N.C. Senator Ellie Kinnaird's Newsletter

August 20, 2007 Newsletter

Dear Friends,

Ellie Kinnaird

This is the last email report of the 2007 session. It was a good and productive session that made me proud to be a legislator and Democrat. We accomplished a great deal for those who need it the most (except, of course reducing the highest income tax rate and making the 1/4% sales tax permanent.)

Let me start with the intangibles: we apologized for slavery, instructed the Treasurer to stop investing in companies that do business in Darfur, and recognized the 1898 overthrow of the legitimately elected government and the destruction of black owned homes and businesses in Wilmington. We honored the Tuskegee Airmen and two of our legendary musicians, Earl Scruggs and Joe Thompson.

Substantively, we passed a refundable Earned Income Tax Credit for the working poor, funded medical coverage for children in foster care through age 20 and provided fund for post-secondary education for them, funded two programs for low-income and uninsured families and children, at-home help for the disabled and elderly, funded supported employment for people with mental illness, developmental disabilities and substance abuse and started a rating system for long-term care. We finally have mental health parity health insurance and relief for those with serious chronic illness with lower premiums. Fire-safe cigarettes are now the only ones allowed in our state, which will protect hundreds from injury and death. We raised the amount a person injured by the state can recover to $1,000,000. Migrant farm workers now will have a clean mattress where they were not guaranteed any mattress at all before.

We strengthened ethics reform, put money into the rainy day fund for emergencies (we could use some rain right now, in any quantity), added to our education funds at every level and gave a pay raise for teachers and state employees. College will be more affordable for those who save and those who borrow.

On the environmental front, we will work to insure that all state buildings be constructed with energy and water conservation. Buffers will now be required for landfills that border streams, parks, and gamelands. A tax on tonnage going into landfills will be used for recycling. Swine farms must meet higher standards for waste disposal and money is provided for alternate methods, some that will even produce electricity. And we put significant funds into Land For Tomorrow, a long-term goal.

Finally, I am happy to say my Human Trafficking Victims Protection and services bill passed. And after eleven years, we have a spay/neuter law to provide help to low-income people and hopefully cut down on the 236,000 animals slaughtered in our shelters every year.

I wish everyone a happy summer’s end and a good year.

Paid for by Ellie Kinnaird for Senate • PO Box 668, Carrboro, NC 27510 • 919-929-1607 •