John Locke Updates: Law & Regulation

North Carolina's archaic certificate-of-need laws leave the state with significant deficits in psychiatric hospitals and substance abuse facilities — and higher prices. North Carolina should join the 15 other states that eliminated certificate-of-need laws.

Gov. Roy Cooper's business shutdowns and restrictions amount to a regulatory taking depriving business owners of the use of their property. Lawmakers should reform eminent domain to include compensation for regulatory takings.

Regulatory dark matter are "rules" we don't know are rules — policies, guidelines, interpretive statements, etc. that state agencies enforce against people as if they were rules. There's no telling how much regulatory dark matter there is in North Carolina. Legislators should require agencies to identify regulatory dark matter and either repeal or formally adopt them, and they already have the language to do so.

North Carolinians should know that many of the energy policies Gov. Roy Cooper has advocated for here in North Carolina follow the mistakes identified as the cause of California's blackouts. As in California, these missteps will leave North Carolina unprepared for our energy future and will ultimately lead to blackouts here. North Carolina should not repeat California’s mistakes.

Cooper has continued to ignore research on the long-term severe health consequences from lockdowns. New research from professors at Duke University, Johns Hopkins University, and Harvard Medical School warns that the death toll from the economic impact of lockdowns and other government COVID containment measures could far exceed that of the virus itself.

There is already a host of constitutional, statutory, and judicial criteria in place that restrict how the General Assembly can draw districts. Additional reforms can assure equitable redistricting without a redistricting commission.

The North Carolina Emergency Management Act (EMA) delegates too much power to the executive branch and provides too little legislative guidance and oversight. This article proposes specific changes to the EMA to correct these deficiencies and restore the separation of powers guaranteed by the North Carolina State Constitution.

The obvious societal need for rural broadband signals opportunities for human ingenuity in the private sector. State policymakers should continue to focus on removing regulatory barriers to enable more rapid expansion by broadband entrepreneurs.

Biennial voter registration list maintenance is a normal part of keeping lists current and helping prevent election fraud. Fewer registrations will be removed this year than were in 2019.

Prior to becoming governor, AG Roy Cooper spoke strongly against consumers being made to pay coal ash cleanup costs, but under his governorship and two settlement agreements later, consumers appear to be on the hook for almost 90 percent of the $9 billion cleanup costs.