Along with Medicaid expansion and teacher pay raises, a Town of Franklin fire substation, funding for a chiller unit and a regional indoor firearms training facility are some of the projects that got funding from the North Carolina state biennium budget approved by legislators last week.
“I’m very happy about the special allocations for my whole district,” said Sen. Kevin Corbin, a Franklin Republican. “We got millions of dollars for the eight western counties. Other than constituent services, my main goal is to meet our funding needs for my counties.”
“I was very pleased with the critical investments that were made in the budget, from raises for state employees and teachers, to significant mental health funding, and water and sewer infrastructure investments,” Rep. Karl Gillespie, a Franklin Republican. “This fiscally responsible spending plan produces a balanced budget while lowering income taxes for North Carolinians.”
The budget brings $400,000 to the Town of Franklin to pay for a fire substation. The new substation opened earlier this year on NP&L Loop. Franklin Fire & Rescue Chief Ben Ormond said the funds will help finish the station.
“This will include framing and finishing all the walls for the day room, kitchen, bunkrooms and another bathroom. It will also include installation of all utilities, sprinkler system, furnishings, backup generator, and exhaust removal system in the apparatus bays,” Ormond said. “Once finished, this will complete our substation, and we are very grateful for the state’s support on this, especially Karl Gillespie and Kevin Corbin.”
Other direct funding coming to Macon County is $5 million to the Town of Highlands for the dredging and restoration of Mirror Lake and another $5 million for water/sewer upgrades in Highlands.
As part of the budget, Macon County will receive $352,00 for “general projects.” Macon County Manager Derek Roland said that money will used for the following projects.
• $97,000 for Macon County to replace the 90-ton chiller unit and repair fan control boxes at the Human Services Building.
• $60,000 for Macon County to upgrade 911/emergency response equipment.
• $31,000 for Macon County to upgrade the Viper 800 MGHz radios for law enforcement and emergency services.
• $64,000 for Macon County for repaving of the deteriorating parking lot at Franklin EMS Base.
• $100,000 for Macon County to replace the heating and cooling units serving the gym area at Robert C. Carpenter Center. The center has two, 15-ton gas units located on the roof. Both units are inoperable and are 25+ years old.
Southwestern Community College received a $10 million appropriation to build a regional indoor firearms training facility. The firing range will be built at the Public Safety Training Facility in Franklin, according to SCC Public Relations Director Tyler Goode. He said they did not have a timeline yet for the project but would start ASAP and follow state construction guidelines.
Corbin also said there’s a “few other projects” to be announced “in the next 10 days or so,” Corbin said.
Medicaid expansion
The budget implements the funding mechanism for Medicaid expansion in North Carolina and will add coverage for thousands of Macon County residents.
“Health insurance for 600,000 more North Carolinians that brings more mental health and substance use disorder treatment, help for desperate rural hospitals and billions of dollars into our economy is a life-saving, monumental decision for our state,” Gov. Roy Cooper said in a statement.
According to the original Medicaid expansion bill signed into law this past spring, Medicaid expansion will provide coverage to adults aged 18-64 with incomes up to 133% of the federal poverty level.
A March count by the Macon County Board of Health estimates that they could add 6,478 uninsured individuals in Macon County to the Medicaid rolls.
Corbin, the chair of the Senate Select Committee of Appropriations on Health and Human Services said a lot of the preliminary work is done and Medicaid expansion is ready to roll out.
On Monday, Sept. 25, Cooper and the NCDHHS announced they would implement Medicaid expansion on Dec. 1, two months later than the original Oct. 1 rollout date.
Despite passing Medicaid expansion earlier in the year, the Republican-led NCGA mandated the funding for this come out of the state budget. The federal government covers 90% of Medicaid expansion costs, with the other 10% coming from the hospitals that will benefit from the reimbursements. It’s estimated that North Carolina will receive $521 million per month from the federal government for the Medicaid expansion, according to media reports.
Corbin said Angel Medical Center will receive $10 million annually from Medicaid expansion.
Other budget highlights include:
• A grant allocation for the Nikwasi Town Cherokee Settlement given in 2021-22 to the tune of $713,400 and the Watauga Town Cherokee mound sites grant for $100,000 is packaged together into one $813,400 grant to land acquisition for both Nikwasi Town and Watauga Town Cherokee mound sites.
• Adds a district court judge to Judicial District 43, which includes Macon County, going from six to seven.
• Adds a magistrate to Macon County, taking it from three to four.
• Changes the Superior Court District that Macon County is in from 30A to 43A.
• Reduces the personal income tax rate from 4.75% in 2023 to 4.5% in 2024, 4.25% in 2025 and 3.99% beyond 2025, accelerating the already-scheduled cuts.
• Prohibits COVID-19 vaccine and booster mandates for state agencies, local governments, public schools and post-secondary academic institutions, effective Jan. 1, 2024.
• Authorizes the State Board of Community Colleges to implement a tuition pilot program for up to 100 residents of Rabun, Towns, Union and Fannin counties in Georgia to attend Tri-County Community College in Murphy at in-state rates for the 2023-24 academic year.
• Create an Office of the State Fire Marshal, with that position appointed by the NCGA.
• Exempts state legislators from state public records laws, and allows them to decide which ones to destroy.
•Exempts breast pumps and related equipment from retail and sales taxes.
• Raises the retirement age for appellate court judges in the state from 72 to 76.
• Increases registration fees for electric vehicles from $140.25 to $180. Plug-in hybrid owners would pay an additional $90. All these fees would become effective Jan. 1, 2024.
• Extends the duration of an N.C. driver’s license for those aged 18-66 from eight to 16 years. Also, remote renewals are a permanent option.
• Funds a study on the effectiveness of the DMV, and a study on potential privatizing the DMV.
• Levying a new tax on ride-share services, 1.5% for exclusive ride service and 1% for shared-ride services, with taxes collected going to the Highway Fund, effective July 1, 2025.
The casino holdup
The long-awaited compromise 2023-25 budget, House Bill 259, came up for a vote Thursday, Sept. 21 in both the state House and Senate. As a conference report, there could be no floor amendments. The budget passed the state House 69-40 and 70-40 in its second and third readings, respectively, which by rule took place on different days (Sept. 21 and Sept. 11). The state Senate votes were 28-19 and 26-17.
Immediately after the last vote, Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, announced that while he called the bill a “bad budget that seriously shortchanges our schools, prioritizes power grabs, keeps shady backroom deals secret and blatantly violates the constitution, and many of its provisions will face legal action,” he said he would allow the budget to become law without his signature. By NCGA rules, a bill not signed or vetoed after 10 days while the legislature is in session becomes law.
“I will not allow people who are crying for help to wait any longer, so I am directing our Department of Health and Human Services to begin today the process for expanding Medicaid while allowing this budget to become law without my signature,” Cooper stated.
The North Carolina House and Senate passed their initial versions of the budget, House Bill 259, on April 6 and May 16, respectively. In June, each chamber appointed conference committees to hash out the details. The committees finished their work by the first week of July. Several big-ticket items, such as tax cuts and casinos, were negotiated by state Republican leaders.
After two-plus months, it seemed a vote would happen the week of Sept. 11. However, state legislative leaders called off the vote after numerous state Republicans opposed leaders’ plans for four new casinos, three non-Native-owned and one Lumbee Indian-owned. Earlier that week, the state Republican leaders planned to take the casino legislation out of the budget and pair it with the Medicaid expansion implementation in a separate bill. However, those same legislative leaders scrapped the casino plan midweek and put Medicaid expansion implementation back into the state budget.
When asked about the casino legislation, Gillespie said, “The feedback I received from my district made it clear that they were strongly opposed to the gambling proposal and I believe decoupling gambling from the budget was the correct decision, particularly to ensure we achieved consensus on the state budget.”
Corbin said holding up the budget would not have been good for his district.
“It was obvious there wasn’t enough support for it to go forward,” Corbin said of the casino legislation. “I agreed with the decision to move on without the casinos.”
Currently, there are three casinos in North Carolina. One is in Kings Mountain, owned by the Catawba Indian Nation. The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians owns the other two, located in the nearby towns of Cherokee and Murphy. Both of those EBCI casinos are in Corbin’s eight-county senate district and the latter is in Gillespie’s four-county house district.