Agenda - 05-04-2021; 8-a - Minutes

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7 1 Commissioner Greene said she wanted to mention an issue that came up at the Transit 2 Policy Advisory Committee last week. She said the state maintenance assistance program and 3 rural operating program money has be en eliminated. She said the impact of that in the current 4 year was $6 million to Chapel Hill and Durham. She said the money is vital and ends up having 5 to be replaced through limited capital budgets. She said she has a statement calling for the 6 General Assembly to fully restore the public transportation budget in those two funds. She said 7 she would appreciate any comments. 8 Representative Meyer said the transit folks have been in touch since it happened. He 9 said this will be revisited during this year's budget discussion. He said he is unsure if the 10 Governor's budget team is proposing to address this through ARP funds or state funds. He said 11 it would be better for it to be funded with state funds because it can go back to recurring 12 funding. 13 Senator Foushee said Senator Murdock is working on this on the Senate side. 14 Commissioner Bedford asked if there would be any work across the aisle in developing 15 the budget, or if Democrats would be shut out after Governor proposes the budget and the 16 school increases. 17 Senator Foushee said there is already some change, but she is not sure how effective it 18 is going to be. She said she represents the Senate Democratic Caucus in the budget 19 discussions, and Representative Adcock was also part of initial discussions. She said she has 20 been invited to several of those meetings. She said even though there is a Representative and 21 herself in those discussions, she thinks the way Senator Berger is framing how the process 22 moves forward, particularly with a cap on what the spend number will be, what will be 23 considered for recurring or one time funding through ARP allocations, there is going to be a trick 24 some way where the discussions will only go so far. She said she hates to be pessimistic, but 25 is leery about what influence Democrats will have, and the process being any different than it 26 has been before. 27 Representative Insko said the Democrats are getting public overtures, but in private will 28 have no impact on the budget. She said there does seem to be in an interest in a public 29 collaboration, but it will be a miss when it comes to the money. 30 Representative Meyer said in the end it will be Senator Berger and Governor Cooper. 31 Senator Foushee said Speaker Moore and Senator Berger want a budget that the 32 Governor will sign. 33 Representative Insko said she thinks they want a budget they can run on in 2022. 34 Senator Foushee said the Governor not signing the budget would mean the legislature 35 has failed to do its duty. She said she believes the Senate Democrats will sustain a veto if they 36 believe it is in the best interest of the state, and Senator Berger knows that. She said she 37 believes they want a budget that the Governor will sign and believes the Senate will work 38 towards that effort. 39 Chair Price brought attention to issue #52 on evictions, which came from the Department 40 of Human Rights and Relations. She said this asks the Representatives and Senator to support 41 legislation that would remove an eviction from a tenant's credit record because it tends to follow 42 them. She said even during the pandemic, when a lot of work has been done to avoid evictions 43 with the Eviction Diversion Program, it is something that has been a problem and it has gotten 44 worse and can go from bad to worse when the moratoria is ended. She having this on a credit 45 report really hurts families and communities. 46 Representative Insko said she would pass this around to people who are working on 47 criminal law, to see if it could be amended to a bill, because the filing period has passed. She 48 said she would do that. 49 Chair Price asked if the timing for this meeting should change in the future, because as 50 Representative Insko said, the filing period is over. She said the Board has talked about