newly updated website allows citizens to listen in on each day’s legislative session, committee meetings and press conferences, learn more about introduced legislation, and view each day’s schedule and list of bills to be voted on.
The House will be back in session on Monday night at 7:00 p.m. Next week, we will receive briefings on public education and retiree health benefits. House committees are also expected to be announced so they can begin work.
As I’ve said many times before, I hope you will continue to let me know how you feel about the issues that are being debated by the North Carolina General Assembly and the challenges you and your family are facing each day. By working together, we can make Northampton, Vance and Warren counties and all regions of North Carolina a better place to live, work and raise a family.
Budget Briefings: Corrections & Mental Health
As part of the on-going informational briefings for House and Senate members, legislative fiscal staff told us on Tuesday morning that the Department of Correction will likely need an additional 2,500 prison beds by 2011. The increase is due to growth in the rate of felony convictions and the length of sentences. The analysts said the General Assembly needs to make decisions on building new prisons this year, but added lawmakers could also tinker with sentences and work to reduce recidivism, or repeat offender, rates to narrow the number of beds needed.
On Wednesday the discussion shifted to our state’s mental health services and possible ways to make needed improvements in communities across the state. In North Carolina, nearly $3 billion in federal, state and local money is spent each year on services for mental health, developmental disabilities and substance abuse. However, local and state spending on mental-health care in North Carolina varies widely from county to county, accentuating the gap between rural and urban areas in quality of care.
Legislative staff members described several large problems in the state’s mental-health system. The problems include the regional disparities in the quality of care and the state’s overreliance on psychiatric hospitals. Many rural areas are hit the hardest. In each county, a “Local Management Entity,” or LME, is set up to contract with private mental-health-care providers, but some rural counties simply do not have enough providers. Legislators approved $95 million in new funding for mental health services in the 2006-07 budget and are expected to continue working on additional reforms and improvements in the coming months.
In fact, as part of the permanent House Rules, which were adopted by House members this week, several new standing committees will be created, including one on mental-health reform, which is a signal that a growing number of legislators want mental-health services to be a priority in next year’s budget. All House committees are expected to be announced next week.
This week’s briefings were our first in-depth look at the state’s corrections and mental health systems and expected expenses in both areas as we begin our work to draft and approve a two-year budget during the next five months.
Although the next budget cycle, which begins July 1, will be tight, no one is expecting anything like the “billion dollar plus” budget shortfalls from a few years ago when our state’s economy was in a recession and we lost tens of thousands of jobs. Legislators, who are expecting a budget shortfall of $200 to $500 million this year, will now begin the task of looking at all areas of state government and various programs to determine what can be made more efficient or cut entirely in order to meet the growing needs of our state and her citizens.
House Majority Whips, Democratic Freshmen Caucus Chairman Elected
House Democratic members elected three members to serve as Majority Whips for the next two years: Reps. Larry Bell of Sampson County, Jean Farmer-Butterfield of Wilson County and Deborah Ross of Wake County.
The Majority Whips will be part of the House Leadership team, which includes Speaker Joe Hackney, Speaker Pro Tem William Wainwright of Craven County, and Majority Leader Hugh Holliman of Davidson County. The three-member whip team is responsible for keeping tabs on what legislation is coming to the floor or will be debated in committees, and will offer needed information to members as requested; monitoring how members of the House Democratic Caucus are reacting to important bills or plan to vote; helping to ensure the priority issues of the caucus are advanced throughout the session; and ensuring members are present for important votes and are aware of the positions of the House leaders and the Democratic Caucus on various bills up for debate.
Legislators, Council of State Discuss the Death Penalty
The House Interim Study Committee on Capital Punishment, which has spent the last year studying the state’s death penalty and criminal justice system, held its final meeting on Monday. The House panel recommended some legislation, but did not consider a proposal — a two-year moratorium — that would temporarily suspend the death penalty in North Carolina.
Also on Monday, 44 State Senators and Representatives sent a letter to Governor Mike Easley requesting an immediate suspension of all executions “until we can be assured that North Carolina’s method of execution clearly meets the U.S. constitutional requirement that the punishment is not cruel and unusual”. The legislators also drew attention to recent developments in other states across the country as reason for a temporary moratorium in North Carolina. Governor Jeb Bush imposed a moratorium on executions in Florida following a December 13, 2006, botched execution during which the condemned inmate clearly suffered a protracted, painful death. In addition, nine additional states — Arkansas, California, Delaware, Missouri, New Jersey, Maryland, Ohio, South Dakota and Tennessee — have recently halted executions to review their lethal injection process.
On Tuesday morning, the Council of State — made up of the governor, lieutenant governor and the elected heads of eight state government agencies — approved a revised procedure for administering executions. The council was forced into the capital punishment debate by a judge who placed three executions on hold, citing a 1909 law that requires the council to approve any change in the state’s execution procedure. State correction officials changed the protocol after the state medical board said it is unethical for doctors to participate in executions and threatened to discipline any that did.
The new protocol now goes back before Superior Court Judge Donald Stephens and could be taken up by the General Assembly. Attorney General Roy Cooper has also indicated that he would try to negotiate with the state medical board before returning to Stephens’ court.
Other Legislative Highlights
Below are several bills that have been introduced in the House or Senate during the last week:
* House Bill 130 would change from October 16 to June 16 the deadline for a child’s fifth birthday in order for the child to attend kindergarten that fall.
* Several bills were recommended by the House Select Committee on Public School Construction, which has met in recent months to study ways to meet the growing needs of school systems across the state. It is expected that our state’s school systems need to build $9.8 billion worth of facilities over the next five years. House Bill 66 would allow all 100 counties to levy a one half-cent sales tax with proceeds dedicated to local school construction. House Bill 67 would allow local school districts to seek a refund on sales taxes they pay.
* Senate Bill 70 would reduce the waiting period for retired teachers to return to the classroom without loss of benefits.
* Senate Bill 106 would remove the cap on the number of Charter Schools in North Carolina.
* House Bill 65 would streamline the approval process of school construction projects and renovation plans.
* House Bill 66 would authorize counties to levy one-half cent local sales and use taxes, which would be used for public school construction purposes if approved by the voters of that district.
* Senate Bill 83 would make it a felony for the subject of a domestic violence order to trespass on property considered a safe house for domestic violence victims regardless of whether the person covered by the order is there.
* Senate Bill 87 would prohibit the sale or distribution of video games and software determined to be graphically violent or sexually explicit.
* House Bill 127 calls for a referendum to authorize issuance of $500 million in bonds to fund wastewater and drinking water projects.
* House Bill 91 would allow for residents to register to vote at one-stop absentee voting sites and immediately cast a ballot at the site.
* House Bill 69 would change motor vehicle inspections and emissions from annually to once every two years.
* House Bill 72 would raise the monthly pension for certain firefighters and rescue squad workers from $165 per month to $170.
* House Bill 85 would extend by one year the grandfather date for some lifetime licenses from coastal recreational fishing license requirements.
* Senate Bill 111 would allow adult adoptees or their direct descendants to receive a copy of the adoptee’s original birth certificate and other information related to the adoption.
* Bill 105 would make it a felony to knowingly and willfully disturb, remove or desecrate human remains interred in a cemetery without consent or by law.
Visitors this week included AFL-CIO officials and School Counselors.