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Top Story
Budget
talks reach an impasse
as House Republicans join hands
to oppose tax increases of any kind
 House
Republicans this week closed ranks against any tax increase
– even an extra half-penny local option sales tax – a
development that forced budget conferees to contemplate
additional deep cuts in state spending in order to achieve a
balanced budget. House and Senate co-chairs of the
budget conference committee – all Democrats -- on Thursday
said balancing the two-year budget
with no new taxes will requires more
deep spending cuts in a wide range of programs. Republican legislative leaders
said the Democrats were using scare
tactics in an attempt to build support for tax increases. Read
that story.
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Moody’s
signals it’s ready to lower state’s credit rating
Moody’s
Investors Service revised its outlook for
North Carolina bonds from stable to negative, saying it’s seriously concerned about
“reductions in the level of state reserves, a decline in the
state’s audited GAAP year-end fund balances, and the
slowness to restore long-term structural budget balance.” It’s widely expected that, unless the legislature
takes some significant steps toward increasing state revenues,
Moody’s will strip the state of its cherished Triple-A
credit rating. Read that story.
Read the full text of the
Moody’s letter.
State
Controller releases year-end budget numbers
Everyone
knew state revenues for the year ended June 30 would be way
below projections, but exactly how much has been a guessing
game. But the guessing ended this week when the state
Controller’s Office issued a preliminary (but usually
accurate) accounting for the month of June, the final month of
the fiscal year. Gov. Mike Easley recently put the revenue shortfall at $840
million, but the Controller’s Office says revenues were
$608.3 million below target, an improvement that mostly can be
attributed to a $178 million windfall in individual income
taxes in June. Read
that story, see the complete chart.
Legislative News
Election reform
bills receive final approval The
General Assembly completed work on five election
reform bills, including an omnibus measure that lengthens the
one-stop non excuse early voting period.
Another bill received final approval that bans the use of
butterfly and punchcard ballots in the six counties that
continue using them. Read
that and other stories on legislative issues.
Get
caught up with a week's worth of committee actions and floor
votes, as well as new laws on the books.
Special
Report
Crunching
the numbers on a decade of growth
Each
year the N.C. Employment Security Commission releases an
inch-thick document full of statistics about practically every
aspect of jobs and wages in the state. It takes the agency
more than a year to compile the statistics, so the most recent
report covers the 1999 year. This year’s report, then, for
the first time provides a rare look at how North Carolina grew
and changed during the decade of the ‘90s. We’ve sorted
through the report and culled out these charts to give you a
glimpse into what the numbers mean. Story,
charts.
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