News & Views

Rev. Suzanne Parker Miller (Courtesy photo)

North Carolina’s long running Leandro school funding case is headed back before the state Supreme Court this week and Newsline discusses why this has supporters of our public schools deeply concerned with the head of the group Pastors for North Carolina Children, the Rev. Suzanne Parker Miller.

Common Cause NC Sailor Jones (Backdrop Photo: Getty Images)

The state’s March 5th primary election is right around the corner. Early in-person voting starts this Thursday and it’s already possible to obtain a ballot to vote by mail. Unfortunately, as we’ve discussed previously on News & Views, this year’s election will be accompanied by a raft of new laws that state legislators have recently enacted to make voting a bit more tricky if you haven’t been paying attention to the news.

All that said, the election is on and voters have to make the best of the new rules and fortunately some smart advocates are doing their best to educate and motivate voters. And recently NC Newsline caught up with one of our state’s best, Common Cause of North Carolina associate director, Sailor Jones.

Meredith College political scientist and pollster David McLennan (File photo)

Meredith College pollster Professor David McLennan on what voters are thinking (and in many cases not thinking) about the March 5th primary, as well as some other important issues that confront our state and nation. Read the full results from the latest Meredith College poll here.

Public Ed Works executive director David Rice

No other function of state government in North Carolina consumes a larger share of the state budget or more attention from state leaders than K-12 and higher education. Unfortunately, in recent years, those appropriations have steadily withered even as the attention lawmakers devote to our schools and universities has related more and more to the micromanagement of hiring and curriculum decisions and enforcing an ideological agenda than giving educators the funding and support they need.

One expert who keeps tabs on these trends and frequently critiques the performance of state legislators when it comes to public and higher education is the executive director of the nonprofit research and advocacy group Public Ed Works, David Rice. And recently Rice was kind enough to join Newsline to review some of the top education issues currently facing the state.

Congresswoman Deborah Ross (Courtesy photo)

North Carolina Second District Congresswoman Deborah Ross joins NC Newsline to discuss her new redistricting reform proposal, and several other timely issues, including immigration, artificial intelligence, and the prospects for reviving an enormously successful anti-poverty tax credit.

States Newsroom reporter Ariana Figueroa

Read Figueroa’s latest piece on the sweeping bipartisan immigration legislation :

Rep. Kathy Manning (Photo: House.gov)

In a  special two-part conversation with North Carolina Congresswoman Kathy Manning we discuss the threats to reproductive freedom in modern America and some of the other key issues on the front-burner in Washington.

Durham Tech President JB Buxton (Photo: DTCC)

Thanks to a new $29.5 million grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies, Durham Public Schools are partnering with Durham Tech Community College to start a new high school program for students interested in pursuing healthcare careers after graduation. The program will enable students to attend an early college in which they’ll be prepared upon graduation to enter any number of several high-demand healthcare careers. Earlier this week, NC Newsline sat down with the President of Durham Tech, JB Buxton, to find out more. Read more about the early college initiative here.

Karen Brinson Bell (Photo: NCSBE)

It’s hard to believe, but another election year is well underway and voting-by-mail ballots are already available for the upcoming March 5 North Carolina primary. And in case you hadn’t heard. Some new law changes will make voting – both by mail and in-person – a little different this year.

Not only will voters need a photo ID – both to vote by mail and in person – but other changes will impact the due date for getting mail-in ballots returned, the access to polling places that partisan observers enjoy, and in some counties, whether your signature will be reviewed.

Fortunately, the folks running our elections remain among the nation’s best and, as NC Newsline learned in a recent extended conversation with State Board of Elections Executive Director, Karen Brinson Bell, optimistic that they can make the new laws work fairly and efficiently.

Carl Davis (Photo courtesy ITEP)

Ever since Republicans took control of the North Carolina legislature in 2011, they’ve passed income tax cut after income tax cut and bragged repeatedly of the supposed enormous benefits this has afforded to average North Carolinians.

A new report from the nonpartisan Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, however, debunks such claims. As it turns out, not only have the tax cuts hollowed out a host of core public structures and services – most notably our K-12 schools – they’ve left the tax code unfairer than ever. Today, in fact, rich North Carolina households now pay 50-75% less of their incomes in state and local taxes than do folks in the middle and at the bottom.

And recently we caught up with the author of the report – ITEP’s director of research, Carl Davis, to examine some of the its sobering details.

Read ITEP’s new report: Who Pays?