October 14, 2009
RALEIGH — The future of video poker in North Carolina could hinge on a case heard by a three-judge Court of Appeals panel Wednesday. Lawyers representing the video poker industry told the court that federal law prohibits the General Assembly from re...
Read More
October 13, 2009
RALEIGH — It wasn’t so much a question as a dare. “So, commissioner, have you tried the chocolate-covered bacon?”
Read More
October 11, 2009
RALEIGH — Lawmakers are getting ready to take up a tax reform effort that could change how much, when and who pays for most government services through taxes. While there is broad agreement among legislators that North Carolina’s tax system ne...
Read More
RALEIGH — Shortly after the November 2004 elections, the word went out to lawmakers that they were needed back in Raleigh. North Carolina was competing to land a Dell manufacturer and all shoulders were needed in the wheel of state government.
Read More
October 6, 2009
On first blush, Rep. Howard Coble doesn’t seem like the most likely character to be involved in a dispute over Internet domain names. The 78-year-old Greensboro Republican is more likely to get on the phone with an angry constituent than answer an a...
Read More
October 5, 2009
Who will be the next leader? Will the leadership of the Board of Commissioners stay put for another year? No telling, at this point. In interviews last week, neither Chairman Melvin “Skip” Alston nor Vice Chairman Steve Arnold would say whethe...
Read More
October 4, 2009
RALEIGH — Ed Taylor stood with friends and family in front of the Wake County courthouse Tuesday, each wearing a lime-green T-shirt with a simple message: “Free Greg Taylor.”
Read More
October 2, 2009
Roughly $1.5 million worth of federal stimulus funding will be coming to Greensboro as part of 556 National Institutes of Health grants handed out across the state this week. Nationwide, more than 12,000 such grants were given out under one slice of a $78...
Read More
September 29, 2009
About half of the $787 billion federal stimulus — what sticklers for legislative titles call the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act — passed in February has been spent, says Ed DeSeve, a special adviser to the president on recovery act fun...
Read More
September 22, 2009
When the U.S. House debated a measure governing funding on higher education last week, most of the attention focused on how federally subsidized student loans would be parceled out. (For more on that, see the vote tally section.)
Read More
September 20, 2009
RALEIGH — All 10 lawmakers who represent Guilford County at the General Assembly say they either have decided to run again next year or are leaning that way. “I’m strongly considering it,” said Rep. John Blust , a Greensboro Republ...
Read More
September 18, 2009
RALEIGH — Embattled community organizing group ACORN has four offices in North Carolina, but none is known to have the kinds of problems that have drawn bipartisan criticism in Congress this week. Videotapes, including one that shows ACORN employees...
Read More
September 17, 2009
RALEIGH — Students who cannot prove they’re legal citizens would be able to take courses at community colleges under a policy the State Board of Community Colleges is poised to adopt later this week. Even though the proposal would require undo...
Read More
September 15, 2009
Congress returned to work last week, and many lawmakers report that health care is eating up much of the agenda. “A lot of other issues have just been cast aside,” said Rep. Howard Coble, a Greensboro Republican. “Cap and trade for examp...
Read More
September 14, 2009
Triad residents will have their chance to sound off about Duke Energy’s proposal to raise its rates by 12.6 percent during a public hearing Tuesday night in High Point. If regulators approve the increase, the average residential rate for Duke custom...
Read More
September 13, 2009
RALEIGH — No, the trash police aren’t on the way to your house. But on Oct. 1, it will be illegal for plastic bottles to find their way into North Carolina landfills. In theory, that ban will help more of the 288 million pounds of soda contain...
Read More
September 12, 2009
GREENSBORO — Four busloads of people were scheduled to leave from the Four Seasons Town Centre late Friday to arrive for today’s march at the National Mall in Washington, protesting what they see as myriad government ills. “We’re g...
Read More
September 10, 2009
RALEIGH — Gov. Bev Perdue vetoed a bill Thursday that would have restricted public access to some records, perhaps scoring some political points in the process. The bill, H104, specifies when lawmakers can hold certain items out of public view. It p...
Read More
September 8, 2009
Rep. Brad Miller had come home for the congressional recess last month hoping to work on rewriting the nation’s financial services laws, a topic he’s been involved with since his election seven years ago. But just as lawmakers were heading hom...
Read More
September 6, 2009
GREENSBORO — Don’t call it video poker. Video slots is right out, too. Those are illegal in North Carolina. That machine blipping away in the corner of your gas station or back of the corner bar is a sweepstakes terminal. You also can find the...
Read More
August 31, 2009
RALEIGH — A pair of jeans, a new iPod and a six-pack of beer all got more expensive at 12:01 a.m. today. North Carolina’s sales taxes rose by 1 penny today, increasing to 7.75 percent throughout most of the state, including Guilford and Rockin...
Read More
August 30, 2009
RALEIGH — Crafting a federal health care reform compromise can seem especially daunting when two people invested in the issue don’t agree on the words used in the debate, much less on the debate itself. Take North Carolina’s two U.S. sen...
Read More
What does the money received from the N.C. lottery go toward? How is the state lottery held accountable for the money it contributes toward the N.C. educational system? — Cynthia Spender, Greensboro When lawmakers wrote the lottery law in 2005, the...
Read More
August 27, 2009
RALEIGH — Voters in Guilford and Forsyth counties would have the option of raising their sales taxes by a half-cent to pay for public transportation programs under a bill Gov. Bev Perdue signed into law Thursday. Some communities in the Triangle wou...
Read More
August 26, 2009
RALEIGH — As students across the state go back to school this week, they’ll likely be taking an unwelcome guest into the classroom: a persistent strain of the flu virus. What health workers call H1N1 is the swine flu that flared up around the...
Read More
