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Yahoo
09-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
NC's new governor: Why Stein and other top leaders may have fewer chances to talk to each other
Greetings and welcome to the governor edition of our Under the Dome newsletter. I'm Dawn Vaughan, The News & Observer's Capitol bureau chief. Democratic Gov. Josh Stein ran his first Council of State meeting on Tuesday, shifting two chairs up to the head of the conference table in the Department of Transportation Building, where the group of 10 statewide elected officials gather monthly. Or at least they have been, while Stein was attorney general. Now that he's governor, Stein is moving Council of State meetings to only six times per year instead of the usual monthly 12 meetings. I attended Tuesday's meeting, where new Labor Commissioner Luke Farley objected to the change. Former Gov. Roy Cooper tended to cancel a few meetings a year, but six is still much less than the previous administration. I asked Stein after the meeting about Farley's request, and Stein said he would talk to him about it. We'll see if the meetings resume. Top elected officials in North Carolina, unlike some states, meet as a Council of State to make some decisions, including those involving state property. On Tuesday, State Auditor Dave Boliek questioned one of the property matters, about payments to Raleigh-Durham International Airport by the Department of Transportation. He said the documents about it on the agenda weren't clear, and he didn't want to vote for it. After a DOT staffer explained more about it, giving a clearer explanation of why a payment was backdated, Boliek gave his support. 'Let me say I appreciate the information, but I do have to say that the way this was written up is really convoluted. And it ought to be written so at least an average lawyer can understand it,' he said. After being satisfied with his answer, Boliek and Stein had a brief exchange about ensuring clarity on the agenda items going forward. The meetings aren't just about property matters, as they end with a roundtable of updates, which for me as a reporter is often where the news is. It is a chance for each of them to briefly update each other, and the public, about what they are doing. All of their salaries, and billions of dollars spent by the state agencies they run, are funded by taxpayers. When it was Insurance Commissioner Mike Causey's turn to speak, he said what those who were in the room for the former State Treasurer Dale Folwell era were already thinking: Now Boliek is the councilor who asks all the questions, as did Folwell before. Farley's move, too, is reminiscent of Folwell. It was Folwell who objected, on several occasions, to remote Council of State meetings during the coronavirus pandemic, which Cooper continued even after other government groups returned to in-person meetings. Folwell, a Republican, also began airing the meetings on Facebook Live, making him arguably the most transparent elected official in the state, because he was the only one doing it. Folwell once received the Open Government Coalition's Sunshine Award for his work to make government more transparent. Council of State members' votes are needed on some major decisions made by the governor, which was a stress point during Cooper's handling of COVID-19. Three members of the Council of State kept their seats: Causey, Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler and Secretary of State Elaine Marshall. The new members are Farley, Boliek, Superintendent of Public Instruction Mo Green, Lt. Gov. Rachel Hunt, Attorney General Jeff Jackson and Treasurer Brad Briner. Hunt previously served in the state House and Senate, and Jackson also served in the state Senate, as well as one term in Congress. The Junior League of Raleigh, which hosts the Inaugural Ball, canceled it in January because of the weather. The Junior League and Empire Eats donated food to several local schools, a Junior League spokesperson said, including 10 elementary, middle and high schools. The Junior League rescheduled two inaugural events for April, and tickets are still available to purchase. Details: ▪ A cocktail reception for the 10 statewide elected officials on the Council of State will be held at 6:30 p.m. April 4 at the N.C. Museum of Natural Sciences. Tickets cost $175 and include beer, wine and heavy hors d'oeuvres. ▪ The Inaugural Ball for Stein will be held from 9 p.m. to midnight April 5 at Marbles Kids Museum. It is black tie and includes dancing, food and beer and wine. Tickets cost $250. Coming up Monday on our Under the Dome podcast, I'm joined by our Washington correspondent Danielle Battaglia, and we talk about the firehose of news from the new Trump administration, the Raleigh protest that focused on Elon Musk, the latest on the airliner and Black Hawk helicopter crash in Washington, and other news. You can sign up to receive the Under the Dome newsletter at
Yahoo
31-01-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Group organizing Idaho abortion-rights initiative files lawsuit over ballot language
The Idaho Supreme Court building in downtown Boise. (Courtesy of the Idaho Supreme Court) The group organizing a 2026 ballot initiative to restore abortion rights in Idaho is asking the state Supreme Court to order the attorney general and other state agencies to fix language it says is biased and misleading about what the initiative will do and how much it will cost taxpayers. Idahoans United for Women and Families filed the lawsuit Thursday night. Idaho has a citizen ballot initiative process, but only its Legislature can propose constitutional amendments, unlike many other states. So instead of a constitutional amendment, the voters are asked to approve a citizen-crafted piece of legislation to be adopted. The measure requires a simple majority of voters to pass. As part of the initiative process, the Idaho Attorney General's Office is responsible for drafting short and long ballot titles that summarize what the legislation would do if passed. Idaho law states that the language must describe the proposal accurately and use common language without phrasing that is likely to prejudice voters. Idahoans United announced it would pursue the initiative in April 2024, and filed four proposed policies for approval in August. After that, the group moved forward with one proposed policy that would establish a fundamental right to contraception and fertility treatments under Idaho law, including in vitro fertilization, to make decisions about pregnancy and childbirth, and legalizing abortion before fetal viability, as well as preserving the right to abortion after viability in medical emergencies. Fetal viability would be determined by a physician and what treatment is available, but the commonly accepted gestational age of viability in the medical community is 23 to 24 weeks. In the lawsuit, the group contends that the short ballot title includes the term 'fetus viability,' which is not the medical phrase, and conflicts with the term fetal viability being used in the long title. Melanie Folwell, Idahoans United's spokesperson, said the short title also left out that the law would provide for abortions in medical emergencies after viability. The bigger issue, Folwell said, is with the fiscal impact statement, which is required to be drafted by the Idaho Division of Financial Management, to determine if the new law would cost taxpayer dollars. As written, the statement says the laws affected by the initiative would not impact income, sales or product taxes and have no effect on the general fund. But it goes on to say it could change state expenditures in minor ways. 'Costs associated with the Medicaid and prisoner populations may occur,' it says, citing Idaho Code. 'Passage of this initiative is likely to cost less than $20,000 per year. The Medicaid budget for providing services was about $850 million in FY2024. If passed, nominal costs in the context of the affected total budget are insignificant to the state.' Dan Estes, spokesperson for Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador's office, said they had no comment, citing pending litigation. Reclaim Idaho, a group that pursued an initiative to change Idaho's primary and general election system in 2023, sued over similar issues with their ballot language and ultimately prevailed. The complaint filed in Idaho Supreme Court calls the statement biased and says it includes contradictory language, 'wrongly implies' that Medicaid and corrections spending would increase, and 'prejudicially includes an irrelevant reference to the state's $850 Medicaid budget.' The statement in compliance with Idaho Code, the complaint says, should read that there is no financial impact to state or local governments. The lawsuit includes public records that Folwell requested and received showing email exchanges between Juliet Charron, deputy director of Medicaid and Behavioral Health at the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, and Greg Piepmeyer, chief economist at the Idaho Division of Financial Management, as well as Lori Wolff, chief administrator at DFM. Wolff is named as a defendant in her capacity as administrator. States Newsroom has reached out to Charron, Piepmeyer and Wolff's office for comment. The emails indicate there would be no impact to the general fund, but one email from Piepmeyer details the possible effects for the female prison population, including the 'rate of pregnancy occurring due to events within prison, and the rate at which each of these is already ascribed to rape or incest.' 'None of these are ones into which DFM ought to wade,' Piepmeyer's email said. 'Similar considerations apply to the Medicaid population, but with (probably reasonably) different rates.' The lawsuit includes a motion to expedite, with a request that a final ruling be issued by the Idaho Supreme Court by April 15. The group has to gather at least 70,725 signatures by April 30, 2026, to qualify for the ballot. The Idaho Supreme Court will determine whether to hear the case in the coming days. If so, and if the motion to expedite is granted, an initial hearing would likely take place within the next month, Folwell said. 1-30-25 Declaration of Melanie Folwell 1-30-25 Verified Petition for Writs of Certiorari & Mandamus SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
