RALEIGH – The new law sets minimum liability insurance requirements for ride sharing companies. It also requires the companies to conduct background checks of drivers, specifies that drivers are partners independent contractors rather than employees, and sets parameters letting the companies enter into contracts to service airports in the state.
RALEIGH — The resignation of state Health and Human Services Secretary Aldona Wos, announced Wednesday, could bring Medicaid reform, a goal of Senate legislative leaders, one step closer. Key senators announced Wednesday afternoon that they would remove Medicaid reform provisions from their budget proposal “in the coming days” to speed an agreement on the slow-moving spending plan.
RALEIGH — House leaders unveiled portions of a $2.85 billion bond package at a Monday press conference, arguing that borrowing the money now to pay for projects would take advantage of low interest rates and likely avert anticipated increases in construction costs over time. Along with the $2.85 billion in borrowing, the House committed $1.3 billion for highway construction in a six-year, pay-as-you-go plan.
RALEIGH — Even though Gov. Pat McCrory has said the tolling project along the Interstate 77 corridor north of Charlotte will go forward, it faces a challenge to its constitutionality, as well as allegations the contractor did not meet full-disclosure requirements.
No public official has the power to decide how the public's business is reported, nor whether it will comply with requests for public information.
RALEIGH – Senate leaders on Wednesday eschewed Gov. Pat McCrory’s request for a $1.4 billion bond referendum, offering instead their own plan that would increase spending on highway construction and maintenance. Lee Roberts, McCrory’s budget director, countered the Senate leaders’ assertions, saying that the governor’s plan would not result in the state spending less on roads.
RALEIGH — State Senate Majority Leader Harry Brown and Gov. Pat McCrory waged a war of words Tuesday over the Onslow County Republican's proposal to rework the way local sales taxes are allocated. Brown’s plan would shift the distribution of sales tax revenues from the current formula favoring the location sales are made to one emphasizing county population. McCrory vowed to veto Brown’s plan if it reaches his desk.
RALEIGH — Despite widespread vocal opposition from area business leaders and residents, Gov. Pat McCrory and North Carolina Department of Transportation officials maintain it is too late for the state to scrap the controversial 26-mile Interstate 77 tolling project between Charlotte and Mooresville in favor of nontolled alternatives.
The spending plan fails to advance the conservative agenda in several ways, but it does not signal a return to the high-taxing, free-spending ways of the past.
RALEIGH — The spending plan would exceed anticipated growth in inflation and population over the two-year budget cycle. It also faces an uncertain fate in the Senate, where leader Phil Berger has suggested his chamber wants to use an unanticipated budget surplus to build up state reserves or provide additional tax relief.
RALEIGH — Employers now will have “certainty about the cost of doing business in North Carolina,” Gov. Pat McCrory said Tuesday in announcing that the state has paid off a $2.8 billion unemployment insurance debt to the federal government that he inherited when taking office in January 2013. The state had to borrow from the federal government to pay regular benefits.
