This is a report on the 2009 Legislative Session. Here is a list of all the bills of which I was a primary sponsor. You can click on the link and read the latest version and discover what happened to each bill. These bills range from Medicaid financing, child testimony, redistricting, school choice, property rights and ethic changes such as “pay to play” regulations and the revolving doors. I hope you will find it interesting.

In addition to my own bills my task as Republican Leader of the House required opposition to the Governor’s large tax increases. See my press release entitled, “Democrats’ Three Ring Circus Still Playing in Raleigh” for an explanation of the budget.

There were two bills that I opposed that inserted a distinctly anti-family element into the public school curriculum: the so-called “bullying bill” and the euphemistically titled “healthy youth act”. Each was full of irony. It was already against the rules to bully anyone for any reason in the public schools. I offered a bill (with 62 co-sponsors) and amendments to make that rule a law. But the left needed to specify that this was specifically directed at those of different sexual orientations and gender identities and refused to allow an amendment to make clear that pedophilia and sado masochism were not sexual orientations. The sex-ed bill started out as a drastic “anything goes” reversal of our abstinence until marriage curriculum. However, the final version maintained the abstinence until marriage curriculum and made a few changes, which were not helpful but not dramatic.
We were unable to get a vote on the Marriage Amendment in spite of its sponsorship by a majority of the members of the House. The leadership refused to bring it up. Almost the same fate befell legislation protecting property rights against abusive condemnations although it did receive two procedural votes before being killed.

This Session will be remembered for its large tax increases imposed during a recession and for little else. We will go back in May 2010 hopefully to redeem the time and the Session.