Republican House Speaker Thom Tillis says it is a possibility Governor Beverly Perdue will veto SB13 which targets nearly $800 million in savings for the current budget. If the Governor does veto the bill that means she wouldn’t have the authority for which she asked the legislature to cut $400 million. That permission is part of the bill and would be required for her to make the cuts.
The bill was passed by the House today on a 66-51 vote but it appears the leadership wouldn’t have the votes to override the veto. During final debate Democrats continued the themes that the Balanced Budget Act was a job killer and sent a message that North Carolina was closed for business. Former Democratic Speaker Joe Hackney also accused the Republicans of ignoring the Democrats and the Governor. Speaker Tillis told reporters they talked with Governor Perdue two weeks ago. He said they also met with her staff and the Commerce Department over the weekend. Tillis said the GOP budget writers received no significant feedback despite invitations to join the discussion. Tillis said he wanted Democrats to show him what jobs or projects would suffer from the clawbacks of money from the Golden LEAF Foundation and the One North Carolina Fund overseen by the Governor. Tillis said he didn’t get one reply.
Tillis said if the Governor vetoes the bill Republicans will look for alternatives to find the savings and cuts.
House GOP leader Paul Stam made an appeal to the Democrats. They continued to argue against the bill by saying it would send a bad message to business that the state was not open for business any longer. Stam said that wasn’t true but the idea could be planted in many minds if the Democrats continued to say that. He urged them to stop saying it.
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