When Cherise Fanno Burdeen talks about the U.S. justice system, she’s speaking from more than 20 years of experience. After getting her Master’s degree in Criminal Justice at Indiana University, she worked with the Department of Justice’s National Institute of Justice, did post-9/11 work with the Department of Homeland Security and field work with the Safer Foundation in Chicago.
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It’s been almost three years since state legislative leaders hired longtime conservative politician Paul Coble to run the day-to-day operations of the General Assembly as state Legislative Services Officer. After all that time, you’d think that Coble (who takes home well over $200,000 per year in salary and benefits) would have developed a basic grasp of one of his chief job duties...
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65 - number of days since the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida in which 17 people were killed
57 - percent of Americans who say enacting new laws to try to reduce gun violence should be a priority (according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll)
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In Washington, legal and political walls may be closing in on the slow motion train wreck that is the Trump administration, but here in North Carolina, conservative leaders still refuse to abandon the Prevaricator-in-Chief or the key policy tenets of Trumpism. Three classic cases in point were on display in the news this week:
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“I could choose to do anything else with $50.” But Anca Stefan, a high school English teacher in a Durham public school, says she’ll fork over the $50 next month to take a “personal day” and join hundreds of her local colleagues to promote school funding increases at the N.C. General Assembly.
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Every day, families living in poverty face tremendous barriers placed in front of them through no fault of their own. And every day, millions of North Carolinians exude grit and resiliency and navigate those barriers. That tenacity, however, comes at a steep cost. Research and experience has shown that living in persistent poverty can cause a toll on individuals.
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The Cape Fear River is damaged, contaminated by decades of human malfeasance, negligence and ignorance.
For those reasons, NC State University scientists told a crowd of 75 New Hanover County residents last night, it will be years before their tap water is completely free of GenX and other fluorinated compounds.
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Legislative Services Officer Paul Coble appears to be violating the state public records law and is forcing taxpayers to foot the bill for communications with reporters that could be free. There aren’t any formal policies at the Legislative Services Office (which Coble oversees and that is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the General Assembly) to address communications with reporters or compliance with public records laws, but Coble has informally decided to use the U.S. Postal Service for all of them.
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Donald Trump and congressional Republicans made a lot of promises about their $1.5 trillion tax giveaway that passed in December. They said millions and millions of workers would get wage hikes or bonuses. But it didn’t work out that way – only 4% of the nation’s 148 million employees got more money from their bosses.
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These are extraordinary times in the American experiment with representative democracy. In Washington, a buffoonish would-be despot occupies the highest office of the land and sullies it on an almost minute-by-minute basis in unprecedented fashion. This past Sunday, the editorial board of the New York Times felt obligated to publish a special, full-page editorial...
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Public education in North Carolina has its share of challenges, not the least of which has been the state’s ongoing failure to make sure that school systems in poorer communities receive the financial support they need. But in one major respect, the pattern by which most of our school districts are organized helps them serve all their students, no matter their circumstances.
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This morning, the state Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in the pivotal case of Silver, et al. v. Halifax County Board of Commissioners. At issue is plaintiffs' claim that the maintenance of three, racially segregated school districts in relatively small Halifax County has propped up a system of inequality that favors one predominantly white school district over two predominantly Black school districts.
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In a 2016 report, the North Carolina Commission on the Administration of Law and Justice called for pretrial justice reform – reform that would move the state away from a de facto system of requiring all criminal defendants to post a cash bail in order be released from jail prior to their day in court.
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