Will NC Legalize Marijuana? HOA and a Doggy Snack Station square off

This week on the Outlaw Lawyer, Josh and Joe remote in to discuss the law and how it affects everything around us. And as always, Josh and Joe tackle burning legal questions such as why would a homeowner's association have a problem with a doggy snack station? And will North Carolina legalize marijuana?

Does Josh want anyone teaching his second grader about sex? That's all coming up on the Outlaw Lawyer. Welcome in to the Outlaw Lawyer, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, your hosts. Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm, where you can find managing partners there, practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. Offices conveniently located in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, and Gastonia. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate, and we talk legalese each and every week.

We get into the hot topics and sometimes we get off topic, but it's always an interesting discussion between Josh and Joe. If you've got any questions, feel free to contact us. If you've got a legal situation that you're facing and you have questions, there's a way to get in touch with Whitaker and Hamer. Call this number 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. And you can always email your questions to the show.

Questions at theoutlawlawyer.com and a great website, theoutlawlawyer.com. Gentlemen, away we go. What's up first? Well, Morgan, it's, uh, it's good to talk to you. It's always good to even when we remote in and we're not, we're not sitting face to face.

It's always good to talk to you. But, uh, as you might remember from our previous shows, I can't just go right into talking about the law. I gotta, I gotta talk about other things first, uh, get the juices flowing.

Yeah. It's like stretching before you go for a run. You know, you gotta stretch a little. I gotta get my coffee in me.

I gotta, I gotta limber up. And so the, the, the first, the biggest, not the biggest thing that happened this past week, but, um, Joe, did you survive that, that game seven, the hurricanes, uh, game seven versus the Rangers? You were there. Oh yeah, I was there. Thank you, Josh, for reminding me.

Cause, um, you know, I'd forgotten, I'd forgotten I was present for that. And, uh, man, an exciting game, wire to wire, a lot of excitement, uh, was a lot of things to do. No, it was terrible. No, it was terrible. It was one of the, I've as a, uh, as a Duke fan, a Duke, a true Duke fan, meaning I'm also a Duke football fan, uh, who had season tickets for several years. You know, I've, I've sat through some pretty depressing sporting events, uh, in person.

And I would put this up there. I really put this up there as one of the more depressing times I've had watching a sport. It just was, uh, really no hope from the beginning, basically, you know, you had like two minutes of hope and then it just gets, it got taken away. And you could just see it coming, man. Like the hits kept coming, folks getting injured, you know, bad breaks and really tough, man, really tough, really tough time.

You know, I was, uh, I was at the lake, uh, this weekend and I couldn't get back in time to, to go. And, um, but I felt really bad after the, I guess, game six. I mean, the Rangers hate to say this, but I mean, they really seem like maybe the better team, you know, uh, maybe the hurricanes just played bad, but, um, it was, it was tough to watch how, you know, being, watching it from the couch. So I learned this as a state fan, again, I think I know I've said this on the show, you've conditioned yourself, right? We don't expect nice things. We don't expect to, to win. So as an NC state fan, you know, I, a lot of times I'll talk myself out of going to games because I want to be able to change the station.

You know, I want that freedom to not have to suffer through it. Yeah. Stare directly at the train wreck. I get it.

Right. So I, we flipped away. I think we caught up because we had only watched one of the OB ones that came out once. So we watched the second episode of that and then came back to it. It wasn't good.

I think I actually went, I think I was actually in my bed of sleep before the game ended, which is. Did you just offer up a critique for OB one? I, I'm going to reserve judgment on it.

No spoilers, please. I have not seen it yet. I've heard a lot of good things about it. It's, it's definitely, it's definitely worth watching. I'm not a purist. I'm not a Star Wars purist by any means, but I, I have not, I have not decided if I like it or not.

It's, it's, you know, anyway, it's definitely worth watching. You haven't seen episode three yet, right? Of the show? No. When does episode three? Careful, Joe.

I think, I think, I think business picks up, Josh, for you. I thought episode three, wouldn't that come out Friday? No.

No. Um, uh, when did it come out? Cause they released the first two was at last, I'm getting my Fridays confused. So this Friday, episode three. Yeah, they put two out at a time. And then the third, I don't know, maybe I've just been, I've, I've, uh, I've heard rumblings. I think it's out.

I think it's out and I think business picks up in it. All right. But back to what you started this conversation with, um, the crappy hurricanes game, but that. Well, I didn't realize either. I didn't realize either the hurricanes had so many people on one year deals. I didn't realize I didn't follow them a lot last year.

Uh, yeah, that's the tragedy of it, man. Cause like a lot, you know, prior to this year and us starting to attend the games regularly. I didn't really care. You know, I didn't really care.

I wasn't invested. And I mean, I, I cared in so far as like, you want your home teams to do well. Like obviously I didn't dislike the hurricanes, but I didn't really care.

And even early on, like we'd go to the games they'd lose. And like, I remember walking out and people would be so sad and then people would be so happy. And I was just like, I don't, I can't understand people being this invested.

Like it didn't make any sense to me. Like I, even then I was not invested at all. And then gradually I started getting invested, man, and I got super invested. And so, uh, I almost wish I could go back to that blissful ignorance, man, that no, that just not being invested at all and it not caring. Uh, but unfortunately I think those, I think that's gone, man.

I think I'm at like a lifetime. I'm just invested in hockey now somehow. Well, I'm interested to see what they do. You know, our, our owner and our general manager up there do seem to do good work. Um, but yeah, they're losing a lot of, well losing, there's a lot of guys who could leave and I'm sure we'll lose some of them, but it'll be, it'll be interesting.

I don't know. I was trying to decide if I'm going to watch another hockey game now that they're out. You know, usually if I'm watching like, you know, uh, ACC tournament or something state loses, I'm done. I'm out. I go do something else.

I'm trying to figure out if I'm going to watch before state even played. Right. Did you, I checked out early and then, you know, I got up, it was a couple of days ago where, uh, the baseball team, you know, speaking of NC state, the baseball team didn't make the NCAA tournament got left out. Oh yeah.

That was another thing. That was a real, you know, I don't pay a ton of attention to that, you know, baseball obviously, but, uh, it seems like that was a real injustice from what I don't know who, uh, I was on, uh, I was on Twitter. I was reading, uh, people, the Twitter meltdown for state baseball fans about not getting in. I don't remember who tweeted this.

I'd love to give them credit. Uh, I don't remember their handle or anything, but somebody tweeted that NC state and, uh, the NCAA need to go to couples. Uh, counseling before it gets violent. And I laughed at that for a long time, not to make light of domestic violence by any means, but the NCAA NC state situation has been pretty Rocky for a long time. Yeah.

For a long time, man. And, um, the it's, it's a little head scratching. It's a little, it's a little bit head scratching. This was a real head scratcher, you know, again, not following baseball closely from, but, but from what everything I gather, you know, there was really no discussion about state, even being like on the bubble or being in danger of not being included. Like, I think everyone assumed that they were firmly in and good. And then like, you know, it just, it doesn't, uh, it doesn't happen. And you, you listen to the, the reasoning behind the head of the committee and it just didn't make a ton of sense to me, honestly.

And that's as a neutral party, a neutral third party. Well, Joe, I, we do have a couple, you know, we managed to, uh, fit in a couple of legal topics today, but there's a lot of local, uh, legal news. There were some, there were some other stuff, but I, I stayed local when I, when I kind of put our topics together, but there was a story from last week that we didn't get to reach, uh, in our show. So I put that back on the, on the docket today, but there's a case, uh, where a local HOA, a local neighborhood has sued a man who set up a doggy snack station, uh, in the neighborhood and, and, and services it. And the HOA wants it taken down. Um, that I figured I read the local news outlets covering it, and there's a lot of legal leads behind that story.

So I figured we'd talk about HOA's and, and what they can and can't do. So we've got that on the, the slate today. And then I saw North Carolina legalized hemp permanently. I don't know if you saw that Joe. Uh, I, you know, I did, I saw it in your notes that you sent.

I saw it in your notes. They legalized hemp cause it was, it was a temporary measure. So they had to go in, you know, there's been a big experiment where folks have been able to grow hemp, uh, for CBD products and, and agricultural purposes.

And that was not permanent. So there was a, a bill before the NC Senate and they made that permanent, but they also talked about, uh, medicinal marijuana that hasn't been passed yet, but there's a bill kind of moving along through the process. I figured we'd spend some time talking about that, um, NC Senate as well. There's a big story about, uh, and again, we talked about how, when you name these bills, when the media talks about these, these bills that are before Congress or before the North Carolina legislature, uh, naming them as a big part of the winning the media war perspective on them, right? So Florida had the don't say gay bill that we talked about.

North Carolina has a, what I've seen it called parent's right bill, but it's got some similar provisions. And I figured we'd talk about that just generally today. Um, and we've got some listener questions too. So we have a couple of good listener questions.

One of them I get a lot. Uh, but I figured we'd talk about that as well, but a lot to talk about the outlaw lawyer, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer law firm offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Farina, and Gastonia. And they are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

We get into all the different topics. If you've got questions about maybe a legal situation that you are facing, I've got a phone number for you, 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Just leave your contact information briefly. What that calls about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch and you can always email your questions to the show and we'll use them on future programs.

And we'll of course use a different name. It'll be anonymous, but you can get an answer to your question that way. Questions at the outlawlawyer.com and you can always visit the website. It's a great one. The outlawlawyer.com.

We're back right after this. Welcome back in to the Outlaw Lawyer. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, your hosts, you can find them during the week. Whitaker and Hamer law firm, they're the managing partners there. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. They've got offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Farina, and Gastonia.

And we are here to talk legalese. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate. If you've got an issue that you're facing and you need some advice, you need to get some questions answered. The phone number is 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186.

Just leave your contact information briefly. What the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will return that call. You can also email your questions to the program questions at the outlawlawyer.com.

Josh, where are we going next? Well, Morgan, the first story I wanted to tackle today and kind of put an attorney perspective on was one I saw kind of make the rounds on local media. I guess this would have been last week, but there is a court case. So we got a court case here in North Carolina, Wake County, actually, where a homeowners association is suing a homeowner for I guess the word would be an unauthorized doggy snack station. So this homeowner on what he would argue on his property, I think that's part of the argument we'll get to, but he erected a little station there that has some doggy treats. He keeps a water bowl there.

And I think there must be a camera because he can see people coming back and forth. But he put this on his property four or five years ago. The HOA has taken an issue with it for probably a lot of reasons and sued him. I guess there's been some back and forth. HOA's usually don't sue you right away.

They usually send you a lot of letters and threaten to find you daily until it's remedied. And so nothing's happened. So here we are. There's a lawsuit, Wake County court, and I saw a lot of people reporting on it. A lot of people, I think the way they reported on it, they kind of felt, you know, a lot of times if you I don't know, Joe, if you if you see this a lot or if it's just me reading into things. But, you know, a lot of times, depending on what outlet you're watching or reading, you know, the the media outlet has a predisposition to one party or the other when they talk about this kind of stuff.

So I kind of felt like everybody was feeling sorry for the guy who set up this doggy snack station who was who was getting sued. But it got it got a lot of attention, this thing. Yeah, you do. You do a lot more reading and watching of the news than I do.

I'm more of a simpleton, Josh. And I like my mindless my mindless social media as opposed to actual news and happenings. But, yeah, I see what you're saying when I do when I do keep up with it. I agree.

You usually do see some, you know, some kind of taking aside. And a lot of folks, it's it's hard to be on the team on the side that doesn't want sweet, cute, fluffy dogs to have delicious treats. It's very difficult to be team HOA. Yeah. Who's team HOA, man?

Like, there are definitely people. That's the thing. You know, we do a lot of real property law here and we deal with HOAs frequently. And it's just something that, you know, being heavily involved in an HOA. I know we don't take stances and we don't take positions here, but I'm comfortable saying that's not for me being being heavily involved in an HOA.

I was not built for it. And it's not that's not my thing. You got to have rules.

We live in a society of laws, Joseph, you have to have rules. I don't disagree with that. I'm not saying like they have no function. I'm not saying they have no purpose.

They absolutely do. I'm just saying that I am like, I'm not the guy that's going to be on the board of directors. I'm not going to be the president of HOA.

I'm not going to be the guy. Like, I'm trying to think of what my neighbor would do. And I'm lucky enough to live around family. Thank goodness. And a lot of people probably wouldn't think that's a great thing.

But like, we all get along. But like if I'm in a neighborhood like a traditional neighborhood and I got folks I don't know on both sides of me or that aren't related to me, like I'm trying to think of what they would have to do that would rise to the level of me being like, well, I'm going to I'm reporting them to my HOA. And it would have to be drastic. You know what this made me think of you were talking about how you don't maybe I read the news more than you, but it made me think of this a couple of weeks back, you know, my phone a couple weeks back, my phone went haywire and I had to order a new one. So I had to go two days without a phone, which is crazy. I had backup phones.

Usually I can switch, but they weren't working. So I just did not have a phone for like a day and a half. It was terrible. But it reminds me that that day, Joe, I met you out for lunch and I didn't have my phone on me. Right. So I had to call you from the office and say, look, I'm leaving now to go to this place to meet you for lunch. I'll be there. I don't know if you remember this, Joe. I remember that. I thought about that moment. And so I went there and I sat down and you were running late. You were on a conference call. I knew you might be late.

What a big deal. But let's say we were supposed to meet at 12 and it was like 12, 15 hours. And I was like, well, did I tell him exactly where I'd be?

Is he already in here? And I just started running through the scenario. Yeah. I was like, man, I wish I could just text him, you know, like I know he's going to be late. And then I didn't have anything to do. Like back in the day, like let's say in college, I had a flip phone.

Right. And we didn't have fancy cell phones back then. And so I'd always bring in like the newspaper, the news and observer or like the Wall Street Journal. I'd bring something with me when you went to eight. So you had something to do while you're waiting for your food.

And I didn't have any of that. So I just sat there and read the menu like a crazy person for like 15 minutes because there was nothing else to do. While I wondered if you would come to eat lunch with me or not, you know, and it was it was crazy to think there was a time where you didn't have. You could just text somebody, you know, like, hey, but anyway, there's a lot of anxiety at that lunch. That's what I was going to ask is what you did. You just read the you read the menu. Did you just you just look at people, you know, looking at people like, you know, there was a glance at people. This was in this particular situation there. There was a bar that had a TV.

And so I moved my seat so I could see the TV because I was going rotten, man. Yeah, that's that's an interesting thought. You know, I don't know how it got there off of the of the doggy treat conversation, but it is an interesting thought. Is it is it really, Joseph?

I just I just spit that out. But the HOA issue, just so people know the legal issue here. There's a couple of legal issues. But, you know, when you buy your lot in a subdivision that has an HOA, I think a lot of people are wondering the impression, hey, I own this quarter of an acre.

It's all mine. And that's not always the case. You have sewer easements.

Right. So the back 10 feet of your lot, there may be a sewer easement for drainage or drainage easement. And you're not supposed to put any permanent structures in there.

There's only certain things you could do there. This guy's property, it sounds like. And again, I don't have the complaint in front of me, but it sounds like at least the HOA's argument is this is not this this snack station wasn't erected on his property.

It's it's erected on a piece of property is actually a city of Raleigh right of way. And HOA has taken the opinion that it's their job, according to their covenants. Covenants are the the documents that are recorded when when a subdivision gets started. Just letting everybody know what the restrictions are with the with the big, big how big your house can be, how small can it be?

Can you have chickens? All that kind of stuff gets addressed in the covenants and they get recorded down at the registered deeds. And they're saying part of the covenants there is that they're supposed to keep the city of Raleigh right away clear.

And there's not supposed to be anything happening there. And there's probably some liability issues to who's responsible. Someone gets hurt on something that's not on this guy's property. So I'm sure the HOA, that's kind of what they have in mind. There's some legal issues there, some liability they're worried about. But they definitely got, I think, in local media, got pegged as the bad guys when this got reported.

Yeah. And, you know, this is looking at the way this whole thing is gone and looking at both sides arguments. It's a fairly maybe not interesting to everyone, but interesting to us, I think, as attorneys, what what the arguments of each side really are. And, you know, you've got the it's kind of unique because it's not necessarily that the it doesn't appear that the neighborhood's even saying that this individual just cannot have the pet sack station at all. They're just basically saying they want it to be on his property. They don't want it to be on this what they consider to be community, you know, HOA community owned property. So, you know, a lot of times when you see this type of thing, you see you just see the HOA outright saying, hey, you can't do this period.

This is an activity that can't take place upon any portion of any property, even the property you own. But but this is a little bit of a different situation here. And HOA's are a lot like anything else. You know, there's some built in power and authority there.

And if the wrong person gets in there, you know, it's always it can it can go south. I'm not saying that's the case here. We've represented a lot of we represent a lot of HOA's here at the firm and we represent a lot of people with valid complaints against their HOA. And and if the sides can't agree, you you end up litigating, looking for injunctions, things like that. So it's it's part of the process. And, you know, when something like this gets litigated, there's a lot of money involved.

Right. So someone, you know, I imagine attorneys aren't working for free on this. And so that's what I always think when I see something like this, I was like, man, I wonder how much this is costing everybody, because there's always we have people we consult with people all the time. And some people, you know, we get that concept where someone wants to prove a point. You know, I just want to make sure they know they were wrong or I want to I'm right here. And how much is that worth to you? Right.

How much is being right worth to you? So we've had that conversation a time or two with folks. But anyway, I thought it was interesting.

Almost the subject matter, I think, is interesting because you don't see it a lot, but also the way it's being covered. So this one, it just got started. So it'll be interesting to see how it pans out over the next couple of weeks. HOA Doggy Snack Station controversy, Bedford Falls in North Raleigh.

We'll see how it goes. It'll probably be making another appearance on the Outlaw Lawyers. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer are your hosts. They are the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. They're also practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. They have offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay Varina and Gastonia.

And if you've got a legal situation that you're facing and you just you want answers. I've got a phone number for you. Get in touch with Whitaker and Hamer. Eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six.

That's eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will reach out to you. You can also send your questions to the program. That's questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. Again, questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. We'll answer those on a future program and check out the Web site. The outlaw lawyer dot com.

We're back right after this. You're locked into the outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, your hosts. They are the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. They're practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina.

Offices conveniently located in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay Varina and Gastonia. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate, sometimes referee between Josh and Joe. Always an interesting conversation when we discuss legalese. If you've got an issue you're facing and you've got a question and you need an answer. Well, I've got a phone number for you. Eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six.

That's eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. Leave your contact info briefly what the call is about and an attorney with an answer to your question will be calling you shortly. Again, you can also email your questions to the program.

Questions at the outlaw lawyer dot com. All right. Now we're going to go in which direction. Josh. Well, Morgan, there were two pieces of legislation that came before the North Carolina Senate in the past week or so.

And I think both of them are worthy of conversation. The first one that that jumped to my attention was in North Carolina. We have officially legalized hemp.

All right. So the agricultural use of hemp has been legalized. There was a test period that the North Carolina Senate had approved a while ago. We were at the end of that.

I think it was like five years or something, but we're coming to the end of that. And they went ahead and legalized hemp for agricultural CBD uses. Of course, this doesn't legalize marijuana or the use of marijuana in any way.

It's still illegal in North Carolina as it is on the federal level. But hemp is legal. And I guess that's a step in the right direction.

What do you think, Joseph? Yeah, man, it's a step in the right direction. You know, hemp. I don't know that a lot of people realize it.

Maybe a lot of people do realize. But the sheer volume of benefits and uses for hemp is like mind blowing, man. Like it would really I think it would really blow your mind, especially if you're not well versed on the subject. Just the sheer number of applications and things that hemp can be used for, you know, things that it can replace. It's really crazy.

And, you know, you look at it. And I think we we probably have a more and again, we try not to to to really give a lot of insight into our own personal beliefs. But you could probably gather from just our general discussion about the topic of marijuana in general. We probably have a more relaxed view than some do as to how that should be treated, whether it should be be legalized in some fashion. But it's very difficult to look at hemp and look at what it can do and the applications and things like that and then make an argument why it shouldn't just be legal. You know, I always take a real libertarian type stance on something that's criminal when you decide to make something criminal. Why?

Right. That's that's I think that's kind of a libertarian take on any anything you're making illegal. Why is that illegal? You know, why are we going to spend resources and put people's life at risk to enforce laws to make this illegal? Why is this so dangerous that it needs to be illegal? And obviously, I think the answer, especially for just hemp, is that 100 percent should be illegal. Like, I don't know that you can find any justification that hemp as an agricultural crop should have ever been illegal. And I know we inherit some of these things, right?

We inherit the way things were in the 1910s, the 1930s, 1950s, and it takes us a while to to clean up. But but I think any time someone's telling you something needs to be illegal, your first question should be, why should that be? Why should that be illegal?

Why should? So here hemp, obviously, I think everybody's on the same page. But it was funny to see it wasn't funny, but NC legislation when this came up, there's a Senate bill that would make some some level of medicinal marijuana legal in North Carolina.

And so it looks like that hasn't been looked at in a while, but it looks like that's going to come up this week again and could could reach the Senate floor this very week. And again, it'd be heavily limited and heavily regulated. But it's, again, a step in the right direction, because at some point, I think you have to ask yourself, you know, why is why is marijuana illegal, especially now with so many states having approved it?

What's what's the point? You know, what are what are you trying to prevent? What's the government's aim in keeping people from owning or using, you know, marijuana as you know, why draw the line there? Yeah, and exactly. And, um, I mean, that's, that's, that's a whole other issue. I agree with you completely. I think, you know, most folks who have done the research and looked into it would agree with you completely. There's, you know, it makes perfect sense. But, you know, even if you did make an argument that there should still be an outright prohibition of marijuana itself, medicinally or recreationally. How do you extend that argument to him?

That's, that's really where it just, I just don't see how you do it. And, you know, the reason why, you know, hemp was was illegal at one point, and, you know, again, still still is in some ways, is because it's tied to marijuana, but the, you know, it's a different, it's a different thing, you know, related but different. And if you just look at the sheer, you know, not even including like the health benefits of like CBD oil and things like that, which, you know, research would suggest there's there's a lot of benefits there. Take that out of the equation and you just look at industrial hemp uses. I mean, I think it would it's it's mind blowing the number of things that that hemp can be used for and can replace and just and do it in a more environmentally conscious way.

Like, there's just, there's a wealth of uses and a wealth of benefits that it's almost insane to me that it hasn't been permanently legal prior to now. You know, I was talking about that stance you take, anytime somebody says you can't do anything, anytime someone says, hey, this should be criminally illegal, you should always ask, why is that case? And that's what my kids do, right? Anytime I ask them, like, you got to go to bed. Why can't I watch this movie?

They're gonna go into the profession, I think. And when you really have to spell it out for them, sometimes they win, right? Sometimes I'm like, you know, why can't I watch this movie? I don't know, it's violent. But you let us watch this movie and it was violent. Yeah, all right, fine.

Just watch it. You know, just fine. But yeah, we should always be asking those questions. And sometimes, you know, moving slow is not a bad thing.

I have to tell people that too, you know, like, especially when we talked last week about the school shooting and obviously the kind of visceral responses both sides of the debate on guns had on that. Quick action is never is almost never the answer. You know, everybody needs to take time and reason through things. So I don't want to criticize NC lawmakers too much.

But at some point, you know, you're moving, you're moving too slow. So this seems like this was a good decision. Hopefully, this medicinal marijuana bill will pass.

I think that's the way to go. That's almost every other state. I always tell people, if you know, one day, North Carolina will legalize recreational use of marijuana, but I may not be here. I may be dead and gone by the time they do that.

We'll be like the last state, maybe us in Alabama to actually legalize it. But it'll, it's gonna happen one day. It's inevitable because society's just kind of changed their tune pretty quick on how they feel about that kind of thing. Yeah, I agree, man. That's a bold prediction.

But I think it's a very safe prediction. You know, the if you look at the trajectory of how marijuana is viewed, you know, societally, you'll see like, it's the I don't know that we I don't see what pushes us back. Like, I don't know what could come out that would cause a reversion of this, you know, kind of progression of thought. So I think that it's inevitable, you know, and so what do you gain? What is gained by continuing to prohibit it in the way that it's prohibited? Like, you know, that that's the question you got to ask yourself, like, just like your kids ask, like, what, you know, why should it be illegal? Why can't it be? It's what do you gain from it not being legal? Really?

And I think it's a difficult question to answer. Yeah, I think, you know, there's a lot of clear, there's a lot of clear cut things, you know, yeah, murder should be illegal, right? You know, theft should be illegal. You know, those are those are no brainers, but I think there's a lot of stuff in the criminal code. Maybe we'll do that one show, we'll just open up, we'll crack open the North Carolina criminal code, and kind of pick out some things that are illegal, that might be a bit antiquated, or maybe need to be revisited. But that might be, you know, they did that the Simpsons one time, you probably didn't see that one.

Nah, I didn't see it. But that sounds like a rocking episode to me, man. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. That sounds like a real barn burner. I was gonna say there's our Simpson reference for the show. There you go, ding, ding. They were reading, there was this episode, they were reading the charter, the town charter, the Springfield town charter.

And it had male ducks had to wear pants. Yeah, it was like one of the old laws that was still on the books, you know, but I bet we got some of those in North Carolina. If we, somebody's probably already done that. I just haven't seen it. But maybe we'll, we'll dial that up one week. I just like that idea in general, man.

Like, I think that should be what the show is now. It's just, we just read. We just read statutes, just as slowly and as monotone as we can. We just read statutes. And that'll only appeal to the real purists out there.

The real, the real legal purists. But we'll be making those guys happy. I think our audience might dwindle after a couple of weeks. Maybe they'd wait for us. Like maybe Josh and Joe will come back and talk about something fun. And then just like, maybe they love it.

Maybe everyone loves it. And the show takes off to a new stratosphere. The, the other, the other piece of legislation is getting a lot of attention is, and again, I've seen it called different things. I'm gonna call it the NC parent's rights bill, because that's what I've seen it referenced as to the most. But we've got some legislation here locally, North Carolina, that is, is very similar. We spent some time talking about the Florida bill that got named, the media kind of named it the don't say gay bill.

And so we spent a while talking about that one. The NC bill is a little bit different, but it has some overlapping provisions. You know, it's again, depending on what side of the ground you stand on, some of it might, some of the bills provisions might seem overly difficult, overly hard. Some of them, I think, make sense. I think, you know, this bill, like the Florida bill has a, they don't want any sexual type instruction, gender type instruction in, in schools for kindergarten.

I think it was through the third grade. I don't have it in front of me. But, you know, I, I don't see anything. I don't see any problem with that. I don't want, I have a second grader. I don't want that second grader personally.

Spending a lot of time talking about anything, sexual in nature, gender in nature. I personally, again, that's my, I don't put a lot of personal opinions out here on the show, but I, you know, just, I do that just to point out that some of this bill seems to be reasonable when I just read it arbitrarily. But this one, it really depends on your personal leanings and your personal beliefs on, on what's true and correct and how you want to raise your kids. And anytime that's the case, man, that's a lightning rod for, for legislation or anything like that. I agree, man. This is a real lightning rod. And I will say, you know, this not commenting on the substance of this bill, not commenting on, you know, the goals and the aims of this bill, strictly commenting on the, the, the common, the, the, the catchy name factor.

I got to give the, I'm going to give it a 3.5 out of 10 in terms of coming up with a cool name for this book. The, there's some other things in there that, that, that draw more objections. So of course, it's got a, it's got a provision just to alert parents to a lot of different things that might come up as a kid gets older. So if they, if they want to change their pronouns, I think that was mentioned in there. If they, you know, there's a, there's a medical issue, a mental health issue that might come up that's related to, to gender.

They want that reported to, to parents. And, and so again, depending on what side of the debate you fall on, that's perfectly reasonable or incredibly objectionable, right? So it's no, you know, civilized society is a series of measured compromises. And at some point when we can't compromise on, we have off limit topics or topics that are so divisive, we can't civilly discuss them. Then little, little parts of society start, start breaking down, you know, when we can't talk to each other and come to some sort of compromise or some sort of agreement that everybody can live with.

And we, we have some problems. And, you know, to me, man, to me, you talk about, when you talk about notifying parents of things, you know, certain things that involve their children, like to me, that seems perfectly, perfectly reasonable. And you can almost be like, well, I can't, what's the argument?

What argument could be made against that? And then I guess you have to remember, like, not every parent and not every parent child relationship is, is that of mine and my kids or you and your kids. And, you know, I guess they're as sad as it is, you know, there's, there's a lot, there's some parents out there that don't necessarily have the best interest of their kids in mind.

There's some unhealthy relationships there. So I guess that's a piece of the puzzle. But, you know, some of this stuff does, like you said, it seems, it does seem fairly, fairly reasonable.

But it's a lightning rod. And whenever you have that lightning rod, you've got, there's, there's two sides of that coin, and both are usually equally adamant about their own position. Yeah, everything I read, you know, described this as Republican legislation. I think Governor Cooper came out against it.

And, you know, so it sounds like maybe I don't know that he said this, but it sounds like he'd, I'm guessing just by all his statement again, I'm making a leap of an assumption here, but he would, he would veto it maybe if it came to his desk. And so I don't know what in the end, the point is, but you definitely have some parents, you know, who are involved in their kids' lives who, you know, and, and I think somebody got interviewed and made a good point, you know, they have to sign a form and, and call the school for their kid to get like antacid, you know, like over the counter medication. I know, like, we, you know, at our school, our kid uses inhaler and there was like all these documents to fill out so he could use his inhaler, you know, so it's a big problem. And those kids these days snortin' Tums, man, that's a new thing.

You have to go through the, like, just all this stuff or like simple stuff. And then, you know, if, again, I don't know what the situation would be, but if a kid goes to a guidance counselor or something that's having maybe some mental health issues or some, some struggles with, with sexuality and, and that, not to get back to the parents. That seems at least as important as Tums, right? You know, at least, you know, so I think, I think both sides have good intentions on this debate. You know, they want kids to be able to figure themselves out and not to, again, if they don't have a good relationship with their parents, you know, I see both sides, but, but in the end, when you read this bill, it doesn't sound unreasonable just, just to read it and how it gets applied. And I think, I think when we talked about the Florida law, that was our, you know, it wasn't drafted really well.

How will this get applied? It didn't make a lot of, you know, it didn't, there was, there was going to be a lot of legal problems. So from an attorney perspective, we saw a lot of problems with it and this bill has the same, the same issues, you know, but anyway, I guess it's neither here nor there. We're not, we're not part of the North Carolina Senate. Me and Joseph don't have a vote, but we just like to talk about these things for, for the sheer joy in talking about legal. Well, I was going to say, yeah, I was just going to say you're both parents and a lot of our listeners are parents and they're facing these same issues. So, you know, it's an interesting conversation.

I'm sure it's going to come back up on the program. I want to remind everybody you're listening to the Outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. They're the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina with offices in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Varina and Gastonia.

If you have a legal question you need an answer for, you're in a situation possibly. Here's a phone number for you. 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186.

Just leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. And you can always email your questions to the program. We'll answer them on future programs. That's questions at the outlawlawyer.com. Speaking of, we've got some questions coming up on the other side.

Stay tuned. You're listening to the Outlaw lawyers. Welcome back in to the Outlaw lawyers. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They are your hosts. They are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. They have offices conveniently located in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Varina and Gastonia. I'm Morgan Patrick, consumer advocate.

Again, we have that legalese conversation each and every week hitting the hot topics and then maybe some that you hadn't really thought about, but it'll get you thinking. If you've got an issue that you're facing, you've got a question and you need an answer, you can call Whitaker and Hamer. Use this number 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. And leave your contact information briefly what that call is about. And an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. And as always, you can email your questions to the program.

Questions at the outlawlawyer.com. All right. Listener questions.

I love these. Josh, take it away. We've got two today, Morgan. The first one is one that we have gotten a lot. It's been on the news. It's been the subject to a lot of discussion.

I've got kind of a generalized version that I'm going to read out here. So here is listener question number one today is, I went under contract for a new home back in 2021. The builder gave me notice that the final purchase price will increase by 80,000 because of material and supply chain issues. Plus the completion date has been extended. Is this a breach?

What can I do? All right. So that's kind of our question. We've got somebody who's who last year, last summer went and picked their lot out, signed up with a builder to build their house. They're supposed to be closing on it this summer and they're getting some bad news. The price has gone up and we're not going to close on time.

And then so their answer is, what can I do? And Joe, you know, we represent a lot of buyers, right? We represent a lot of builders.

We get on both sides of this question a lot. I know you've seen it too. I have seen it. It's a common, it's common, you know, and it's increasingly common because, you know, we had, I don't know if you know this, Josh, but there was an outbreak of a sickness. Some would call it a pandemic. Did you know that took place? No.

Yeah. So that caused a lot of issues with the supply chain that caused a lot of societal issues in general. And one of the things that occurred was a drastic increase in a lot of things. Cost of labor, cost of materials. So, so you saw, you saw a whole lot of, you saw a whole lot of price increases and you saw just a lot of things went through the roof. And so what you had happen was you had a lot of folks who they got in a contract for a property and the builders quoting them based on what they would generally expect this project to cost. And then you get into the process, the prices increase substantially, and you're looking at a situation where you've had, you know, 60, 70, $80,000 increases in the cost of materials during that time. And it puts you in a situation like this. So we definitely see it.

And the answer as to whether this can be done. And I know you love this answer, Josh, but it's the answer to virtually any legal question. And that's, it depends. Right, right. It depends on a lot of things. You know, I like how I saw this and I don't have them in front of me, but I saw this just come up on like the local news a lot.

I think the NNO had some articles on it when it was, when it was happening. And it's just interesting how the builders are always the bad guys, right? It's always the company. It's always the landlords that are the bad guys, the builders that about the HOAs are the bad guys. And sometimes they are, right?

Sometimes that's the case, depending on the facts, but this bias towards, it just seems apparent to me. But anyway, well, yeah, what can, it depends on the contract you signed, right? So a lot of builders have their own contract and that contract, it contemplates things like this. You know, this is based on pricing and such and such, and this can go up by a certain amount or a certain percentage, or we'll just tell you what it is so you know, and we're going to pass that because that's what happens. You know, when things inflate and we're seeing that now with this crazy, crazy, crazy inflation, I had to buy a lot of boat gas this weekend. I know this is a first world problem to complain about, but man, gas with no ethanol, boat gas, not cheap right now. No gas is cheap, right? Yeah, I was going to say gas price is going through the roof.

I think average is 465 right now. Big, big number. But this gets passed along to the consumer, right? Anytime there's a new tax, anytime there's a new tariff, anytime there's a supply chain issue, you know, that gets passed right along to us. So it's in the end, it's your problem, and a lot of it depends on the contract you sign, and I would guess a lot of people sign these contracts without having a lawyer, you know, review. But a lot of these contracts are, you know, stipulate we can go up on price, and if you can't do it, then, you know, you might lose some deposit, maybe get your deposit back. The builder is just going to sell it to somebody who can't afford it. So that's, you know, but if they sign, if the builder signed a contract with you that didn't allow a price increase, then maybe you have an argument that they're going to have to eat it instead of you. But still, you know, it just depends on your bill. You know, there's legal arguments to be made, right?

Like, okay, maybe this is a breach. But a judge, a judge can't, you know, can't order, you know, a builder to sell you a house at a price where he's going to take $100,000 loss, and he doesn't have $100,000 to pay that loss, right? Because you're still going to have liens on the house. Well, the judge can't order it, but like, but you still have, you're still going to have the same issues. The judge can't magically produce the funds to pay the contractors so that you don't have a property that's just riddled with liens.

That can't be removed. You know, they, those contractors' rights are protected, just like your rights are protected. So it's still going to be, it's still going to be an issue. And, you know, practically speaking, you get a judgment against the builder that cannot pay those liens.

That judgment is going to be virtually worthless. So there's, you're still going to be in a bad situation. And I'd say, you know, I'd say this is a relatively new issue that we've seen cropping up more and more. I think a lot of the builders' contracts prior to this new period we've kind of entered post-COVID didn't necessarily account for this situation, but virtually every builder we work with in the last several months has included some sort of, you know, escalation clause or something that would allow them to increase the price based on changes.

So it is something that's become increasingly common, and I'd say has really become the standard recently. Yeah, you can't, you can't be in the business of building houses and just take loss after loss after loss, you know, and some of that's got to be passed on. And I don't know, it's one of those, it's one of those difficult situations, because again, you certainly have sympathetic home buyers who are in a position now where they can't afford the house, you know, if it went up too much or, you know, it's really going to put them in a bind. But the builder also can't just, you know, take a loss on this situation that came up through no fault of their own either, right, you know, so it just puts everybody in bad positions.

But when it gets reported on, it always seems like it's the homeowner, or the perspective homeowner who people sympathize with the most. But anyway, it's an interesting question. It's one we've seen a lot, and I imagine we'll see even more of coming up here soon. All right, we need to take a short break. We've got one more listener question to go before the end of the program.

So we'll get right to it. You're listening to the outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. Again, offices conveniently located for you, Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. If you've got a legal situation that you're facing, you've got some questions, call this number 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information briefly what that call is about, and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch, and you can always email your questions to the program, and we'll answer them on the show, kind of like we are today. Questions at theoutlawlawyer.com.

We're back right after this. The outlaw lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, Whitaker and Hamer law firm, where you can find them each and every week. They're the managing partners there. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. Again, those offices, you can find them in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina and Gastonia. If you've got a legal situation, you need a question answered, you can call 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information briefly what that call is about, an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch, and again, you can always email your questions to the program, and we'll answer them on a future show.

Questions at theoutlawlawyer.com. Final question of the program, Josh. This is one that comes up from time to time, but our generalized version of a question that we get very often is, I was eating at a restaurant, and my food had a hard object in it. I bit down on the object, it caused me a lot of pain. I went to the dentist afterward and everything checked out okay. Can I sue?

So that's a question that comes up every now and again, and this reminds me of a story. I was in the KW cafeteria as a kid eating with my family. You guys know all about the KW. I think we've talked about the KW here on the show.

Yeah, you shortened it. It's K-N-W. K-N-W. K-N-W. K-N-W. K-N-W. K-N-W. So we're at the K-N-W cafeteria. We're having a nice meal as a family, and I was a kid. Maybe I was in middle school. I might have been in elementary school, but I remember we were sitting there. My dad was eating.

My dad's going to get mad at me this weekend putting his business out on the radio. But we were sitting there eating, and he always did Salisbury. That's his meal.

Salisbury steak. Oh, so good. Yeah. Yeah, that's what he does every time. So he's eating his rice. He bites down on something.

We hear like a crack. He cracked like half his tooth, and it just fell out. I just remember being like, and he was just like, oh, well, I guess I'll have to, you know. I just remember being like amazed that that just happened, and like he wasn't like riding on the ground in pain.

How good was that Salisbury steak to just put him into a state of euphoria where he's just like, no tooth, half my tooth gone, but I got to keep this rolling, man. I think they did. I think they took us to that.

I think they did just talk to a manager. And if I remember correctly, I think I think the K-N-W just covered his whatever dental bills he had at the time, you know, but but yeah, the short answer is, is you can sue, right? But the problem might be what's your actual damage? Yeah.

And in this situation, everything checked out okay. Like you've got you got pain, you know, and pain and suffering is a relevant factor to, you know, any kind of litigious suit seeking, you know, recovery of damages. But at this, it's difficult. It's difficult if pain and suffering is your own is the only thing you've got, you know, how do you quantify that, you know, having there needs to be a quantifiable component to to any kind of of lawsuit of this nature. Well, you have to prove negligence, right? So this if you did sue, let's say my dad decided to sue the K-N-W, you got to prove that that they did something wrong, right? The fact that something hard was in the rice or whatever it was, by itself is not enough, because there's, you know, you get a steak, you might get some bone, right?

You can get pieces of bone in a hamburger. And there's, you know, there's a certain level that's not negligent because it just happens, right? So you have to prove they did something wrong. So you have to prove negligence happened. And then you have to like, like you said, Joe, pain and suffering, you certainly can get compensated for but, you know, three seconds of pain, you know, maybe is not worth a lot in the in the in the in the marketplace, but cracking half a tooth and having to get extensive dental work. Maybe that's a different situation.

I get doctors involved, you got medical records, you've got a clear injury. And, and, but yeah, yeah, I hadn't thought about that time at K-N-W in a long time. And this question really just rocketed that into my brain, just, just amazed. Like, you know, because as a kid, you crack a tooth, you're out of school for like, like, I wouldn't, I wouldn't milk that for as long as I could, you know?

Well, and it's nice that K-N-W stepped up and took care of that. I mean, that's that that's some scary stuff. How old was your dad when it happened?

Let's see, if I was in middle school, my dad would have probably been late 40s. I was gonna say those are his real teeth too. Yeah, yeah. All right, well, we are up against the clock, guys. Another great show. The Outlaw Lawyers, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm, where you can find them during the week. They're the managing partners there. They're practicing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina and offices conveniently located.

Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay Verina and Gastonia. And if you've got a legal question you need an answer to, I've got a phone number for you. 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Just leave your contact info briefly what that call's about. An attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. You can always email your questions to the show. Questions at theoutlawlawyer.com. We're back next week with another edition of the Outlaw Lawyer. We'll be right back.