This week Chad Adams spoke to the Western Wake GOP about the struggle over leadership and power in the North Carolina House of Representatives. As the new session began, the lottery was again the source of much speculation as a way to increase revenue to fill the roughly $1.2 billion gap between projected state revenues and expenses. Roy Cordato told UNC-Chapel Hill’s Daily Tarheel that government-endorsed and government-operated gambling is inappropriate. What’s more, he explained, if legislators want to give citizens the right to vote on a lottery, then tax increases should be subject to the same approval. Donna Martinez used Friday’s edition of “The Carolina Journal Report” on State Government Radio in Raleigh to address the budget and the need to end the “temporary” income and sales tax increases that should have already expired. In its coverage of the opening of the session, the Raleigh News & Observer featured a story about the Leandro school-funding dispute. Next to it was information on three education-focused groups, including JLF’s North Carolina Education Alliance.
