• Maximize use of the SAVE program: The federal government enhanced the SAVE program. Now, states can submit multiple cases at once and search using more data points than before. The SBE can join once the updated program has “hard launched”. 
• Require documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote: 6 states require documentary proof of citizenship for new registrants, and 3 others require documentary proof if they cannot verify citizenship through other data. North Carolina may have to adopt a 2-tier system, similar to Arizona, allowing only votes in federal races for those using the federal application and not presenting proof of citizenship. 

1) 📝📝📝 WCPSS tries to tutor on the cheap - and fails

• The Wake County Public School System (WCPSS) is blaming a federal funding freeze for the delay in resuming an intensive reading tutoring program for K–3 students
  • Last year, WCPSS paid approximately $339,000 to nonprofits to operate and recruit teachers for a tutoring program
  • The district currently seeks to attract over 230 tutors for a similarly sized project
  • Assuming this year’s tutoring program would be the same size, $339,000 would be a modest investment, less than 1% of the  over $2.2 billion budget for a district with 160,000 students
• Why should WCPSS resume the program?
  • Students continue to struggle with learning loss
    • 3rd-grade reading proficiency dropped to 46.6% in recent state test results (down from 48.6% the previous year)
  • From 2020 to 2025, WCPSS received $434.2 million in federal COVID relief funds, with federal law requiring 20% (about $87 million) to be spent specifically on addressing learning loss
• How did WCPSS spend its Covid funding?
  • WCPSS spent 62% of the federal funds on salaries and 14% on employee benefits
    • However, the spending specifically allocated to salaries for tutors and tutorial pay totaled only about $660,000—less than 0.2% of the total federal relief funds
• Despite the widely accepted consensus that intensive tutoring is the best way to remedy learning loss, WCPSS's efforts to provide high-quality tutoring have been sorely lacking 
  • WCPSS owes students a tutoring program and parents and taxpayers an explanation

You can get the full picture here. 

2) 💡💡💡 Feds predict major blackout risk from switch to renewables 

• A recent U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) report warns that America's power grids face a hundredfold increase in the risk of blackouts by 2030 if baseload power plants continue to be closed and replaced predominantly with unreliable wind and solar resources
  • By 2030, 104 gigawatts (GW) of planned capacity retirements will be replaced by 209 GW of new generation
  • However, only 22 GW of this new generation will be "firm baseload generation resources" (coal, natural gas, or nuclear), with the rest being intermittent solar and wind sources
• With due respect to North Carolina, the SERC-East subregion (North and South Carolina) faces emerging winter reliability risks
  • It found that, by 2030, under the “Plant Closure” scenario, the planned additional power plants in the Carolinas won’t be sufficient or reliable enough to make up for all the planned power plant closures
    • The blackout risk would be 27x worse under this “Plant Closure” scenario
  • The “Required Build” scenario would necessitate an additional 500 MWs of capacity (on top of the planned new capacity) by 2030 to uphold the reliability standards
• This report underscores the importance of SB 266’s repeal of the Carbon Plan’s interim goal
  • The now-repealed interim goal of the North Carolina Carbon Plan would have led to: 
    • 6.2 GW of coal retirements… 
    • Replaced by 12.8 GW of new renewable capacity (mostly solar and wind/battery backup)... 
    • But only 3.8 GW of new, firm replacement generation (natural gas and nuclear)
• This repeal is expected to lead to an updated Carbon Plan with a more reliable resource mix 
  • Modeling without the interim goal showed potential savings for electricity consumers of $13 billion
  • This change allows policymakers to delay coal plant closures until reliable replacement generation is secured, mitigating the blackout risk
• Refocusing the planned future resource mix back to least-cost and reliable sources should avoid some of this increased blackout risk
  • Being able to delay coal plant closures till reliable, one-to-one replacement generation is in place would eliminate even more risk

You can read the full report here. 


3) 🗓️🗓️🗓️ State Board of Elections is conducting a 10-year rules review

• The North Carolina State Board of Elections (SBE) is conducting a review of 38 election rules to determine whether they are still necessary
• The review is required by state law and has three steps:
  • The agency analyses the rules to make initial determinations if they are still necessary, invites public comments, and presents the initial determinations to the Rules Review Commission
  • The Rules Review Commission reviews the agency report, decides if any of the agency's determinations need to be reversed, and then presents a report to the Joint Legislative Administrative Procedure Oversight Committee
  • The agency consults the committee, which may recommend that the General Assembly direct the agency to conduct a review of the specific rule
• We are currently in Step One
  • The public comment period is open through October 17th, and you can make a public comment:
    • Online (You will have to make a separate comment for each rule you believe is unnecessary)
    • By email to [email protected] (Identify the rule or rules you believe are unnecessary in your comment)
    • By mail to Attn: Rulemaking Coordinator, P.O. Box 27255, Raleigh, NC 27611-7255 (Identify the rule or rules you believe are unnecessary in your comment)

You can get all the details here.