Carolina Journal Exclusive

Law Firm Racked Up Hotel, Airline Fees

July 02, 2009, By David N. Bass

RALEIGH — Attorney General Roy Cooper used North Carolina gas-tax revenue to reimburse Washington lawyers thousands of dollars in unnecessary hotel and airline fees, according to receipts and travel records obtained by Carolina Journal.

Previous CJ Exclusive

7.01.09 - Income Tax Hike Would Cost N.C. 2,800 Private-Sector Jobs

RALEIGH — Two new personal income tax brackets included in the N.C. House budget could “destroy” more than 2,800 private-sector jobs in the state, according to a report from Boston-based economists who analyzed the tax plan.

Headlines

7.02.09 - Perdue warns NC lawmakers at start of new year

RALEIGH — Gov. Beverly Perdue put pressure on legislative leaders Wednesday to approve a final budget for the new fiscal year as soon as possible with a tax plan that will prevent more job losses or furloughs. Perdue told reporters the Legislature’s two-week stopgap spending measure she signed into law Tuesday still prevents state government from realizing several million dollars in expected tax increases and cost savings every day.


Related NC Budget and Tax Articles:
Perdue to lawmakers: Pass budget now
Perdue: Indecision costs $5 million a day
JLF: Can-do budget offers alternative to tax hikes
NC lawmakers agree to stopgap spending plan
Budget awaits deal over which taxes to raise
Home builders may get tax help

7.02.09 - Senate panel endorses deferring property taxes

DURHAM — A bill that would cost local governments around the state an estimated $37 million to $45 million in deferred property taxes early next decade picked up an endorsement Wednesday from the N.C. Senate’s Finance Committee. The committee’s support, offered in a voice vote, clears the way for the full Senate to pass the bill on Wednesday. The same version has already passed the state House.


Related Local Government Articles:
Legislator questions Durham diversity provision
Greensboro boards lack diversity
Local jobless rate climbs after a brief reprieve
Charlotte overcharged business license fees
Savings from Guilford layoffs smaller than expected
JLF: What government costs cities and counties
No. 935: Bureaucrats’ Survival Tips

7.02.09 - Local governments opposed to ‘open government unit’

RALEIGH — City and county lobbyists argued Wednesday that a proposal to create a new state office to handle open government disputes and a change in how legal fees are awarded could delay further the release of documents. The “Open Government Unit” with the Department of Justice would issue advisory opinions about public records questions and attempt to work out public records and open meeting issues without going to court.


Related Open Government Articles:
Bill to ease rule on legal notices
NC panel would award legal fees in records cases
CMS board to tape closed meetings
Charlotte mayor proposes recording closed meetings
Openness? Bill parses who pays
N.C. government transparency site launched

7.02.09 - Apple may be headed to Maiden

CHARLOTTE — County officials are keeping quiet, but signs are starting to point to the Catawba County town of Maiden as the site of Apple’s new $1 billion data center. It would make sense: Catawba County’s economic development office announced this week that town and county officials will hold a joint meeting Monday for an “announcement.”


Related Economic Incentives Articles:
Incentives offered to Fletcher company
State conceals much about Apple
Documents show Apple’s tax-break quest
Joines to return Prim’s donation
Tax credits for movies pushed
Film incentives bill still moving through N.C. Senate

7.02.09 - Law targets mental hospitals

RALEIGH — A new state law will give the public a glimpse behind the curtain at state psychiatric hospitals and other mental health facilities when a patient dies. The legislature gave final approval Wednesday to a bill that will require state mental health, developmental disability and substance abuse facilities to publicly report the deaths of patients in their care.


Related Social Services Articles:
Jones: I’ll take blame for DSS accounting failures
Mental hospitals may lose schools
Program helps former foster kids go on to college
JLF: Jail diversion programs effective
Options explored for helping mentally ill
Will energy efficiency waste taxpayer dollars?

7.02.09 - Bill lets sizable medical malpractice awards be made public

RALEIGH — Consumers will soon be able to know whether their doctors have paid medical malpractice awards under a bill approved this week by state lawmakers. The bill, which must now be signed into law by Gov. Bev Perdue, allows the N.C. Medical Board to publicly post medical malpractice awards of $75,000 or more on its Web page.


Related Health Care Policy Articles:
JLF: Repeal Certificate of Need laws
Law takes aim at ambulance fraud
N.C. is among top 5 in rabies
Guilford heart patient who died had H1N1 flu
State probing tots’ exposure to flu
Eligibility requirements for in-house care may change
Counties Burdened by Medicaid

7.02.09 - Easley's appeal may be doomed

RALELGH — N.C. State University is highly unlikely to negotiate a settlement with former first lady Mary Easley, who earlier this week indicated she will appeal her firing, the university's new leader said Wednesday. NCSU does not have the money to pay any settlement, Interim Chancellor James Woodward said in a meeting with editors and reporters at The News & Observer. He added that he stands behind his decision to eliminate Easley’s position.


Related Higher Education Articles:
UNCP chancellor search may take months
Scandal spooks NCSU donors
Mary Easley to fight termination
Easley will appeal firing by NCSU
Greensboro College fending off creditors
UNC tuition exemption returns to budget spotlight
No. 938: Skills College Grads Really Need

7.02.09 - Charlotte became 18th-largest city in 2008

CHARLOTTE — The city of Charlotte was the nation’s 23rd fastest-growing city for the year ending in July 2008, and is now the county’s 18th-largest city, according to Census estimates released Wednesday. For bragging rights, Charlotte has passed Memphis, Tenn., in population. The Queen City has 687,456 people – up from 570,091 at the start of the decade.


Related NC Economy Articles:
Charlotte home prices down 10% from 2008
Wilmington population estimated to top 100,000
Areas outside Buncombe municipalities growing faster
Local jobless rate climbs after a brief reprieve
Economy is on the mend, but recovery a ways off
Amazon ends its commissions in N.C.

7.02.09 - Possible Cuts: HAWS preparing to reduce vouchers

WINSTON-SALEM — Officials with the Housing Authority of Winston-Salem are working with the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development to avoid drastic cuts in services to make up for a nearly $2.8 million shortfall. Because of a drop in financing from HUD, HAWS may have to cut as many as 1,800 people from its Section 8 housing voucher program starting in October and cut the amount of all remaining vouchers by 10 percent starting in September.


Related Federal Government Articles:
Asheville alters stimulus request
Private stimulus monitoring site outperforms federal version
House backs Lumbee recognition
House may vote today on Lumbee recognition
Eastern Band asks for $18M in stimulus
Stimulus money to help spruce up parkway

7.02.09 - Sewer Monster found in Raleigh

RALEIGH — It looks like blob of wriggling pudding staring out through a single, puckered eye. You can see it caught on camera, clinging to the concrete pipes below Raleigh’s Cameron Village: the Sewer Monster. It’s really a colony of prehistoric creatures known either as bryozoans or moss animacules, thousands of wormlike animals, biologists report.


Related Water & Sewer Articles:
‘Smart’ meter could save Cary water, money
Rainfall levels good, but that could be erased
Feds: No proof Lejeune was root of diseases
Jordan Lake cleanup bill sails through Senate
Mecklenburg adopts new stormwater rate system
Durham water/sewer stimulus bid climate arid

John Hood’s
Daily Journal

7.02.09
Tomorrow Is Yesterday

The proposed “high-speed” rail service would be a technological step backward and have negligible effects on energy use, carbon emissions, and air quality.

Other Opinions

7.02.09
Follow the money

The special-interest groups that fund state legislators’ campaigns have plenty at stake in the budget. Only public scrutiny assures honest decisions says the Greensboro News & Record.


7.02.09
Sex education

The Wilmington Star-News says that the Honorables in Raleigh have finally restored common sense to sex education in North Carolina.


7.02.09
Because they can

Rob Christensen writes that politicians are more likely to stray as they tend to be attractive, outgoing, interesting, persistent, and have huge egos.


7.01.09
Hanging on

After all the collateral damage inflicted in the firefight over Mary Easley’s cushy job, you’d think she’d want to walk away from it all as fast as she could writes the Fayetteville Observer.


7.01.09
Leniency for Black?

The Winston-Salem Journal says that Jim Black holds the keys to his release or his possible transfer in his own hands. He need only cooperate with prosecutors.


6.29.09
Bettering Our State By Thinking Institutionally
This is an especially demoralizing time. It seems that everywhere around me people are exploiting public trust for private gain.

Media Mangle

5.19.09
Sleeping with the enemy

The Carrboro Citizen is making a devil's bargain by seeking a loan from the town government.


5.15.09
Simply irresponsible

In an attempt to foster popular support for a mortgage bailout program, a news account fails to ask some key questions of a foreclosure "victim."


4.17.09
Defining journalism down

As a recent CNN report on the Tea Party movement shows, the rules of journalism have changed in the past 30 years, and not for the better.


Week in Review

Upcoming Events

Monday, July 06, 2009 at 12:00 PM, Noon
A meeting of the Shaftesbury Society
with our special guest Hal Young

Good Walls Make Good Neighbors: N.C.'s Unique Law for Non-Public Schools

Monday, August 03, 2009 at August 3-August 7
Appalachian Institution Retreat
with our special guest Dr. Michael A. Gillespie

"The Noble, The Good and The Free"

Monday, August 24, 2009 at August 24-August 28
Appalachian Institution Retreat
with our special guest Dr. Michael Zuckert

"What the Founders Thought"




The Locker Room ~ John Locke Foundation's Statewide Issues Blog
Selling The Dream
Investor Ploitics
Locke, Jefferson, and the Justices
Equal Rights for All
Free Choice for Workers, A History of the Right to Work Movement
Jesse Helms - Here's Where I Stand