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It's 505 and welcome in to a Tuesday edition of the Carolina Journal News Hour, News Talk 1110-993 WBT. I'm Nick Craig. Good morning to you.
Well, with today being July 1st and yesterday being the end of June, marking the last day of the fiscal year, state lawmakers have yet to pass a new budget. The lack of agreement between the North Carolina House and Senate means that the state has officially entered its new fiscal year, which begins today, without an updated spending plan. Good news, despite that, there is no risk of a government shutdown. Under North Carolina law, most state operations continue at their current funding levels, even when a new budget isn't approved in time. Services like public school, public safety, and health departments will continue to operate uninterrupted.
However, while core functions continue, funding increases and new investments do remain stalled as the debate continues. The House's budget proposal includes significant raises for teachers and state employees, as well as other public workers. For example, the proposal includes a more than 8.7% pay increase for teachers in the upcoming fiscal year, which should have started today, along with a 2.5% across-the-board pay raise for state agency employees. Employees. Those increases will not take effect without an enacted budget.
That includes expanded funding for infrastructure improvements, transferring of Medicaid funds for disaster relief, and tax cuts. Essentially, any change requiring new appropriations or policy shifts is essentially frozen or stalled until lawmakers agree on a final budget or pass targeted mini-budgets. Brian Balfour of the John Locke Foundation noted the positive and negative aspects of a budget stall. He said, quote, one significant backdraw is that state agencies, including school districts, are left in limbo for planning services, but then noted it's also a bit problematic for state agencies to not really know how much money they're getting and how they're going to use it. Both chambers have introduced these so-called mini budgets over the last week or so in an attempt to continue budget operations throughout the state.
Last week, the Senate approved a $5 billion stopgap measure to move essential funding priorities forward in spite of those ongoing budget delays. House Bill 125 appropriates over $3.4 billion in the next fiscal year and $1.9 billion in the 26-27 fiscal year to address urgent funding needs in North Carolina. Those are issues such as disaster recovery funds, Medicaid adjustments, and funding for capital projects across the state.
Meanwhile, the House introduced their own mini budget, which appropriates just shy of $1 billion in recurring funding for the 25-26 fiscal year. Joseph Harris, the policy analyst over at the John Locke Foundation, says that the House's proposal, quote, Predominantly focuses on salary increases for state employees. Your question this morning is a valid one. What is the holdup? The current delay stems from disagreements between the North Carolina House and Senate over spending priorities, including the scope of tax cuts, teacher pay levels, and how much to set aside for savings and capital projects.
Valfourt called these disagreements a gap too big to bridge at this point, as Joseph Harris explained the difference of opinion that the two chambers have over personal income tax rates. He said, quote, the Senate wants to lock in and accelerate future rate reductions while the House prefers raising revenue triggers. To make further cuts much less likely. Lawmakers are set to return to Raleigh in the coming weeks to further negotiate as the 4th of July holiday is just a couple of days away. Although no voting dates are set on the legislative calendar for the near future, we are expecting lawmakers to be back probably about the middle part of this month, and they will once again take a crack at these budget negotiations and figure out what some of those spending levels are going to look like, not only for now this current fiscal year, but the 26-27 fiscal year as well.
We will be keeping a very close eye on the budget and everything entailed in that on our website, CarolinaJournal.com, and of course, right here on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Continuing our coverage this morning of the major political news over the weekend, U.S. Senator Tom Tillis announcing that he is not running for reelection, leaving an open primary here in the state of North Carolina. Focusing on the Democrat side of issues this morning, DonnaKingCarolinaJournal.com joins us on the news hour. Donna, there was a call on Monday with the head of the Democratic National Committee.
They've wanted to get some stronger grips here in North Carolina for the last couple of election cycles. What are we hearing from Ken Martin? Sure. Ken Martin and some of his leadership there, the DNC, held a media call on Monday, as you said, and they're really pulling out all the stocks. They're going to blitz this summer in some swing states.
And North Carolina has certainly bubbled to the top, even more so than it had before, due to Tillis' decision to say he wasn't going to run again.
So they were really focused on it, had a state, had a nationwide focus. But North Carolina really is what they see as one of the top opportunities to pull a Senate seat. In North Carolina, though, that would be a they have a long history of Republicans taking Senate seats.
So it's a rare opportunity.
Well, and you know, obviously it's not the exact same election cycle, but Democrats tried a similar tactic in the 2024 elections. A lot of money flowing into North Carolina to try and flip the state from Trump, who had won two previous elections, to Harris. They were unsuccessful in doing that, but obviously the dynamic's a little bit different as we head into a midterm election. They've tried, Donna, and they spent a lot of money doing so, essentially to no avail thus far. Yeah, it seems like it.
The last time that Democrats were successful in a Senate bid during the midterms was 1998.
So whatever that is, ends up being 28 years ago. And in that case, we saw John Edwards, Democrat, defeat Locke Faircloth. I mean, it's been quite a while since Democrats claimed a Senate seat in the midterm. In the general election, really, I mean, that was 2008.
So even then, it's been quite a long time. You know, that was Kay Hagen, and then Tom Tillis then unseated her the very next election in 2014.
So, you know, Democrats are putting a lot of eggs in this basket. They are really focused on North Carolina. But a lot of this really hinges on whether former Governor Roy Cooper is going to step forward and be that candidate. Seeing some commentary on social media over the last day or so, like many others, his inside sources claim that he is pondering a run. Donna, it's kind of interesting the timeline with all of this.
You probably would have expected that somebody like Roy Cooper would have already announced if he was seriously running for it. His camp seems to indicate that they're going to look at it for the next couple of weeks. What do you make of all of that? Right.
Well, so what I'm hearing is that former Governor Cooper was very hesitant to really get involved with this, that for personal reasons, he was reluctant to jump into this race. Certainly, this has lit a fire under both parties to have Tillis say it's going to be an open seat. He's not running again.
So now we're hearing that Governor Cooper is considering this more seriously. The challenge, though, is if he decides not to, who's going to jump in? Because right now we're in a really polarized political environment. And if he runs as a moderate, because he has that sort of personal image as a moderate, whether he acts on that or not, whether he, you know, in policy is a moderate is a different story, but he has the image of being a moderate to the electorate.
So then what happens if he decides not to? You know, that's going to be the real challenge because Tom Tillis, he was swimming upstream for 2026, and he had really set his image at being a moderate or a pragmatist willing to reach across the aisle, and it just wasn't working. For him, it appears that it was not working for him with his base. Would that work with the Democrats and Cooper's base? I just don't know.
Obviously, there's still some time before this is all said and done. Candidate filing doesn't open until December. But, Donna, it's a quick jump from December till a primary in March to raise the account of money that is needed to win a statewide primary like that. You would imagine that those announcements would probably have to be made coming up here in the next couple of weeks, if not next couple of months. Sure.
The Cooper camp is saying that he's going to make a decision in the next couple of weeks. Certainly, maybe it'll be sooner than that. But we're also seeing a lot of Republicans. Being batted around almost all of the congressional Republicans, Richard Hudson, Brad Knott, Tim Moore. Those folks are all being listed on a short list, Pat Harrigan, a few others.
Now, none of them have made any sort of public statement of whether they're going to. This is all being hashed out behind the scenes. But doing this in June, I think, speaks to TELUS's eye on the health of the party, of the Republican Party in North Carolina, because this does give them the summer to really get situated, to let individual primary candidates get a website going, get some fundraising going, because once Labor Day hits, it is going to be Katie Bar the door because then they're all going to file in December. And then, as you said, the primary is right around the corner. We'll obviously be keeping an eye on both the Democrat and the Republican side of the aisle to see what kind of candidates come forth as frontrunners in those races.
Continuing coverage over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com. The editor in chief of Carolina Journal, Donna King, joins us on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Hello, it is Ryan, and we could all use an extra bright spot in our day, couldn't we? Just to make up for things like sitting in traffic, doing the dishes, counting your steps, you know, all the mundane stuff. That is why I'm such a big fan of Chumba Casino.
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It's 5:22. Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour. News Talk 11:10, 99.3 WBT. It has been a busy couple of days in North Carolina. Back on Friday, Democrat Governor Josh Stein vetoed House Bill 402, which was limiting rules with substantial financial costs, also known as the Reigns Act, R-E-I-N-S Act, which was a major piece of regulatory reform legislation that we have talked about a lot over the last couple of months.
Back on June the eleventh, the Senate approved it by a vote of twenty-six to seventeen, with the House concurring on a vote of seventy to forty-four on June the seventeenth. The measure marks a significant effort by Republican lawmakers to impose new checks on unelected regulatory bodies and to curb the economic burden of expansive government rulemaking. With that veto on Friday, it now goes back to the North Carolina House for a potential veto override. House Bill 402 targets what supporters call regulatory overwatch by requiring greater legislative scrutiny for rules that impose high financial costs. The legislation introduced tiered thresholds for regulatory oversight, and they are as follows.
Any proposed permanent rule with an economic cost of $20 million or more over five years must receive direct approval from the General Assembly unless the rule is mandated by federal law. Another is that rules that would cost more than $10 million over five years would need unanimous approval by rulemaking bodies or or commissions, again, unless required by federal law, and any rule exceeding $1 million over five years would require a two-thirds sopramajority vote from the adopting body. Importantly, the bill expands the definition of a substantial economic impact from $1 million over a 12-month span to $1 million over five years. That change is expected to significantly widen the range of regulatory subjects to stricter scrutiny and comprehensive fiscal requirements.
Now, Republican leaders in the General Assembly argue that the bill would enhance government accountability and protect North Carolina residents and businesses from overregulation. They say that unelected bureaucrats currently have too much power to impose costly rules without sufficient input from elected officials or consideration of some of the long-term financial consequences. Backers of the legislation also emphasized the bill's emphasis on transparency, noting that the expanded fiscal note process will offer stakeholders, including businesses, local governments and citizens alike, a clearer understanding of the economic consequences of proposed regulations before they are implemented.
Now on the other side of the aisle, opponents of the Rains Act warn that the legislation could in fact stifle timely responses by regulatory agencies, particularly in areas such as environmental protection, public health, and worker safety. Why?
Well, because they claim requiring legislative approval or supermajority board votes would in fact lead to bureaucratic delays and partisan gridlocks.
Some also raise concerns about the threshold set in the bill that could discourage agencies from proposing rules if its cost projections, regardless of its net benefits, appear politically risky or burdensome to defend. The governor said on Friday at the veto when he did veto this legislation, quote, this bill will make it harder for the state to keep people's drinking water clean from PFAS and other dangerous chemicals, their air free from toxic pollutants, and their health care facilities providing high-quality care. It would impose red tape, including an unworkable ultimatum requirement that would hamstring the decision-making of agencies, boards, and commissions, making them less effective at protecting people's health, safety, and welfare. the Rains Act would have placed North Carolina among a growing number of states across the nation, adopting measures modeled after a federal level regulation from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act. Seven states have passed such laws thus far, with Kentucky and Utah passing those earlier this year.
North Carolina's version, House Bill 402, which is what we've been talking about this morning, reflects a broader movement to rein in executive agency power at the state level. Americans for Tax Reform estimates that more than a quarter of United States across the U.S. will have Reigns Acts on the book by 2026. Donald Bryson, the CEO of the John Locke Foundation, said in a statement after the veto, quote, unelected bureaucrats shouldn't impose multi-million dollar regulations in the dark, but Governor Stein's veto of the Reigns Act protects their very overreach. By rejecting this common sense reform, the governor has chosen bureaucratic power over democratic accountability.
The Rains Act would have required legislative approval for regulations with a price tag exceeding twenty million dollars, rules that can reshape our economy, burden small businesses and raise the cost of living for families. If a regulation impacted your wallet, your vote should matter. The John Locke Foundation urges the General Assembly to override this veto and restore the people's voice in the rulemaking process. With this, an override may be possible. There may be enough votes to override the veto as Representative Carla Cunningham, the Democrat from Mecklenburg County, Cecil Brockman, the Democrat from Guilford, and Representative Shelley Willingham, the Democrat from Edgecombe, all voted in favor of the bill back on June the 17th in the North Carolina House.
As I mentioned, it passed the House in a 70 to 44 vote. For that, Republicans need a supermajority vote, three-fifths of each chamber. They've already got those numbers in the Senate. They would need one vote in the House.
So if one of those three Democrat lawmakers is interested in Having the Reigns Act go into effect, they very well could cast the vote to do that. There are a couple of veto overrides that will be a major part of the discussion as lawmakers are set to make their way back to Raleigh coming up here in a couple of weeks after the July the 4th holiday. We will continue to see those on the calendar and we'll continue to track those details over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com, and of course, keep you up to date right here on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest. Life comes at you fast, which is why it's important to find some time to relax a little you time.
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He did officially sign House Bill 1012 into law. That is the Disaster Recovery Act of 2025, Part 2. He did that at the reopening of the Chimney Rock State Park in western North Carolina. And it came just a day after the General Assembly sent the bill to the governor. The funding is a bipartisan package that allocates more than $700 million for Hurricane Helene relief.
The legislation marks the fifth. Major recovery package passed since Helene devastated portions of our state in September of last year. The legislation formally extends the Hurricane Helene state of emergency through October the 1st of this year, combined with prior efforts, totaling more than $1.4 billion North Carolina's total funding. This is just in-state funding for Hurricane Relief. It has already exceeded $2.1 billion.
Some of the key appropriations include more than $270 million allocated from the DOT's budget, specifically towards Helene Western North Carolina repairs, $75 million towards construction and reimbursement of privately owned roads and bridges, $70 million to continue pulling down critical federal disaster recovery funding, $65 million towards repair and reconsideration of damaged schools, $50 million in addition, no interest loans for impacted local governments and Local municipalities, $70 million in funds for local governments and capital repairs that would be infrastructure projects, $25 million to upgrade and enhance regional airports to support disaster responses, $18 million to invest in fire stations across western North Carolina. That is to prepare for a high-risk fire season, which we have talked about is already now upon us here in the state. as well as about seventy million dollars in additional infrastructure and other projects. The package also includes targeted funds for landslide mapping, dam safety improvements, damaged rail line repairs and renewed tourism promotion. At the reopening in Chimney Rock, Stein said, quote, rediscover the unforgettable, a new tourism initiative to bring more visitors back to western North Carolina.
The governor said, quote, nine months ago, Hurricane Helene devastated western North Carolina's economy. Let's make sure our neighbors know that we haven't forgotten them. We can support the region's recovery by just showing up. If you're planning your summer vacation or weekend getaway, make sure you experience something that makes western North Carolina unforgettable, and that includes the beautiful Chimney Rock State Park. Hurricane Helene took a toll on Chimney Rock with the loss of key roads, bridges, and trails, making vast majorities of the Chimney Rock State Park essentially inaccessible since the storm in September.
The park is now opened on a limited basis from Fridays to Mondays to visitors who make advanced reservations. While the village of Chimney Rock, the actual town and municipality there, has not yet officially announced reopening.
However, several local businesses are open and welcoming tourists. Musicians and Western North Carolina native Eric Church can be heard in a new video highlighting the tourism initiative. Church said in a press release, I'm proud to be from Western North Carolina. It's where I was born. It's where my soul finds rest.
Our family has lived here for generations, and it has become a part of the fabric that has made me the man that I am now. It's an honor to be in the voice. It's an honor to be the voice that invites more people to discover and visit the place that we love. With that, Governor Stein said that he is continuing to ask the Trump administration and Congress to send an additional $19 billion to North Carolina for disaster relief, $11.5 billion in new appropriations and more than $7.5 billion in allocations from previous appropriations across the state. As we get deeper into this year, we will continue to track the progress as we have done so over the last six months or so, right here on the Carolina Journal News Hour.
You can read more on what is in this more than $700 million Hurricane Helene relief package by visiting our website this morning, CarolinaJournal.com, where it's now 542, News Talk 1110, 993, WBT. A pretty big decision from the United States Supreme Court on Monday as it relates to the state health plan to walk us through those details. Mitch Kokai with the John Locke Foundation joins us on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Mitch, this decision kind of revolves around a story in Tennessee back a couple of weeks ago. What's the latest from the high court this morning?
You might remember, Nick, that back in 2024, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower courts ruling forcing North Carolina's state health plan to cover treatments that are typically sought by transgender patients.
Now, at the time, the state treasurer Dale Falwell appealed that ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. And in the court filings, basically the state health plan's argument was you should decide this case, Supreme Court, along with this case out of Tennessee called United States versus Skermeti, or at least hold off on deciding the North Carolina case until you decide what to do with this Skermeti case, which was already on the court's calendar.
Well, that's exactly what happened. Earlier in June, the U.S. Supreme Court released a ruling 6-3 in U.S. versus Skermeti, where it basically upheld Tennessee's law that blocked hormone therapy and puberty blockers for transgender. And so, not too long after that, within a couple of weeks of that decision, the Supreme Court then went back to the North Carolina case, which is called Falwell versus Caddell or Caddell versus Falwell, depending on what level of court it's in.
Went back to that case and vacated what the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals did in that case, sent it back to the Fourth Circuit and said the Fourth Circuit should give the case further consideration based on what the court said in the Skirmetti case. Mitch, as I understand some of the details in both of these cases, the one in Tennessee and the other one here in North Carolina that we're talking about, both states continued to make the argument that as a state health plan, that's what we're talking about, they should have the autonomy to decide what is the best for the pool of individuals that they insure across whatever industry they're in here in the case of North Carolina or in Tennessee. Is that one of the main arguments that's being made here by both parties? That's certainly the argument in the North Carolina case.
The idea is the state health plan, which is funded by taxpayers, and this plan has some exceptions to it. It's not going to cover everything. And one of the main arguments that the folks on the side of the state health plan, which is overseen by the state treasurer, which is why Treasurer Brad Briner is now taking over this case from the former Treasurer Dale Falwell, the argument is that the reason for exempting these coverages was not because the patients were transgender. It's because these coverages are exceptions that should be made so that the health plan can remain viable and can cover the vast majority of services that need to be covered.
Now, the argument on the other side is almost all of the patients who get these procedures are transgender, and so it's being discriminatory. That's something that convinced a trial court, and then in a very split decision from the fourth year. U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals appealed to the Fourth Circuit as well. The full Fourth Circuit heard this case, and it was an 8-6 ruling in favor of forcing the state health plan to make these coverages.
The interesting thing from the U.S. Supreme Court is that there's no decision about the merits of this case. Basically, it's a bit of a punt in that the U.S. Supreme Court says: look, we're not going to decide whether North Carolina's state health plan has to cover these treatments. But what we are saying is that the Fourth Circuit did not have the benefit of knowing what we were going to decide in this Tennessee case.
And now that we've decided the Tennessee case, the Fourth Circuit needs to go back and see whether its previous ruling complied with that or does not. And if the Fourth Circuit's previous ruling doesn't comply with what we said in the Schermetti case in Tennessee, then they're going to have to come up with a new ruling. Another interesting piece of the story is That the same day that the Schermetti case decision came out, the state treasurer's office put out a news release basically predicting that this was going to happen. The treasurer didn't say specifically that the ruling was going to be vacated and the Fourth Circuit was going to be told to look over the case, but they did predict that the ruling would be overturned or vacated and then said, you know, once we see the order, we'll respond to it and decide what to do next. It is important to note that ever since the Fourth Circuit came out with its ruling, the treatment has been covered.
So it's not as if the delay in resolving this is going to change anything from the patients who are expecting this. But moving forward, if North Carolina is allowed in its state health plan to not cover these treatments, then that will be something that will be a change from the status quo. And Mitch, real quick, I think this is relevant to bring to our audience here. There's been a lot of questions over the last couple of years about the solvency of the state health plan, discussions earlier this year about raising rates. You look at some of these expensive medical procedures that the vast majority of the members enrolled in the state health plan are not taking advantage of.
It's created some big time economic issues over there that the current treasurer's office is trying to deal with so they don't go bankrupt and can't provide service to anybody. Yeah, the state health plan has been underfunded for a number of years. It's been an issue that's been raised for, I'm guessing, a decade or more. It's something that Brad Briner has definitely been taking up during his time as treasurer. And I believe there was a new audit recently from the new auditor, Dave Bollock, saying, look, they're right.
We looked at the books and it is underfunded. It's going to take a lot of money to help shore up this state health plan.
So having some sort of resolution on this transgender case, although I don't think it makes a major difference in terms of the amount of money spent, it certainly will be one of those factors that needs to be addressed so that this issue of funding the state health plan sufficiently gets resolved. We will continue to track the details on this story. You can read more analysis and some quotes from that Supreme Court decision by visiting our website, CarolinaJournal.com. Mitch Kokai from the John Locke Foundation joins us on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Hello, it is Ryan, and I was on a flight the other day playing one of my favorite social spin slot games on chumbacasino.com.
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Some good news for those that continue to struggle with getting an appointment at a DMV office across the state of North Carolina. NC DMV has announced that they will now accept walk-ins for all day, all day for customers effective immediately. They will be starting that at 82 out of the 115 driver's license offices that exist around the state. The agency made the announcement in a press release on Friday and has said that it was in an effort to improve customer service and keep customers out of long lines during the summer heat and beyond. The remaining 33 offices that are not accepting walk-ins all day will soon receive updates that better suit their size and restrictions.
Allowing for the same or similar procedures. Examiners will also prioritize checking customers in quickly and directing them to wait in their vehicles or at nearby businesses until space is available in the lobby of the DMV office. The MV staff will also review customers' documents and documentation to ensure that they have everything they need for their desired service before checking them in. Customers will then receive a text notification when there is room in the lobby and another when it is their turn to be served. NC DMV Commissioner Paul Tyne said in the press release, quote, we're committed to making the DMV experience as comfortable and efficient as possible, especially during these scorching summer months.
By focusing on quick check ins and allowing customers to wait in a cooler shaded area, we're reducing time spent standing in the sun while keeping our offices running smoothly. The DMV still encounter still encourages customers rather to come prepared for the possibility of a significant wait times during check-in, telling folks to bring water snacks, necessary medications and items like umbrellas or even chairs to ensure that they are comfortable while waiting to Be checked in and waiting to get up to the line to get their appointment. Tyne also said that if somebody doesn't have to come into the DMV, please wait while those changes are being made. NCDMV also reminded customers to check for all of the requirements for the specific service at ncdmv.gov. Do that before visiting an office to avoid delays or having to turn around and go back home.
In a preliminary report released last week, North Carolina State Auditor Dave Bollick says that insufficient staffing at DMV offices is some of the leading causes of those major issues, which earlier this year meant that you could not get a single appointment in any DMV offices across the state of North Carolina.
Some big-time issues for DMV do continue. We have additional details on this story over on our website this morning, CarolinaJournal.com.
Well, that's going to do it for a Tuesday edition. WBT News is next, followed by Good Morning BT. We're back with you tomorrow morning, 5 to 6, right here on News Talk 1110 and 99.3 WBT. Riley Herps from 2311 Racing here. And you know what grinds my gears?
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