Legislative Update from Rep. Frank Iler – May 18, 2015
Last week in the North Carolina House of Representatives we passed the individual departmental budgets, we passed a major property insurance reform bill, and I continued to have visitors from back home.
It was so hot last week in Raleigh that on Tuesday, when it hit 90 degrees, everybody that owned a seersucker suit was wearing it. The budget meetings were also hot and heavy, as were some of the debates over revenue and appropriations.
By Thursday, the individual departmental budgets were being heard in the various committees. In my case, this was the House Appropriations Committee on Transportation. After days and nights of discussions among the chairs of the committee, we brought our budget for the Department of Transportation to the full committee for approval. As it was my turn to chair the meeting, I had a busy morning as referee for all the presentations, questions, and discussions. However, after half a dozen amendments, we passed it at 1:05 p.m. Thursday. Of course, at 1:20 I was on my way back to Brunswick County. All the individual budgets will now be combined into the House budget to be debated in the full House Finance Committee, the full House Appropriations committee, and finally debated and passed on the House floor, before being sent to the Senate for their changes and approval. We are anticipating that we will conclude these processes on the House budget by Thursday of this week.
House Bill 182 – Property Insurance Fairness makes several changes to bring transparency and fairness to our property insurance laws. This is of particular interest to us on the coast. It requires more information to homeowners when their rates are raised and they must sign a “consent to rate” form. It also allows insurers to issue bonds to cover catastrophic losses, which should ease rates. In addition, it clarifies that more than one hurricane model must be used when the Rate bureau is applying to the Insurance Commissioner for a rate increase. Other provisions also bring more transparency to the process to protect consumers. The bill passed the House on Wednesday by a vote of 115 – 0, and was sent to the Senate.
Once again, we had some great visitors that came to see Senator Rabon and myself. Having seen the Brunswick County Commissioners and Board of Education members the previous week, we had the Brunswick County Republican Women to visit last week. About 10 of their members attended a great gathering in my office. They then had a chance to meet and take pictures in the House chamber with House Speaker Tim Moore. It is safe to say that Speaker Moore and most of my colleagues know well where Brunswick County is and that we are very active in our area. It was a pleasure to also welcome N.C. Ports Authority Chairman Tom Adams, also from Brunswick County, for lunch and conversation about our vital ports in Wilmington and Morehead City.
We expect another week of marathon budget meetings, this time in the full House Appropriations Committee and on the House floor. We will have all day meetings with well over a hundred amendments. Regardless of the beautiful weather, we will spend all our time inside.