The June 10th meeting of the Senate Commerce Committee was a packed room waiting to witness a bill transformation that surprised no one familiar with budget season. The entire session was a presentation of additional elements that took House Bill 117, the NC Competes Act, from a modest 7-page JDIG incentives bill and turned it into a leviathan 46-page tax reform bill. Notably Senate Bill 369, the Sales Tax Fairness Act, saw a resurrection as Part IX of the bill.
There are a few differences though the meat of the proposal stays the same. County authority to determine distribution to cities is now included as an appeasement and the phase in period seems to be a little more generous. The predetermined adjustment table is gone in favor of more general wording that presumably garnered more support for inclusion in the act. During the presentation Senator Brown defended the intentions of the change as serving rural counties, stating that NC economic growth was not dependent on a few urban economic engines but the continued growth of all counties.
Committee ended abruptly with the statement that everyone needed to digest the changes presented. That much is certainly true, though I can never stomach bills that degrade into a rodeo of rider legislation packages. Now we wait for action on the senate version of the final budget where appropriations for HB 117 and others will be determined.
