Latest news with #HouseBill306
Yahoo
01-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
NC lawmakers file bills to make it easier to build and manage workforce housing
This workforce housing development in Bertie County opened last summer. Dream Point can house as many as 40 people. (Photo: Bertie County Schools) Two bills filed in the North Carolina House in recent days would make it easier for local governments and developers to build, manage and maintain workforce housing. House Bill 306 would authorize Blowing Rock, Boone, Watauga County and the Watauga County Board of Education to construct and provide affordable employee housing on property owned by the governmental units. The bill comes as western North Carolina struggles to rebuild in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, which devastated the region a little more than six months ago. Approximately 73,700 homes in the region suffered damage and more than 8,800 homes had major damage or were destroyed. The price tag for housing assistance has been estimated at $15.4 billion. HB 306 was filed by Rep. Ray Pickett, a Blowing Rock Republican but has bipartisan support. Reps. Vernetta Alston and Zack Hawkins, both Durham Democrats, are among the bill's cosponsors. Alston filed a bill last year to build allow workforce housing to be built in Durham. The bill never got off the ground. Several previous attempts to get legislation passed to build workforce housing in Durham also failed to win support from Republican leader who control the General Assembly. Under HB 306, the governmental units may provide workforce housing separately or through a partnership, joint venture, land trust or similar entity. It also authorizes them to contract to finance, construct or maintain affordable housing for local government employees and to rent or sell affordable housing for residential use exclusively to local government unit employees. Local governments may 'charge below-market rates, offer below-market financing, and place reasonable restrictions and buyback provisions on the resale of housing units,' the bill states. Workforce housing already exists in North Carolina and has been used by some counties to attract and retain teachers, particularly to rural regions where lower tax bases make it difficult to pay competitive local salary supplements. Local supplements are paid from local funds. It's money teachers receive on top of state pay. Wealthier counties such as Durham, Orange and Wake can pay higher supplements. Low wealth counties see workforce housing as a way to attract and retain teachers. Less than a year ago, Bertie County, one of the state's low-wealth counties, opened a 24-unit, two-bedroom apartment complex it built to provide housing for as many as 40 teachers 'Rural communities like Bertie [County] often lose out attracting viable candidates to urban areas where there is shopping, great restaurants, entertainment and other amenities,' BCS Superintendent Otis Smallwood told Newsline last year. 'In addition, Bertie County…is not able to pay teachers large local supplements like larger districts. Layer all of that with inadequate housing and you have a recipe for not being able to attract enough talent to educate the youth in our community. In many instances, we have to rely on recruiting international teachers.' North Carolina already has several affordable housing projects for teachers. Duke TeachHouse in Durham, for example, is a living and learning community for early career teachers and graduates of Duke University's teacher preparation programs. Others include Williams Baldwin Court in Asheville for teachers who work for Buncombe County Schools and Asheville City Schools, and Hertford Pointe in Ahoskie for Hertford County Schools' teachers. The Dare County Education Foundation offers 24 housing units in Kill Devil Hills and 12 units in Hatteras for teachers employed by Dare County Schools. Another bill introduced in the House on Monday would create a revolving loan fund in the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency to provide short-term financing to support preconstruction costs of workforce housing projects. House Bill 603 was filed by Democratic Leader Robert Reives. It would create the Workforce Housing Preconstruction Revolving Loan Program to make loans available to developers before they obtain permanent, private financing. Eligible uses for loans would include land surveys, environmental due diligence and soil testing, utility connections, planning and permit fees and site clearing and grading. Loans would be capped at $1 million. Under HB 603, 80% of projects would be reserved for counties designated as development Tier 1 and Tier 2 areas. Counties with those designations are among the state's most economically distressed. The remaining 20% would be reserved for projects in, wealthier Tier 3 areas.
Yahoo
21-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Idaho legislators address ‘monetization of politics' in new campaign finance bills
Idaho House Speaker Mike Moyle, R-Star, answers a reporter's question during a press conference on Jan. 6, 2025, at the Statehouse in Boise. (Pat Sutphin for the Idaho Capital Sun) Republican House leadership introduced four bills on Friday to address the influx of out-of-state spending involved in Idaho elections. A total of $17 million was spent on campaign and independent expenditures on 2024 legislative races. More than $9.3 million of that money was spent on materials to oppose or support candidates, according to an official website managed by the Idaho Secretary of State. 'We've never seen that before, so it's our intention to do a little bit better job of identifying who's sending that money in here, where that money's coming from and what it's getting spent on,' House Speaker Mike Moyle, R-Star, said about the legislation. 'The voters deserve to know that.' Moyle, alongside House State Affairs Committee Chairman Brent Crane, R-Nampa, introduced four bills to the committee, including: House Bill 306, which would establish 'criminal libel,' is a bill to make it a felony for someone to publish false statements about another person, establishing a maximum $100,000 fine, imprisonment for at most five years, or both. House Bill 307 is a bill to allow the Idaho Secretary of State Office to investigate false claims against a candidate and publish its findings on its website. House Bill 308 is a bill to require electioneering communications costing more than $1,000 to be reported within 24 hours closer to primary and general elections, and require political committees to upload materials they make about a candidate or campaign to the Idaho Secretary of website. House Bill 309 is a bill which would require lobbyists to disclose expenses on a weekly basis during the legislative session and a monthly basis outside of session. The legislation has support from Idaho Secretary of State Phil McGrane, who said in a press conference before the committee meeting began that Idahoans have a right to know who is trying to influence their opinions during elections and who is trying to influence lawmakers. 'You can see it playing out in this session where there's a lot of pressure,' McGrane said. 'If you go to the speaker of the pro tem's office, they've got stacks of postcards from some of these organizations putting pressure on the process, and so adding transparency and disclosure is a key part of this effort.' Crane said the legislation addresses what he considers 'monetization of politics,' or wealthy groups outside of Idaho getting involved in the state's politics. Out-of-state campaign spending responsible for many of Idaho's negative campaign ads 'I'm extremely concerned,' Crane told the committee. 'In fact, I'm angry about the out-of-state money that is being spent to influence the outcome of elections in Idaho. If I had a magic wand and I could do what I wanted to do, it would be only Idaho dollars spent on Idaho elections.' In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruled campaign contributions are protected free speech, thus allowing corporations and unions to spend unlimited money on political campaigns. The legislation introduced on Friday is meant to enhance campaign finance transparency, Crane said. 'We just want to let you know that we take it seriously when out of state money is being spent, especially dark money out of state,' Crane said. During the 2024 primary election, the political committee that spent the most to oppose Idaho legislative candidates was the Make Liberty Win PAC, based in Virginia. The committee spent $716,000 to support and oppose Idaho candidates in 2024. Moyle was one of the candidates the PAC attacked the most, with $112,000 spent against him during the primary, IdahoEd News reported. The political committee sent mailers across his district falsely labeling him as 'anti-gun,' KTVB reported. The committee voted to advance the bills for a full hearing at a later date. Crane said he would give the legislation a few weeks to circulate among legislators until then. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
