PRIVATE NC DRUG REHAB CLINICS ACCUSED OF FORCED UNPAID LABOR OF PATIENTS: Attorney General Josh Stein and other state officials are investigating a drug and alcohol rehab center that faces allegations of forced labor, abuse, fraud and more. The North Carolina company operates clinics near Asheville and Raleigh. The investigation comes on the heels of an article about the rehab company that was published by Reveal, a nonprofit news website run by the Center for Investigative Reporting. According to that report, a company called Recovery Connections Community put its patients to work for free in adult care homes, charging the homes for their labor but not paying the patients for their work. Some of the patients told Reveal they worked 16-hour days for no pay and also received little to no training before going to work in those sensitive medical environments.
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/article211970559.html

NC LAWMAKERS CHANNEL TRUMP WITH MEDICAID WORK REQUIREMENTS: The matter is one of several policy items that House Speaker Tim Moore and Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger are hashing out as they wrangle over the $24 billion budget. The change appears to be a Senate priority without support from key budget writers in the House. "We're talking about it," Berger, R-Rockingham, confirmed Wednesday evening as he emerged from budget talks for a dinner break. The potential Medicaid requirements would affect about 60,000 people, according to state Rep. Donny Lambeth
, R-Forsyth, a House budget chairman as well as a chairman on the House Health and Health Care Reform committees. The change would require approval from the federal government, but the Trump administration has indicated it's open to similar changes.
https://www.wral.com/medicaid-work-requirements-a-sticking-point-in-budget-talks/17575822/

NC'S AFRICAN-AMERICAN STUDENTS ARE ARRESTED OR SUSPENDED AT ALARMING RATE: In North Carolina, black students are nearly six times more likely to be arrested at school and school activities than white students, according to recently released federal data analyzed by WRAL News. That disparity is among the worst in the country. Law enforcement arrested more than 600 North Carolina students on public school grounds, during off-campus school activities or on school transportation during the 2015-16 school year, according to the latest data from the U.S. Department of Education. In North Carolina, 9.2 out of every 10,000 black students were arrested, compared to 1.6 white students. Only three other states – West Virginia, Iowa and Rhode Island – had a higher disparity between the arrest rates of black and white students. About 147 out of every 1,000 black students were suspended from North Carolina schools in 2015-16. That's compared to about 44 white students out of every 1,000.
https://www.wral.com/nc-s-alarming-disparity-of-black-student-arrests-among-worst-in-country/17515727/

13 ARRESTED AS POOR PEOPLE'S CAMPAIGN RETURNS TO NC GENERAL ASSEMBLY: Thirteen protesters were arrested Monday afternoon outside the offices of top legislative leaders. The North Carolina Poor People's Campaign, part of a national movement and in some ways a continuation of the "Moral Monday" movement in North Carolina, held a chanting, singing sit-in outside the the office suites of Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger and House Speaker Tim Moore. This was week two of a planned six-week campaign in the state. Last week, protesters closed Jones Street outside the statehouse, and nearly 50 were cited. Today most, if not all, of those arrested wore yellow armbands, signaling their willingness to be arrested. Others dispersed as police ordered, then stood aside and cheered those led out in plastic zip-ties, again much like the Moral Monday protests.
https://www.wral.com/chanting-protesters-arrested-at-general-assembly/17570113/

LEGISLATORS CAN DECLARE COOPER'S BUDGET 'DOA', BUT IT RESPECTS NC'S NEEDS: North Carolina’s legislative leaders pronounced Gov. Roy Cooper’s budget D-O-A. It would have been a bit more appropriate, even polite, if the diagnosis came AFTER he’d proposed it. Before the budget is relegated to the recycling bin, state Senate leader Phil Berger, House Speaker Tim Moore and their lieutenants should enlighten themselves and give the budget a look. They might even consider joining Cooper to show some R-E-S-P-E-C-T for the many North Carolinians and issues they’ve neglected for the last seven years while lavishing the state’s corporations with excessive tax breaks. Legislators would go a long way toward appropriately honoring North Carolina’s education, health, public safety, rural communities, growing businesses and working families, by adopting the priorities that Cooper laid out last week.
https://www.wral.com/editorial-legislators-can-declare-cooper-s-budget-doa-but-it-respects-n-c-needs...