Legislative Update for 05/23/23
May 23, 2023
The House and Senate have overridden Gov. Cooper’s veto of Senate Bill 20, Care for Women, Children, and Families Act, on a strict party line vote. This means, starting July 1st, the state will prohibit elective abortions after the first 12 weeks, allowing abortions up until the 20th week in instances of rape or incest or up until the 24th week if there is a life-limiting anomaly in the unborn child. In cases of a medical emergency for the pregnant woman, abortions will be allowed at any time. The bill also includes a number of other policy measures, including allowing for independent practice by Certified Nurse Midwives, appropriating additional funds for a number of maternity programs, new reporting requirements for all abortions and criminalizing certain actions, like the provision or advertising of abortion-inducing drugs.
As you can imagine, there were mixed reactions to this new law. Speaker Moore, and many other Republican policymakers, were quick to share their excitement over the move to further abortion restrictions in our state.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 05/12/23
May 12, 2023
After several weeks of lengthy committee meetings and floor debates, the crossover deadline has passed. With a substantial number of bills moving, controversy was sure to follow. Controversial policies included new abortion measures, a gun bill, and a bill banning surgical gender transition procedures for minors. Of course, those are just the bills that make the headlines, there are hundreds of other bills that moved through the process with very little review or debate so we are going through those to see where we need to intervene. Please see below for some of the bills that made their way around the General Assembly last week.
On Tuesday evening, Republicans unveiled their long-anticipated abortion bill. As expected, the bill further restricts abortions in the state by prohibiting elective abortions after the first 12 weeks instead of the state’s current 20-week policy. It would allow abortions up until the 20th week in instances of rape or incest or up until the 24th week if there is a life-limiting anomaly in the unborn child. In cases of a medical emergency for the pregnant woman, abortions would be allowed at any time.
Senate Bill 20, the “Care for Women, Children, and Families Act”, would also make a variety of additional changes to healthcare laws in our state. One of its noteworthy changes would allow for independent practice by Certified Nurse Midwives, repealing the 40-year-old requirement for a signed physician “supervision” agreement and also a “fix” to the law regarding guns and domestic violence victims.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 05/04/23
May 4, 2023
With bill filing deadlines behind us, the crossover rush began last week and is careening towards its finish on Thursday, May 4th. Any bills that do not have a fiscal impact on the state will have to be approved by at least one chamber in order to remain eligible for the remainder of the 2-year session. This to me is the most dangerous time of the session, when bills with very little, if any, discussion are voted on and move through committees and on the floor of the House and Senate. Committees have so many bills on their agendas, that there is little time to intervene, amend or discuss the bills at this stage.
Yesterday, the House and Senate Republicans announced that they had reached an agreement on a bill that would further limit abortion in North Carolina. They put the provisions into Senate Bill 20 (a bill already approved by both the House and Senate) and heard the bill in a joint House and Senate Rules Committee hearing today and expect to have the bill approved on Thursday by both chambers and to the Governor. According to the press conference, all Republican members of the House and Senate have committed to voting for the bill and if that is true, they will be able to override any veto from the Governor. By putting the bill into a “conference report” they have also protected the bill against any amendments – legislators will have to vote yes/no on the bill.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 04/27/23
April 27, 2023
Speaker Moore says he thinks legislators are “really close” to reaching a consensus on a change to the state’s current abortion policies. Speaker Moore told reporters that he believes Republicans are coming to an agreement for abortion restrictions after 12 weeks. However, there is still no final agreement at this point on any part of an abortion bill. When reporters reached out to Senate leader Berger for comment to this, he said he is still discussing options with his members. Senate leader Berger has said previously that he would personally be in support of restrictions following the first trimester (12 weeks), and Speaker Moore has said that he thought that is where his chamber would end up on this, as well. This seems to confirm that a 12-week ban is likely what we will see proposed from this General Assembly – that’s an 8-week decrease from the state’s current 20-week ban. It is unclear what exceptions would be included for rape, incest, and health of the mother and we understand those details are still being worked on behind the scenes. Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 04/17/23
April 17, 2023
What a rollercoaster ride we are on this session! I have been a lobbyist and involved in the General Assembly for over 20 years and I have never seen a session move this quickly. Some of this makes sense in that the leadership teams for both the House and the Senate have been fairly consistent and should know their caucus and have a pretty good plan for what they want to get done. We are hearing that the Senate expects to roll out their version of the budget in about two weeks and that the conference committee wants to complete their work on the final budget by the middle of May! I have not seen a budget done that early ever and frankly the trend has been to take longer and longer, with some budgets not being done until July and August and a few years in there not reaching a budget consensus at all. Of course, much has to happen before a Budget is approved so we will see what happens! More than usual is riding on this budget to be approved since Medicaid Expansion is also on the line.
As you can see by the length of this legislative report and the next few – bill filing deadlines are here. That means the bill drafting division is trying to finalize all the bills in their pipeline to file by the deadlines – Senate deadline was April 6th and the House has two deadlines, public bills by April 18th and bills regarding appropriations or finance by April 25th. We understand that over 220 bills were filed on April 6th and some of those bills will be in committee next week. It is very difficult for lobbyists, let alone the public, to keep up with all the bills and respond to them. It will be a very busy few weeks at the General Assembly working toward May 4th which is the Crossover Deadline – the date that a bill must move from the chamber it was filed in to the other chamber. If it does not move by that date, officially the bill is ineligible to be heard for the session. The exceptions are bills that impact spending (appropriations) or taxes (finance) as these are eligible for the length of the session.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 04/11/23
April 11, 2023
The House budget proposal as released tops 1,000 pages and spends approximately $30 billion over the biennium. “This is a budget that invests in our state employees, teachers, infrastructure and workforce development. It is a budget that balances the needs of the state with a growing economy while maintaining a sustainable spending path,” Speaker Moore told reporters.
The House budget was released, discussed in committee the next day, had a few amendments, and went quickly through the various committees – Appropriations, Finance and Retirement. It was approved on a bi-partisan vote with 9 Democrats joining their Republican colleagues. There is much to like in the House Budget, including the trigger for Medicaid Expansion, substantial teacher raises, State employee raises, and other funding for hard to fill positions in schools and government. Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 03/30/23
March 30, 2023
The wait is nearly over! The House budget will be unveiled this week. Health Chair Donny Lambeth said that the House budget will be presented to caucuses on Tuesday and on Thursday morning, the budget will move on to Appropriations subcommittees for discussion. By that afternoon, the budget proposal will be in the full Appropriations Committee. Floor votes will be held next week before the legislative Spring Break begins. With most of the focus on the budget, the House isn’t expected to do too much heavy lifting on policy bills until after the budget has passed over and they return from their week off.
Once the budget leaves the House, the fun will really begin. The Senate will develop their own version of the budget and then typically a Conference Committee will be formed to iron out the differences between the two chambers’ spending plans. While both chambers have Republican majorities, priorities somewhat vary between the two. There will likely be lengthy negotiations between the chambers to balance out their top priorities for this biennium’s budget. Once it’s over to the Senate, the chambers will switch roles and the Senate will now be the one whose focus is mostly off of major policy bills and onto the budget.
MEDICAID EXPANSION
After 13 years of discussing this policy measure, the General Assembly has approved a Medicaid expansion bill with wide bipartisan margins and sent it on to the Governor. On Monday the Governor invited a variety of legislators, groups and lobbyists who worked on the issue to celebrate the signing of the bill, but unfortunately it is not over just yet. There will be one hurdle left for North Carolina to become to the 40th state to approve Medicaid expansion: the state budget. The expansion portion of the bill would not become law until a new state budget is enacted, and would be voided if there isn’t a new state budget by June 30, 2024.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 03/22/23
March 22, 2023
As expected, Gov. Cooper released his proposed budget this week. The Governor’s budget would spend approximately $34 billion in state funding, and include major investments in mental health support, teacher pay, state employee compensation, public education, child care funding, job training, infrastructure, and economic development.
The Governor’s plan would make our state the top state in the southeast for teacher pay, with an average 18% raise for teachers over the biennium. On average, state employees would see an 8% raise over that same period. The budget would fully fund the remedial Leandro plan ordered by the Supreme Court for North Carolina’s public schools, and includes funding for more school nurses, counselors, social workers, and school psychologists.
Gov. Cooper’s plan hopes to use the $1.8 billion federal sign-on bonus North Carolina will receive for expanding Medicaid to create the Improve Health Outcomes for People Everywhere (IHOPE) program to improve mental health and substance abuse services. The Governor proposes to use $1 billion of the bonus to create this program, using the funds to increase Medicaid rates for behavioral health services over three years ($225 million), improve access to mental health services in schools and throughout the state ($175 million), fund additional behavioral health services for justice systems ($150 million), improve behavioral health crisis support ($200 million), improve health technology and data tracking ($50 million), and more to improve access to mental health care.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 03/16/23
March 16, 2023
House and Senate leaders have reached an agreement on the overall spend for this biennium’s budget. In 2023-2024, the state plans to spend approximately $29.7 billion and will follow the next year spending roughly $30.8 billion. “Reaching this agreement with the Senate on the overall spend is an encouraging start to crafting another responsible budget that addresses the needs of North Carolinians, including key investments in teacher and state employee raises, infrastructure, and workforce development,” Speaker Moore said in a press release.
The budget process is ticking away and will be even further down the road once the Governor releases his budget proposal. This will be our first real glimpse at our State Departments’ funding requests for this biennium.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 03/09/23
March 9, 2023
A decade-long stalemate over Medicaid expansion appears to be coming to an end. On Thursday, House and Senate Republican leaders announced that they had reached an agreement to expand Medicaid in North Carolina. The agreement was said to have been reached in final negotiations that ran late Wednesday night into Thursday morning. At the time of the press conference, legislative leaders had not discussed their agreement with Gov. Cooper, or their respective caucuses. “We wanted to go ahead and get it out there … and get the details to the public, because it’s something we can all be very proud of,” said Speaker Moore regarding the timing.
The bill will include some Certificate of Need (CON) reforms and a provision to authorize HASP, a federal reimbursement program for hospitals. The compromise language “will eliminate certificate of need for behavioral health beds and for chemical dependency beds. It will raise the replacement equipment threshold to $3 million and index that number to inflation. It will increase the threshold for diagnostic centers to $3 million and index that to inflation.”
One measure that was noticeably missing from this agreement was the SAVE Act, a measure that would repeal the requirement for Advanced Practice Registered Nurses to obtain a physician’s signature on a “collaborative practice” agreement in order for them to practice independently in the state. This provision was included in the Senate Medicaid expansion package passed last session.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 02/28/23
February 28, 2023
Speaker Moore told reporters this week that the House plans on having their version of the budget out on April 6th, right before Easter and the General Assembly’s spring break the week of April 10th. It appears to be a favorable time to be working on the budget with the news of a projected $3.25 billion surplus for the state this year, however the surplus is non-recurring, one-time money and not recurring money which can be used for a wider variety of funding priorities.
As in years’ past, there are two topics that remain top priorities in both chambers that still prove difficult to fully agree on when it comes down to specifics: raises and tax cuts. It’s clear the chambers have already begun negotiations around the amount of tax cuts for this biennium. “The conversations I’ve had with leadership in the House, with members in the House, leads me to believe that the House is prepared to move forward with further reductions in in our taxes,” Senate leader Berger said. “We’re still early in the session, we’ll see how that materializes.”
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 02/21/23
February 21, 2023
Last week, the North Carolina House of Representatives made history by passing a bill that would expand Medicaid. While the House has passed a bill to study expansion previously, this bill would actually set it in motion and have North Carolina join the vast majority of states who have expanded. The hold-out chamber from last session did not seem to have adequate support in the Republican caucus to pass this measure along with the Senate previously, according to Speaker Moore. Now, it seems the tide has changed. This bill received bipartisan support and was approved by the chamber by a vote of 92-22.
The bill was amended to include a pilot program that would provide forgivable loans to eligible medical and nursing students who choose to practice full-time in rural areas. It was also amended to include language that would authorize work requirements as a condition of participation in the Medicaid program if there’s ever any indication that the federal government would authorize those requirements. “This is a part of history, and we need to advance this bill, move it forward so we can begin some serious discussions with the Senate on how do we make this happen for the state of North Carolina and for people who benefit from this,” primary sponsor Rep. Donny Lambeth told his colleagues on the House floor. Now, it’s the Senate’s turn to respond. The Senate has indicated that they have other priorities they wish to couple with Medicaid expansion, so it is likely that the Medicaid expansion proposal from the House will be amended on the Senate side. This long saga continues.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 02/14/23
February 14, 2023
The legislature has a full week planned ahead, with 22 Committees meeting just today alone. The legislature couldn’t let the Parents Bill of Rights bill have all the fun; this week they are expected to roll out other high-profile contentious bills, including the House’s Medicaid expansion bill and various bills that would loosen the state’s restrictions on firearms. The House and Senate have yet to reach a consensus on a Medicaid expansion proposal, so the House version that will be debated this week will almost surely vary from the Senate’s proposal from last session which included other controversial health care reforms. Along with that, Republican legislators are expected to move firearm bills this week. Ever a partisan issue, these gun bills will likely garner a lot of attention and opposition from various groups and Democratic legislators opposed to less restrictive access to firearms. Appropriations Subcommittees will also continue to meet this week to review various areas of the budget and find out about the many programs being funded by the State. The House will be presenting their budget proposal first this session.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 02/07/23
February 7, 2023
Session is gaining momentum as more and more bills are steadily being filed and committees are beginning to hold their first meetings of the biennium. Of course, it’s not the General Assembly’s style to slowly ease into session. Legislators started with a bang this week with the session’s first contentious bill making its way through committees, the Parents’ Bill of Rights bill.
Read the full report here.
Legislative Update for 02/01/23
February 1, 2023
The legislature is up and running for 2023’s long session. While most of Wednesday afternoon was spent handing out gavels to new Committee Chairs, bills also began to be filed. There were 20 bills filed in the House and 18 in the Senate on the first day. The very first bill filed in the Senate was Sen. Rabon’s NC Compassionate Care Act, Senate Bill 3, which would allow the use of medical cannabis in our state. This bill passed the Senate during last year’s short session, but was stalled in the House. “There is support for something where there’s doctors involved, and where there’s some type of controls and pharmaceutical involvement,” Speaker Moore told reporters when asked about the House’s stance this year. “There’s some support, but we’ll see. There’s a chance it may happen.”
The medical cannabis bill was not the only hot topic bill that was filed right out of the gate. Democrats held a press conference to discuss their filing of an abortion bill that would codify abortion rights under the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision into state law. While abortion policies are likely to be changed this session, this bill is unlikely to get much traction in a Republican-led General Assembly. Republicans are expected to file a more-restrictive abortion bill during this session.
Read the full report here.
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