Opinion Roundup: N.C. politics heat up, armed guards in school, opioid addiction solutions and more

Saturday, March 31, 2018 -- A round up of opinion, commentary and analysis on: House Bill 2 lingers in election year, Republicans push for Ken Fontenot, Henderson County wants armed forces at school, solutions to opioid addiction and more.

GARY ROBERTSON: House Bill 2 saga lingers in election year (AP news analysis) -- North Carolina is again an attractive location for big out-of-state corporations. The state no longer sits squarely in the crosshairs of culture wars over transgender rights. College basketball tournament games are back, after a one-year hiatus. But the saga of House Bill 2 hasn't been forgotten, and many Republican incumbents who passed it in 2016 are being targeted this election year, with the flap over the law still an issue.

COREY FRIEDMAN: N.C. GOP bankrolling effort to get Fontenot on ballot (Wilson Times reports) -- Republicans are stepping up their support for independent state House hopeful Ken Fontenot as he inches closer to a November showdown one signature at a time. The N.C. Republican Party distributed a mailer to 6,000 Wilson County homes this week and state Rep. Susan Martin, R-Wilson, has recorded a robocall urging voters to sign Fontenot’s ballot access petition. He says he’s collected 1,400 of the 2,000 signatures needed.

TRAVIS FAIN & LAURA LESLIE: Sources, records show Cambridge Analytica employees in NC (WRAL-TV reports) -- "If anything improper was done by the vendor Cambridge Analytica during the course of the election, it was done without the campaign's knowledge or consent," Tillis campaign says.

TYLER DUKES: Media groups ask judge not to seal records in Harnett sheriff lawsuit (WRAL-TV reports) --Five North Carolina media companies told a federal court this week that they oppose a move to keep records secret in a lawsuit against the Harnett County Sheriff's Office over excessive use of force.

Good reasons for consumer protections (Winston-Salem Journal) -- Getting government off your back sounds good, unless it means that government no longer has your back.

CAMMIE BELLAMY: Rep. Rouzer ducks public appearance, students plan Wilmington town hall on gun violence (Wilmington Star-News reports) -- Rep. David Rouzer, R-N.C., will not attend, invites students to meet him privately.

Drywall plant will bring needed jobs to area (Wilmington Star-News) -- Wilmington and New Hanover County leaders are set to vote early next week on financial incentives for National Gypsum, the Charlotte-based company seeking to reopen its idled drywall plant near the port. The city and county are considering a joint incentives package totaling about $600,000 over five years for the manufacturer of Gold Bond gypsum board.

MORIAH BALINGIT: It just hurts my heart’: Low pay, big classes are the plight of Oklahoma teachers (Washington Post analysis) -- Educators in Oklahoma — among the nation’s lowest paid — also work as grocery clerks, Uber drivers and restaurant servers to pay their bills. Now at a breaking point and inspired by West Virginia educators, teachers in about 140 school districts plan to walk off the job.

BRIAN WUDKWYCH: Pitt making 'halting progress' toward improving children's health, education (Greenville Daily Reflector reports) -- A new county report card shows troubling trends for child poverty and hunger, but Pitt County officials said they are working hard to combat the issues. N.C. Child, a statewide nonprofit advocacy organization, released its annual report card this week and outlined county results in 15 areas of well-being, from prenatal care to graduation rates and everything in between.

ALEXANDERIA BORDAS: Henderson County aims to be first in N.C. to have armed forces at schools (Asheville Citizen-Times reports) -- As school children in Henderson County spill out onto playgrounds, line up in hallways and meet for activities, they could soon be mingling with armed guards dressed in plain clothes. Sheriff Charles McDonald hopes to make sure that’s true in all 23 public schools in Henderson by next school year in what could be a first in North Carolina.

CULLEN BROWDER: Doctors question limits on opioid addiction treatments (WRAL-TV reports) -- For those on Medicaid, there are basically two choices to control the withdrawal symptoms that come with opioid addiction.

MIKAYA THURMOND: Nash jail gives inmates with history of addiction help before release to keep them off opioids (WRAL-TV reports) -- Nash County authorities are providing opioid-blocking injections to county jail inmates with a history of using heroin or other opioids before they are released to curb their appetite for drugs out on the street.

VALERIE BAUERLEIN & KATE KING: New York City’s Sewage Shipment Runs Afoul in Rural South (Wall Street Journal analysis) -- New York City is halting its yearlong practice of sending trainloads of treated human waste to Alabama, after weeks of legal challenges and complaints about a “death smell” coming from the containers.

ADAM WAGNER: Sutton’s coal ash exceeded groundwater standards hundreds of times (Wilmington Star-News reports) -- A pair of coal ash basins at Duke Energy’s Sutton Steam Plant site leached toxic metals into groundwater at levels above state standards on hundreds of occasions between June 2016 and September 2017, according to a StarNews analysis of 2,400 pages of data reported by the energy giant. More than 550 samples were taken from sites ringing the ash basins off U.S. 421, finding that groundwater standards had been exceeded 930 times, including 276 times by boron and 229 times by arsenic.

LENA TILLETT: Triangle woman called trailblazer in global biostatistics, Durham jazz scene (WRAL-TV reports) -- Dr. Cicely Mitchell may be known as a trailblazer for women of color in the field of biostatistics, but her contribution to the local community also extends into art and music.