Legislature Wraps its Short Session for Now

This week, the House and Senate worked late days finalizing bills and passing legislation in their last week. Last night, the House and Senate released their adjournment resolutions for the legislative short session. The House and Senate wrapped up their work today and have gone home. However, the adjournment resolutions allow for the legislature to return every month through December. Bills in conference between the House and Senate will still be viable for passage during these sessions. This means that virtually any policy issue could be brought up in these bills. It is expected that this was done primarily to allow more time for negotiations on top session issues that were not resolved, including Medicaid expansion, medical marijuana, and sports betting. NCRLA will continue its lobbying efforts to ensure that the hospitality industry is protected from potential negative policy coming from those conference reports in the mini-sessions.

Note: View from Jones Street is published every Friday when the North Carolina General Assembly is in session. This will be our last edition until the mini-sessions occur and hold substantive votes. 

Budget Passes House and Senate

This week the House and Senate released their budget. This short session budget is an adjustment to the main budget passed last year. The budget bill passed with significant Democrat support in both the House (19 Democrats voting yes) and Senate (12 Democrats voting yes) on Thursday with final votes today. Governor Cooper has not yet indicated how he intends to react to the budget, but it is unlikely that he will veto the budget. The bill did not include additional significant tax cuts, but also did not include Governor Cooper’s top priority, Medicaid expansion.   

Social Districts Modifications and 2022 ABC Omnibus Bill Go to Governor

HB 211: Social District/Common Area Clarifications passed the House and Senate this week and will be sent to Governor Cooper. This much-needed bill makes clarifications about the implementation of these districts and allows for a new common area entertainment area permit for social districts as well. These changes will help municipalities across the state adopt social districts and give

HB 768: 2022 ABC Omnibus bill also passed the House and Senate this week and was sent to the Governor. This legislation will become effective when it becomes law. HB 768 includes several provisions of importance to the hospitality industry including:

• Establishment of a bar permit. Customers would no longer be required to pay a membership fee and form to enter a bar. This antiquated system is overly burdensome and not normally enforced in North Carolina
• Allows distilleries that are in dry counties to serve mixed drinks without having to hold a voter referendum
• Distilleries would also be able to attain a new mixed beverage catering permit to cater their products at events
• A new transitional permit would be created to allow a 60-day grace period to transfer the alcohol sales permit to a business’ new owner before it expires

ABC Technical Corrections Bill Includes Big Reforms for NCRLA

SB 470: ABC Technical and Other Changes came out of the conference committee and passed the House and Senate. This bill included major provisions pushed by NCRLA including:

• A restaurant’s seating requirement has been reduced from 36 people to 10 people.
• A bar area or similar area in an establishment where alcoholic beverages are prepared, poured, or mixed is no longer subject to health inspection, except for the preparation of garnishes for alcoholic beverages.
• It is no longer necessary for an establishment to maintain kitchen operations at all times it is open to the public in order to qualify as a restaurant.
• A permittee may recycle spiritous liquor containers for display purposes.

This bill becomes effective when it becomes law in a maximum of ten days. NCRLA is thrilled to see another three bills pass this session that continues to make major reforms to our ABC laws in North Carolina and we continue to push for further modernization to ease business operations in this state. 

Worker Age Lowered for ABC Permittees

HB 661: Age Requirement Modifications came out as a conference report and passed the House and Senate this week. This bill would make a number of age requirement modifications to address workforce shortages. It temporarily changes the law from 16 to 15 years old to be able to work at an establishment with an ABC permit. They would still not be allowed to prepare, serve, dispense or sell any alcoholic beverages. This section of the bill is effective when it becomes law, a maximum of ten days from today, and expires December 31, 2023. NCRLA has continued to lobby legislators on the dire shortages of workforce in the hospitality industry. This temporary adjustment is a step in helping ABC permittees. We will continue to lobby every possibility we can in order to help our industry face the greatest workforce shortage in history.  

Short Term Rental Update

NCRLA has been working all session to prevent new legislation from AirBnB from passing. This draft language being pushed by their lobbyists would prevent cities and counties from regulating any online marketplace facilitator. This bill would have had a number of widespread implications on both the hotel and restaurant sides. After weeks of lobbying, we are confident that this legislation will not be taken up this year. We will remain ever vigilant as the legislature returns for its mini-sessions later this year that this harmful legislation does not come up in any conference reports. 

Occupancy Tax Bill

This week a bill to change Buncombe County's occupancy tax passed through Committee and was combined with other legislation dealing with Mitchell, Hickory, and Conover counties’ occupancy taxes. This bill would primarily change Buncombe County’s occupancy distribution from 75% for tourism promotion to 66%, which is in compliance with the House guidelines for occupancy taxes. The language for Mitchell County is in compliance and would create a tourism development authority to spend the funds raised. Hickory-Conover’s language would extend authority from 2029 to 2039 for the use of the funds. This is the first bill on occupancy taxes that has passed through the Senate in over two years. There is a lot of tension from other legislators who wanted to also pass their bills and were not included in HB 1057. We expect that the next legislative long session will see many occupancy tax bills introduced. NCRLA will continue to fight to defend the House guidelines and protect occupancy taxes for tourism promotion and related expenditures. 

Shelley Wolford Appointed to Workforce Commission

The annual appointments bill was introduced and passed this week. In HB 1175: 2022 Speaker & PPT Appointments, Shelley Wolford of Golden Corral was appointed to the North Carolina Education and Workforce Innovation Commission.

Shelley is the Senior Vice President for Strategy & Communication for Golden Corral, and she is the NCRLA Foundation Board Vice Chair. The Education and Workforce Innovation Committee administers and develops—in coordination with the State Board of Education and the Superintendent of Public Instruction—the Career and Technical Education Grade Expansion Program. This program was established to expand Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs by prioritizing the inclusion of students in 6th and 7th grade through grant awards provided to selected public school units. The Commission also facilitates The Education and Workforce Innovation Program fund (EWIF) to foster innovation and education that will lead to more students graduating career and college ready.

NCRLA Congratulates Shelley on her appointment and we look forward to working with her to help train the next generation of hospitality industry employees!

Take a look at the bills that NCRLA is tracking here: