RALEIGH, N.C. — Good morning and welcome to Today @NCCapitol for Thursday, June 6. This is WRAL's roundup of what you need to know about North Carolina state government today.
TAXES: House Republicans seem to have settled a dispute over tax reform that blew up publicly Wednesday morning.
The Howard amendment would have lifted at $25,000 cap on deductions for taxpayers, allowing the wealthy full credit for mortgage interest income, charitable contributions and local property taxes. Lifting the cap would have cost the state some $528 million in revenue, money that would have had to have been cut from the budget.
Howard said she was, among other things, trying to protect the home building industry that would be hurt by the loss of the mortgage interest deduction.
Her objections temporarily derailed the bill.
House Republicans met Wednesday afternoon in a closed door meeting to settle the dispute. The Associated Press reports they have decided to go back to a version of the bill without the Howard amendment.
"It was a caucus decision," he said. "We decided to move toward the common goal of providing tax relief for all North Carolinians," Jordan Shaw, a spokesman for House Speaker Thom Tillis, told the AP.
BUDGET: House lawmakers plan to be in town on Friday, which is usually a day off on Jones Street. On the floor, leaders say they'll move some Senate bills in a bid to clear their calendars for the end of the session. In the morning, they plan for House budget subcommittees to work on a new budget proposal that will be heard in the full Appropriations Committee and on the floor next week.
HOUSE AND SENATE SESSIONS TODAY: Both the state House and Senate are scheduled to meet for floor sessions at noon. The House once again has a bill that would redraw Wake County's school board districts on the agenda. Lawmakers have put off consideration of the measure for two days now.
WRAL.com will carry the House floor session live at noon. Check the Video Central box on the home page.
MCCRORY: Gov. Pat McCrory will speak the state Board of Transportation at 9 a.m. Later in the day, he will make an economic development announcement in Greensboro.
COMMITTEES: For a complete listing of legislative committees, please see the main @NCCapitol page. Among the highlights:
House Environment (10 a.m. | 544 LOB): The committee will take up a bill designed to move the state toward allowing hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.
The rewrite of Senate Bill 76 unveiled in House Commerce Wednesday takes a more cautious approach, restoring several consumer protection requirements the Senate sought to repeal. Most notably, the House version restores the requirement of lawmaker approval before any fracking can begin.
Today's committee meeting is the second review for that go-slow bill.
WRAL.com will carry the session live. Check the Video Central box on our home page.
Senate Judiciary II (10 a.m. | 1224 LB): The committee will take up bills related to bail bondsmen carrying official credentials and bail bonding procedures.
STORIES: Stories we were following Wednesday included:
REDISTRICTING: A three-judge panel seeking information about the role of race in drawing North Carolina's congressional and legislative maps concluded a two-day trial Wednesday after listening to testimony from redistricting experts, including the consultant who helped draw the current Republican boundaries.
