By a unanimous vote in both chambers on Monday evening (October 15th), the General Assembly quickly approved and Governor Cooper signed legislation appropriating almost four hundred million dollars in disaster relief for communities and individuals impacted by Hurricane Florence.  The … Read more

During the final week of the recently adjourned 2017 legislative session, the General Assembly enacted S.L. 2017-193 (H161), “Divestment from Companies that Boycott Israel.” This legislation created a new Article 6G of Chapter 147 prohibiting the investment of state funds … Read more

Earlier today the General Assembly passed H142 (S.L. 2017-4), Reset of S.L. 2016 repealing HB2 (S.L. 2016-3), the Public Facilities Privacy and Security Act, which was enacted during a special session held in March 2016.  In repealing HB2, H142 enacts … Read more

UPDATE March 2017:  See this post for a discussion of the impact of HB2’s repeal on city and county contracting authority. UPDATED April 2016:  See Trey Allen’s blog post update for information on a recent 4th Circuit ruling that has … Read more

What do the time frame for providing public notice of a lease of government property and leasing government property for communications towers have in common? Changes to the statutory requirements for both are included in legislation that became law earlier … Read more

This post reviews the origin and purposes of the Chapter 160D initiative. The 2015 bill discussed below was not adopted in 2015. It was introduced again in 2017 but not enacted. However, a substantially similar bill was adopted in 2019 … Read more

North Carolina local governments have a new partner in their economic development efforts. Session Law 2014-18 authorizes the North Carolina Department of Commerce to enter into a contract with a nonprofit entity in order to carry out many of the … Read more

On August 20, the North Carolina General Assembly adjourned sine die (Joint Res. 2014-8). The term sine die is from the Latin “without day;” this type of resolution means that the legislature did not set a date to return to … Read more

Since 1995, local governments have had express statutory authorization to prequalify bidders for public construction contracts under G.S. 143-135.8. If you look to this statute for guidance on the criteria or process to be used for prequalifying bidders, you will … Read more

If you are a local government official who serves on the TAC of a MPO or RPO, recently enacted legislation makes you subject to civil fines and potential criminal prosecution for failing to file or filing incomplete your SEI and … Read more