Weekend reads: Dueling budgets, marijuana legalization, and steps to ensure a healthy pregnancy
North Carolina Legislative Building (Photo: Clayton Henkel)
Dueling GOP budgets: NC House Repubs advance proposal that Senate counterparts say is too generous
By Lynn Bonner
Republicans in the state House were hit from all sides Wednesday as they gave preliminary approval to their $31.7 billion budget proposal.
Their House Democratic colleagues condemned the budget for proposing to spend about $500 million on private school vouchers — money they said could be better used to increase public school teacher pay, give more help to childcare centers that are floundering as pandemic-era federal support dries up, or provide emergency funding to the State Employee Health Plan.[Read more...]
Bonus read: Votes but no breakthrough in the GOP state budget stalemate
NC lawmakers, advocates call for action to address crisis in Black maternal health
By Ahmed Jallow
When she found out she was pregnant in 2016, Charity Watkins, a doctoral student at the time, did all the right things, meticulously following all recommended practices to ensure a successful and healthy pregnancy.
“I initiated prenatal care… my husband and I enrolled in birthing classes, I read books on what to expect, and took extra care to ensure I ate well and exercised throughout my pregnancy,” said Watkins, who is Black. [Read more…]
Governor Cooper vetoes bill that targets mask wearing, alters campaign finance laws
Governor Roy Cooper vetoed House Bill 237 (Various Criminal and Election Law Changes) on Friday, saying the controversial legislation created a gaping loophole for secret and unlimited campaign contributions.
“While voters are kept in the dark, this scheme allows anonymous out-of-state billionaires to flood North Carolina with campaign contributions to rescue extreme right-wing candidates that Republicans now fear will lose,” said Cooper in a statement.
Good government groups widely panned the bill that initially addressed just wearing masks in public, but was then revised to include language that would dramatically change the state’s campaign finance laws. [Read more...]
Medical marijuana clears initial North Carolina Senate vote with bipartisan support
Late addition to hemp bill sparks debate over family values, compassionate care
“We all want to be compassionate and help people in need,” Jere Royall of the NC Family Policy Council told member of the Senate Rules Committee Thursday morning, before sharing his dismay about the latest version of House Bill 563. A day earlier, a lengthy amendment was added to the bill regulating hemp-derived consumables to legalize medical marijuana in North Carolina. [Read more...]
Bonus read: NC’s medical marijuana bill finds new life as state moves to regulate hemp-derived consumables
N.C. House budget calls for $135 million in childcare stabilization grants
Despite hurdles, Habitat Humanity of Durham is dedicating three new homes this week
Surrounded by friends and Habitat Humanity of Durham staff, Laura Phoenix grew emotional Thursday during the dedication of her new home in East Durham.
Just a year ago, the 43-year-old yoga instructor was without permanent housing after a bad break-up. It was the second time as an adult that she’d found herself without a permanent home. [Read more…]
VP Harris’s husband Doug Emhoff, Dem officials celebrate Juneteenth at Raleigh campaign event
Second Gentleman calls on audience to “save our democracy, save our world, and our very way of life.”
Second Gentleman.
It’s a unique and rather awkward official title that Doug Emhoff – the husband of the nation’s first woman vice president, Kamala Harris – bears, but it appeared to be one with which he’s come to enjoy as he stumped in Raleigh on Tuesday for his wife’s and President Biden’s reelection in November.
Emhoff’s seemed comfortable and at-home as he spoke to a gathering of 200 or so in the steamy back parking lot of Southeast Raleigh’s Word of God Church during an informal Juneteenth celebration that featured food trucks, vendors, children’s games, and performances by an elementary school chorus.[Read more.…]
Juneteenth holiday: An important moment to contemplate our nation’s past and present (commentary)
What in the world could they have been thinking?
That’s one of the questions (or, at least, one hopes it is) that most white Americans ask themselves periodically when contemplating the evil of human slavery – the institution that undergirds so much of their modern privilege and wealth. How could any human being ever think themselves entitled to own another human because of their skin color? [Read more...]
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