public policy advocacy for the professional engineer                        Feb. 7, 2011

Your Legislative Update for February 7 is below.  Please feel free to forward this on to others who might find the information useful!

Last Week At The Legislature

One week into the legislative session and the Republican majority is already a few steps closer to delivering on several of their most ambitious goals. Committee chairs have been named and committee members established - although House Speaker Tillis says he may still be doing some shuffling. Even so, the process of committee appointments has moved far faster than in previous years when Democrats were in the majority.

Click here for a list of House Committees.

Click here for a list of Senate Committees.

Look for the Republicans to keep up this fast pace as they establish new rules intended to streamline the legislative process such as limiting the number of bills that can be filed and prohibiting public bills with no substantive provisions or, blank bills (one local bill is allowed). While the Senate has passed permanent rules, the House rules are temporary until permanent rules are established.

Health Care Reform

Last Wednesday, after a three and a half hour floor debate, the House passed a bill that would block the federal health care individual insurance mandate from taking effect in North Carolina, mostly along party lines - Republicans in favor, Democrats against. Democrats argued that this bill was a waste of time since the issue would ultimately be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. The bill would next be taken up in the Senate.

Charter Schools

The lifting of the cap on charter schools got attention in a Senate committee last week with the introduction of a bill sponsored by Senator Richard Stevens of Wake County. Click here for more...

Economic Incentive Money

Long known for criticizing the use of incentive money to attract business to NC, the Republicans took a swipe at the Governor with Senate Bill 13, offering a plan aimed at saving $800 million in the current fiscal year by, in part, raiding some business recruiting incentive funds. Click here for more...

Budget Balancing

The incentive money grab is only the first in what is expected to be severe reductions in state funding to deal with a projected $3.7 billion shortfall.  Republicans contend that the pain is necessary and do not hide the fact that state employee layoffs, pay cuts and reductions in state benefits will be necessary. Click here for more...

Other Top Legislative Issues

Two other top issues for the Republican leaders, Speaker Tillis and President Pro Tempore Berger, are regulatory reform and tort reform. Click here to learn about these issues...

What's in the News

Lawmakers Shouldn't Ignore Transportation Spending and Tax Cuts

Lawmakers Should Have Limits

Solar Farm

Stimulus Oversight

Debt Study

Petitioning or Engineering?

Charlotte makes big step onto national stage with Democratic National Convention Announcement

If there are questions or you need additional information, please feel free to contact me at bbailey@penc.org or phone 919-834-1144, ext. 1.

Sincerely,

Betsy Bailey
Professional Engineers of North Carolina

PENC Draft Legislative Issues

The PENC Legislative Committee has drafted the following legislative initiatives subject to change pending further discussions with the PENC Executive Committee and other interested organizations. You can access it here.

 
Contact Us
Professional Engineers
of North Carolina
1015 Wade Avenue, Suite A
Raleigh, NC 27605

Phone: (919) 834-1144
Fax: (919) 834-1148
Web Site: www.penc.org
E-Mail: exec@penc.org