By Cassie Gavin
Senior Director of Government Relations
This week, the legislature extended some bill filing deadlines so legislators will have more time to propose new bills. This often happens since the deadlines are self-imposed by legislative leadership. Crossover - the date by which a bill must be passed by one chamber to remain eligible for the biennium - remains May 13th for now but might also be changed.
If you’d like to listen in to committees or House or Senate sessions, you can do that via the NCGA website here. For many meetings, video is also available.
Updates on environmental bills that we’re following:
H 220, Assuring Choice of Energy Service, was approved by the House Energy Committee last week with a split vote and was scheduled to be considered by the House Commerce Committee on Tuesday, but it was delayed until next week. Please continue to ask your House member to oppose H 220 so that we can protect community options to address climate change. The bill would disallow local governments from requiring electrification of buildings which is a method to address climate change by limiting fossil fuel burning. It’s also worth asking your local government to actively oppose this bill by contacting legislators.
H 130, East Coast Greenway/State Trails, passed the House nearly unanimously 114-1 on Tuesday with only Rep. Pittman (R - Cabarrus) voting no. The bill would authorize the addition of the East Coast Greenway to the NC State Parks system. The bill was sent to the Senate and assigned to the rules committee. Please ask your senator to support this bill.
H 296, EV Charging Station/Parking, is a helpful bill to allow enforcement of EV parking spaces. It easily passed the House Energy Committee and will next be considered by the House Transportation Committee on Tuesday.
Some new environmental bills filed this week that deserve our support:
H 342, Building Code/EV Charging Station, sponsored by Democratic Reps. Butler (New Hanover), von Haefen (Wake), Brown (Wake), and Brockman (Guilford) would require that NC building codes be updated to require that one- and two-family dwellings include an electric circuit capable of accommodating electric vehicle charging. The idea is that it’s much cheaper to install these at construction of a residence than to add them later. This would help communities transition away from fossil fueled vehicles to electric vehicles, thereby reducing auto emissions, the top contributor to greenhouse gases in the U.S.
H 343, Statewide Commuter Rail Study, sponsored by Triangle-area Democratic Reps. Alston, Morey, Hawkins and Martin, would create a legislative study committee to develop a statewide strategic vision for commuter rail. That vision would efficiently integrate freight, passenger, and commuter rail uses to encourage increases in passenger rail traffic as a share of overall transportation. Improving rail and other public transit options is a key part of reducing transportation emissions.
S 358, C-PACE Program, sponsored by Senators Johnson (R - Union), Lazzara (R - Jones, Onslow) and Woodard (D - Durham, Person), would allow businesses to do energy efficiency and resiliency upgrades and pay for the upgrades over time on property tax bills. C-PACE stands for commercial property assessed clean energy and it’s a program that has been popular and successful in other states. Learn more about C-PACE here.