Budget Vote Next Week? Perhaps...

Republicans in the General Assembly could hold votes on the state budget as soon as next week, House Speaker Tim Moore (R) said Tuesday as they await a counter-offer from Gov. Roy Cooper (D) on a potential compromise plan.  If no compromise is reached, Moore said Republicans are prepared to move forward with a vote on their own budget proposal and to see if enough Democrats will join with them to override a potential veto by Cooper. Moore said Democratic and Republican legislative leaders met with Cooper Friday, nearly four months after the current fiscal year started. 

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Redistricting 2021 – Much like 2019, Minus the Lottery Balls

The redistricting process for North Carolina’s congressional and legislative maps has looked a lot like the 2019 court-ordered redraw process: long days of lawmakers and staffers standing around computer screens.  But, one key player from 2019 didn’t make an appearance this time: the lottery ball machine.  Back then, legislators invited the flashy random number generator used on TV to select nightly winning lotto numbers.  This year  – with control of Congress at stake in 2022 – the GOP doesn’t appear to be leaving it to chance.  The official criteria says that partisan data can’t be used in drawing maps, but the options presented by Republicans would likely result in a congressional delegation of nine to 11 Republicans and three to five Democrats. In the legislature, Republicans would likely be able to stay in the majority easily and could potentially regain supermajorities.

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NC Treasurer: Nonprofit Hospitals Falling Short on Charity Care

Many North Carolina nonprofit hospitals are falling short in treating the poor for free or reduced rates to validate their tax-exempt status, State Treasurer Dale Folwell said Wednesday while highlighting a university report on charity care.  Johns Hopkins University expanded its national analysis on hospital care for low-income residents to focus on North Carolina hospitals with the help of the State Health Plan, which covers medical costs for state employees, teachers, retirees and dependents. Folwell’s agency oversees the plan. The report found that the state’s largest nonprofit hospital systems received more than $1.8 billion in estimated federal, state and local tax breaks for a 12-month period ending in 2019 or 2020, depending on how a system’s finances are accounted. But charity care spending — expenses for which they don’t expect to receive payment — for a majority of these systems failed to exceed 60% of the value of the system’s tax breaks. 

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