Personal income tax rates would be slashed and the corporate tax rate entirely eliminated by 2028 under a proposal rolled out on Tuesday, May 25, by N.C. Senate Republicans. The plan would reduce North Carolina’s flat income tax rate from 5.25% to 4.99%. It would also raise the standard deduction from $21,500 to $25,500 for...
A proposed tax cut from Senate Republicans would move North Carolina to fifth in the state business tax climate rankings, the Tax Foundation says. North Carolina, now 10th, ranked 46th when Republicans took control of the General Assembly in 2011. The Tax Foundation is an independent, nonprofit tax research group. The proposed cut would slash...
A bipartisan group of senators is crafting legislation that would find ways to expand broadband access in North Carolina. The bill, filed Monday, appears unfinished. Several sections remain unfilled, presumably with details to come in later editions. But the goals are significant, starting with the title: “Innovative Statewide Broadband Infrastructure.” The legislation would convene the...
Republican lawmakers are pushing forward two election-reform bills designed to shore up voting integrity following the 2020 general election debacle that included numerous accusations of fraud. Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus, talked through the two bills at a news conference and in the N.C. Senate Elections Committee on Wednesday, March 31. “There is a tension between...
Republican senators have introduced a bill that would require lawmakers to sign off on any deal settling a lawsuit in which the legislature is a party. The move, Senate Bill 360, Prohibit Collusive Settlements by the Attorney General, prevents state agencies from circumventing the lawmaking process and changing laws through settlements with friendly plaintiffs, a...
Amid ongoing COVID-19 debates, some policymakers are focusing on the post-pandemic world.
Just days after warning of the need to regulate solar panel disposal, Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus, scrapped his bill for a relaxed version. Facing opposition from solar-friendly senators and the renewable energy lobby, Newton gave regulators until Jan. 1, 2022, to study environmental impacts and adopt final rules. The original bill set a September deadline...
If all the solar panels from industrial-scale electric plants in North Carolina were laid end to end, they would stretch from Raleigh to San Francisco and back nearly four times. Yet the state has no plan to handle the 475,000 tons of panels once they wear out and become waste. Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus, a...
Who is Doug Heyl? Members of a special legislative committee looking into the Atlantic Coast Pipeline would like to know. Heyl is a top communications official in the state Department of Environmental Quality. But what role did Heyl play in the pipeline permitting process? Sen. Paul Newton, R-Cabarrus, flashed a PowerPoint presentation during a meeting...
A legislative panel is hiring a special outside investigator to get answers from Gov. Roy Cooper about his creation of a $57.8 million discretionary fund tied to payments from Atlantic Coast Pipeline partners. A Joint Legislative Commission on Governmental Operations subcommittee voted Wednesday, Nov. 14, to probe whether Cooper’s conduct was legal. The special investigator...
Did state approval of the North Carolina segment of the 600-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline depend on Gov. Roy Cooper’s administration securing a $57.8-million discretionary “mitigation fund” with the pipeline operators? Documents obtained by Carolina Journal suggest it did. The federal government approved the pipeline in October 2017, but the state did not sign off on...
