UPDATE: In March 2013, North Carolina enacted legislation declining Medicaid expansion and directing state agencies and institutions not to participate in the implementation of a health benefits exchange in North Carolina. See S.L. 2013-5, summarized here.  Readers of this blog … Read more

There has been a great deal of activity around local public health agency (LPHA) organization and governance during the 2011-12 legislative session. We at the SOG have blogged about it several times and we are posting regular legislative updates here. … Read more

[Today’s guest blogger is Adam Parker, UNC School of Government summer law clerk.] Let’s begin with an all-too-familiar hypothetical. In 2006, Carl Corporation incorporated a small business, Tar Heel Roofing Inc. Business went well for a few years. But when the … Read more

A short while ago I wrote about the state constitutional provisions on redistricting, noting the argument that for decades North Carolina might have been drawing legislative districts at the wrong time. The state constitution can be read to say that … Read more

North Carolina has a proud 30-year history of almost continuous litigation over legislative and congressional redistricting, described here. The lawsuits for our new decade have started and previous roles have been reversed. Republicans used to complain about maps drawn by … Read more

Before the 1960s North Carolina had a hodgepodge of local courts below the state superior court. In one place or another there were general county and city courts, county criminal courts, domestic relations courts, juvenile courts and recorders courts. Some … Read more

Here at the School of Government, we get a lot of questions about disclosing medical records or information to law enforcement officials. Often the question arises when a law enforcement official appears at a health care facility and presents a … Read more

The 2011 General Assembly completed its second session last week, the contentious redistricting and veto-override session, and has scheduled its third session of the year for September 12th.  At the top of the list of approved topics for the fall … Read more

Today, the Court of Appeals issued an opinion in Liebes v. Guilford County Department of Public Health, one of two cases challenging provisions of the 2009 law that banned smoking in restaurants and bars. The law exempts non-profit private clubs … Read more

Several significant changes to the laws governing environmental health programs were made during the 2011 General Assembly’s regular session. The state Division of Environmental Health was abolished and its programs were transferred to other agencies or eliminated. New laws changed … Read more