by Sarah Michels, Carolina Public Press
April 30, 2025

RALEIGH — There’s never an off year for elections. At least not in the state legislature. This session, dozens of election-related bills have been filed, but a few have sped to the front of the pack: local measures making school board races partisan and those shifting municipal contests from odd to even years, when state and presidential elections take place.

Meanwhile, other legislation — including bills making Election Day a state holiday and changing the way voter registration drives work — has stalled. 

In order for these bills to make it across the finish line, they’ll need a boost to meet the May 8 crossover deadline — the day legislation has to be approved by at least one chamber to move forward. 

Making election boards partisan

When the Jackson County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously on a resolution asking the General Assembly to make school board elections partisan, there was no warning. The proposed change wasn’t even on the agenda. 

Rather, during its February meeting, Commissioner John Smith moved to amend another resolution, which was on the agenda, with the proposal to add party affiliations next to the names of school board candidates. 

Without discussion or public input, Smith and his fellow commissioners voted to approve the amended resolution. 

A week later, the Jackson County Board of Education voted unanimously to approve an opposing resolution declaring its intent to keep school board elections nonpartisan. 

Board of Education Chairwoman Gayle Woody felt blindsided. 

“It was obvious that they had had discussions behind closed doors because there was unanimous agreement with no comment, reason given or discussion,” she said. 

Although Woody shared her concerns with the county’s Republican state House Rep. Mike Clampitt,  he prioritized the commissioners’ wishes. In early March, Clampitt filed a bill to make Jackson County’s school board elections partisan. Since then, that bill has passed the House along party lines and is awaiting a second round of review in the state Senate.  

Woody hopes that never happens. She sees a potential ally in Jackson County state Sen. Kevin Corbin, whose opposition could kill the bill. Thus far, Corbin has been “very responsive” to the education board’s concerns, she said, but votes are never certain until they’re tallied in the state legislature. 

Woody doesn’t want the school board to become another “political football” in her community. 

“I’m obviously aware that political things come up in every aspect of community life, but that should not be the driving force behind decisions made by school boards,” she said. “It should be what’s best for our students.”

A partisan pattern

Jackson County is not the only battleground where the fight over elections is being waged. According to an EdNC analysis, the number of partisan school districts in North Carolina has quintupled since 2013 when only 10 districts held such elections. 

In 2024, 52 of the state’s 115 school districts held partisan elections. Before those elections, 31 of those boards had Republican majorities. Afterward, it was 38. 

“In a state like North Carolina, where we have roughly the same number of Democrats and Republicans, but we have more Republican counties than Democratic counties, moving to partisan ballots is likely to help the Republican Party,” said Chris Cooper, a Western Carolina University political science professor.  

He added that it also helps build Republican talent which can be used to fill out candidate slates for higher levels of political office later. 

Bills to make school board elections partisan in Gaston, Columbus and Pitt counties, as well as the city of Asheboro, are also on the table this legislative session. Each have made it past the House and await Senate action. 

During a committee meeting discussing one of these bills, state Sen. Brad Overcash, R-Gaston, explained that voters want more information on the ballot. Right now, they just have a list of names, he said. 

Even when parties aren’t listed on the ballot, partisanship comes into play because local Democratic and Republican parties tend to make endorsements in nonpartisan races, Overcash added.

“This is a much more fair way to conduct elections because if you have multiple people from the same party running, you have an open public election process rather than an internal party process where they’re identifying who should go on what slate card,” he said. 

While the Jackson County Board of Commissioners has five Republicans, the current school board has three Democratic members and two unaffiliated members. To Woody, it’s proof that voters chose individuals, not a party, in a county that went for President Donald Trump by nine percentage points the past two election cycles. 

Odd or even?

During China Grove’s last mayoral election, 377 people voted out of a population of about 4,500 in the Rowan County town. 

In the Pitt County village of Simpson, just shy of 100 voted. 

And in Vance County’s Kittrell, a measly 26 showed up at the polls for the mayor’s race.

What do these races across North Carolina have in common? They all took place in 2023, an off year for state and federal elections when voter turnout is typically much lower. 

That’s why these small burgs, as well as Madison, Faith and all of Pamlico County’s townships, want to change that. Each asked their state representative to file a bill changing their elections from odd to even years. 

For China Grove Mayor Rodney Phillips, there was an additional motivation: to save money.

The same holds true in Kittrell, where the town clerk said the 2023 election cost $2,500 even though only a few dozen showed. 

Also, when fewer people vote, it’s easier for special interest groups to sway a result, Cooper said. But off-year elections have different patterns than on-year elections in that the issues may be more nationalized when the mayor’s race is on the same ticket as the presidential and congressional contests.

But for many, that’s worth the risk. 

This article first appeared on Carolina Public Press and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post Partisan election bills punctuate flurry of action from NC lawmakers appeared first on carolinapublicpress.org

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Centrist

The content reports on several legislative proposals in North Carolina concerning election-related changes, such as making school board races partisan and shifting municipal elections to even years. The article presents facts about the various proposed bills and their progress through the state legislature, without endorsing a specific position. It includes perspectives from both supporters and opponents of the bills, such as Republican officials advocating for more transparent elections and Democratic officials concerned about the political implications for school boards. The tone remains neutral, presenting both sides of the debate in a straightforward manner.

by Jane Winik Sartwell, Carolina Public Press
April 29, 2025

The State Health Plan is deeply in debt. To get out of the red, the 750,000 employees who receive coverage will experience something many were hoping to avoid: the first significant premium increase in nearly a decade.

It’s part of the strategy from Brad Briner, North Carolina’s treasurer, to pay off a $507 million shortfall the State Health Plan has accrued due to dramatic increases in the cost of health coverage — a deficit which is projected to grow to $1.4 billion by 2027. 

State employees will face a minimum $20 increase in monthly premiums for their health insurance starting in 2026. Those premiums could reach an additional $110 per month. Deductibles and co-pays will increase as well. 

The premium hike will affect even the lowest-paid state employees at a time when many North Carolina agencies face staffing shortages and recruitment challenges. 

It all comes after a potential problem was foreshadowed last year by former Treasurer Dale Folwell, who said the State Health Plan — which covers about 8% of North Carolina residents who have medical coverage — may be unable to stay afloat by fall 2026 due to the aforementioned rising costs in care. North Carolina ranks No. 1 in health care costs by state and has the most expensive health care in the nation, according to Forbes. 

But Briner doesn’t intend to let the State Health Plan drown in debt. 

Paying the price

Folwell’s solution was to have the General Assembly open its wallet.

However, Briner’s plan requires state employees to open theirs as well.

The base premium for state employees will rise from $25 to $45 monthly next year. Increases will reach $110 for the highest-paid employees. Deductibles will increase anywhere from $3,000 to $9,000. Co-pays will rise between $20 and $45 per visit. 

All together, it will bring $100 million back into the plan, Briner said. 

But he isn’t stopping there. He asked for another $100 million from the legislature, and lawmakers delivered in this year’s proposed Senate budget. 

“The Senate gave us everything we hoped they would give us, and we are really, really appreciative that they found the money in a year that everybody knows is really tight,” Briner told Carolina Public Press. “Their number one priority is not the State Health Plan right now. It’s not the State Pension Plan. It is rebuilding Western North Carolina, and we certainly understand that.”

The $100 million could be a boon — provided the House approves the budget and it crosses Gov. Josh Stein’s desk in one piece. 

Additionally, $25 million of it is earmarked to bring weight-loss drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro back into the plan. 

In 2023, as a cost-cutting measure, the plan stopped covering the blockbuster drugs. Now, those drugs will be covered once again for state employees who qualify.

“I tend to think about drugs — the useful ones — in one of two ways,” Briner explained. “Either they have a profound impact on a small population or they have a small impact on a profound population. It’s rare that you have a medicine that is both profound in impact and enormous in population, and (these drugs) are that.”

State Health Plan increase ‘significantly high’

But the premium increase is a disturbing development for state employees. 

Low salaries are a problem across agencies. At the NC Forest Service, for example, there are 100 vacancies, due in part to a lack of competitive pay. Now, those who chose to work for the service will face higher costs for health insurance. 

And it’s not just firefighters. Teachers, too, have been dealing with pay issues.

“We are against any increase to the premiums for public school employees because we know that this increase will take more money out of our educators’ paychecks in a state where our educators are very much underpaid,” said Tamika Walker Kelly, president of the North Carolina Association of Educators, which represents public school workers across the state. “We know that it could be one of the many things that continues to drive our educators out of a profession in a time where we are facing an educator shortage here in North Carolina.”

Recently, the North Carolina Public Service Workers Union held a statewide protest over the price hikes, which they characterized as “attacks on the State Health Plan.”

“As public workers,” union leader Charles Owens said in a statement, “we aren’t being taken care of by our lawmakers.”

While Briner frames the monthly increases as a necessary measure to save the health plan, Walker Kelly sees it as a financial burden on those who receive coverage.

“A $20 increase is significantly high, especially when we are talking about educators who have not seen a significant increase in their base pay from the state of North Carolina in quite some time,” she said. “Twenty dollars is whether or not I can put gas in my car to take myself to and from work.  

“It may seem like a relatively low number on paper, but it provides significant challenges to the economic well-being of our educators throughout the state.”

This article first appeared on Carolina Public Press and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post State Health Plan in debt, employee premiums to dramatically rise appeared first on carolinapublicpress.org

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

The content presents a critical view of premium increases impacting state employees, emphasizing the financial burden on low-paid workers like educators and public service employees. It highlights concerns from union leaders and employee representatives, which aligns with a center-left perspective focused on labor rights and social welfare. However, it also fairly presents the fiscal challenges and responses from state officials, reflecting a balanced approach without extreme partisanship. The article advocates for protecting workers’ economic well-being while acknowledging governmental budget constraints, typical of a center-left stance.

by Sarah Michels, Carolina Public Press
April 28, 2025

For the fifth time in a decade, a court has decided that the legislature cannot remove a governor’s power to appoint election board members. During a hearing last week in Wake County Superior Court, a three-judge panel ruled that a law attempting to give the governor’s elections appointment power to the state auditor would make it impossible for the chief executive to do their job as the North Carolina Constitution requires. 

Currently, county election boards are comprised of five members, with two each coming from the Democratic and Republican parties. The governor gets to appoint the chair. 

The governor also chooses all State Board of Elections members. 

Ultimately, those appointment powers can give the governor, and by extension their political party, tremendous influence on election matters. 

Since former Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper won office in 2016, Republican lawmakers have made numerous attempts to take that deciding vote away. 

Each time, they’ve fallen short. 

In this latest attempt, the Republican defendants — Senate leader Phil Berger, House Speaker Destin Hall and State Auditor Dave Boliek — said they will appeal the ruling. While the players are different this time around, the case will undoubtedly end up in the hands of the state Supreme Court. 

The state’s highest court has seen this play out before. But that was in 2017 when Democrats held the majority and narrowly struck down a separate attempt.

Eight years later, things have changed. Republicans hold a 5-2 advantage. That could make all the difference. 

Appointment power and executive ‘hopscotch’

If courts ultimately side with the legislature, North Carolina will be the first state that grants any elections power to a state auditor. 

Usually, that duty goes to a secretary of state, if anyone, but a Democrat won that office in the most recent election. 

Ann Webb, the policy director for Common Cause North Carolina, hopes courts see through the “partisanship” of legislators.

But partisanship isn’t necessarily unconstitutional, as legislative attorney Matthew Tilley noted during arguments before the Wake County court. 

In response, Wake County Superior Court Judge Lisa Hamilton said if they allowed this maneuver, there would be nothing stopping a future legislature from shifting election appointment power to another executive office, like the treasurer or agricultural commissioner, to ensure their party maintained control. 

“I’m hoping that we’re not going to hopscotch around all nine members of the Council of State until we finally land on the one that would be appropriate,” Hamilton said during the hearing. 

The court’s order reflected this concern. 

While the General Assembly is allowed to assign duties to members of the Council of State, that right stops where the governor’s constitutional duty to faithfully execute the laws begins, the court ruled. The faithful execution of the laws is not a shared duty among all Council of State members, they continued. 

Partisanship takes center stage 

The final battle is set for the NC Supreme Court. 

There, the major dynamic will be “partisan perspectives and allegiance versus constitutional principles,” Catawba College political science professor Michael Bitzer said. 

“I think the expectation is that partisanship will be a determinative factor,” he said. “Whether it’s clearly enunciated in an opinion, I think we’ll just have to wait and see.” 

Webb agrees. The state Supreme Court has shown a willingness to act in partisan ways, particularly when it comes to giving the legislature power, she said. 

“It’s going to be very interesting to watch whether the state Supreme Court is willing to overturn its own precedent or twist the interpretation of its own precedent to allow that (power shift) to happen.”

North Carolina doesn’t have a particularly powerful governor, but that position does come with some fundamental executive power, Webb continued. 

“If that gets dissolved piece by piece by the legislature, then we end up with a false pretense of an executive branch, and that’s not how it’s supposed to work and that’s not how voters assume it’s going to work,” she said. 

Legislative leaders haven’t exactly shied away from the partisan angle. 

In a statement on social media after the Wake County ruling, Hall, the House Speaker, said the Democratic-controlled State Board runs elections like its operating in “a banana republic, making up the rules as it goes.”

Pat Gannon, a spokesman for the State Board of Elections, objected to the characterization. 

“These accusations about the bipartisan-run elections in our state are unfortunate and unfounded. In accordance with state and federal law, North Carolina’s voter rolls are maintained through careful processes that protect our elections and the rights of the voters,” he said in a statement to Carolina Public Press.

If the sixth time’s not the charm, Webb hopes legislators will finally stop. Or, at least, take the Democratic route in attaining appointment power: winning gubernatorial elections.

This article first appeared on Carolina Public Press and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post Appointment power for election boards remains with NC governor appeared first on carolinapublicpress.org

Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.

Political Bias Rating: Center-Left

The content primarily reflects a Center-Left bias due to its focus on the implications of legislative actions concerning electoral processes in North Carolina, highlighting the tensions between Republican lawmakers and the Democratic governor. It emphasizes concerns about partisanship and the influence of political parties on election integrity, while featuring perspectives from advocacy groups like Common Cause, which are generally aligned with progressive values. The content presents legal arguments that defend the governor’s authority in a manner that leans towards retaining Democratic influence in election matters. Overall, the tone suggests a greater concern for maintaining checks on legislative power than for advocating any specific partisan agenda.