Four bills become law without Cooper's signature
Gov. Roy Cooper didn't take any action on four pieces of legislation by Sunday night, meaning all four became laws Monday without his signature.
Posted — Updated
The governor normally has 10 days to act on bills that pass the legislature, but once lawmakers adjourn, as they did on June 30, he has 30 days to sign or veto a measure. Those 30 days ended Sunday night.
Following are the four bills that remained on Cooper's desk when the deadline passed and:
- House Bill 527 calls for the University of North Carolina system to adopt a free-speech policy that includes disciplinary sanctions for anyone who "substantially disrupts the functioning of the constituent institution or substantially interferes with the protected free expression rights of others."
"The legislature should trust its university leaders on how best to do this rather than dictate the terms," Cooper spokesman Ford Porter said in an email to WRAL News.
- House Bill 528 is 19 pages of "technical corrections" to the state budget.
"While the budget technical bill contains some needed fixes, it also continues the wrongheaded approach to state budgeting by delivering major policy changes under the guise of budgeting and without discussion or review," Porter said.
- House Bill 704 would create a committee to study optimal sizes for school districts. Opponents decried an earlier attempt to split up larger districts, so the bill was scaled back to a study of the issue.
"HB704 forecasts a troubling undoing of communities’ difficult decisions regarding public schools. Rather than focusing on how to improve education, this study threatens to undo merged districts and lead to more schools separated by race and income," Porter said.
- House Bill 719 calls for shifting some state workers from the parking garage under the legislative complex to another parking deck to free up spaces for legislative staff for improved security.
"The bill was a power play, plain and simple," Porter said.
Related Topics
• Credits
Copyright 2024 by Capitol Broadcasting Company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
