County Commissioners’ Control Over Local Board of Elections’ Employees

A county’s board of commissioners (BOC) has the power and responsibility to “develop() and direct() the fiscal policy of the county government.” G.S. 153A-101. The board adopts the annual county budget ordinance, as well as capital project ordinances, and has much discretion in allocating funds among the various county government activities. There are some limits to this authority, though. This is because county governments are highly decentralized. Although a BOC serves as a county’s general governing body, it shares authority over many governmental functions with other elected county officials and other semi-autonomous boards and agencies. This shared authority gives rise to tensions, and sometimes outright conflict, between county commissioners and other elected officials and boards. And the statutory delineations of authority between and among the various officials and boards are not always clear, which only adds to the confusion.

One area in particular that often leads to disputes between a BOC and other elected officials and boards is control over personnel—both in determining the number of employees that may be employed by a particular department or board and in setting their compensation, other benefits and terms of employment.

A recent North Carolina Court of Appeals opinion highlights this tension in the context of a dispute between the Graham County BOC and the Graham County Board of Elections (BOE) over which body had the authority to set the number (and terms of employment) of board of election employees. In Graham County Board of Elections v. Graham County Board of Commissioners, — S.E.2d —-, 2011 WL 2207576 (N.C. App. June 7, 2011), the court held that a BOC has “no authority to determine the number of county board of elections employees if those employees can be compensated within the budget established by the county commissioners.” This post takes a closer look at the implications of the court’s decision. Read more »

NC Court of Appeals Upholds Application of State Smoking Ban to For-Profit Private Clubs

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 from the smoking ban, but does not provide an exemption for private clubs that are for-profit. The plaintiff, owner of a for-profit private billiards club, argued that this distinction violated the equal protection clauses of the North Carolina and federal constitutions. The Court of Appeals rejected the challenge, holding that there is a rational basis for the legislature’s decision to treat for-profit and non-profit clubs differently. Read more »

Legislation Affecting Environmental Health Programs

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 the inspection and permitting requirements for public swimming pools, some cooking schools, and nursing homes. Legislation to repeal local private well programs did not make it out of committee, but a bill placing some restraints on permit denials was enacted, and state staff who supported the local programs were laid off. Finally, a new law provided a means for certain nonstandard on-site wastewater systems to be approved for use.

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Annexation Reform: A Summary of the New Law

UPDATE August 2013: In 2012, the legislature replaced the petition process described below with a referendum requirement. The current law is summarized here.

Nearly 40 annexation-related bills were introduced during this legislative session. Included in this number were identical House and Senate bills that would have imposed a one-year moratorium on involuntary annexation, as well as several local bills undoing specific annexations that had been adopted but had not yet become effective. The legislature opted for reform instead of a moratorium  and enacted  S.L. 2011-396 (HB 845). In addition, the legislature has created an exclusion from annexation for land used for farm purposes, as set forth in a separate act, S.L. 2011-363, which also affects authority over farm property in the ETJ. Local bills to repeal certain completed annexations were revised and combined in two separate acts, S.L. 2011-173 (SB 27) and 2011-177 (HB 56). These acts allow completed annexations in nine cities to be terminated by petition of the owners of 60% of the annexed parcels. This post updates and replaces my earlier post about the statewide bill, and provides a summary of the new annexation law (which became effective without the Governor’s signature on July 1, 2011), and of the other related legislation. Read more »

Property Tax Implications of the New Annexation Law

Municipal annexations have been the subject of much debate recently.  My colleague Frayda Bluestein expertly analyzes S.L.  2011-396 (H.B.  845) the one bill that became law among dozens on the topic introduced during the current legislative session here.  My post today focuses on the two major property tax implications of this new law.

First, the law eliminates a major source of tax confusion by requiring that involuntary annexations take effect on June 30, the last day of the fiscal year.   Under prior law, annexations could take effect on any day chosen by the municipality’s governing board.  If an annexation took effect in the middle of the fiscal year, the annexed property was subject to pro-rated municipal property taxes based on the number of full months remaining in the fiscal year. And the delinquency date for these pro-rated taxes depended on whether the annexation took effect before September 1. By requiring the effective date to be June 30, S.L. 2011-396 eliminates both the tax proration and the shifting of delinquency dates for involunary annexations.  But those provisions remain relevant for voluntary annexations, which still can become effective in the middle of the fiscal year.

Second, S.L. 2011-396 and a related law, S.L. 2011-363, give owners of land used for farm purposes, including but not limited to property in the present-use value (“PUV”) deferred tax program, the unilateral authority to prevent the annexation of their property.  Under prior law, PUV property could be annexed involuntarily but was not subject to city taxes unless and until that property became ineligible for PUV classification. Farmland not in the PUV program received no special annexation treatment.

Here are the details. Read more »

Candidates and Conflicts of Interest – What Happens If You Win?

You want to run for city council, but you or your company has a contract with the city (or maybe you want to run to be a county commissioner and the contract is with the county).  Can you be a candidate for election?  What happens if you win? 

Sure, you can run.  The conflict of interest in public contracting statute (G.S. 14-234) does not apply to candidates for local government office (unless that candidate is an incumbent).  But you are wise to prepare yourself for issues you might face if elected. Read more »

Rezoning Conditions Done Right

NOTE:  Post updated 10/27/21 to incorporate statutory updates and other recent developments.

A developer proposes rezoning a parcel from a low density residential zone to a commercial zoning district. The neighbors would be satisfied with some of the uses allowed in the more intensive district, but are wary about others. The staff has several concerns about traffic flow and setbacks that are not addressed in the development standards in the proposed new zoning district. All of these are items that could be resolved with conditions on the approval. Is there a way these considerations be incorporated into the rezoning decision?

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