As you prepare to vote in the midterm elections in North Carolina, you might wonder why we need the three constitutional amendments listed under “Referenda” at the end of your ballot.
The short answer: We don’t. And we advise you to vote "AGAINST" them.
From a policy perspective, none of these amendments will change anything in the short term.
But if they pass, they’ll effectively strip future lawmakers of the power to remove barriers to voting or to raise revenue to provide valuable services.
Voter ID Amendment
Passage of the Voter ID Amendment would not change current voting requirements at all. But it would make a hugely significant change, stripping future state legislatures of the power to pass new laws to change those requirements. We’ve seen voter identification laws prevent eligible voters from exercising their rights, with students, older voters, and historically disenfranchised BIPOC communities disproportionately prevented from having their votes count. We want to protect the authority of future legislatures to improve our voting laws so that every eligible voter’s ballot counts.
Personal Income Tax Amendment
Passage of the Personal Income Tax Amendment would have no near-term effect, as state law already mandates that the personal income tax rate will be lowered to 3.49% starting in 2027. Rather, it would tie the hands of future state legislators to respond to unforeseeable changes in our state revenue needs. As the N.C. Budget and Tax Center explains so well, this amendment would foreclose the opportunity for the state to adopt a less regressive tax structure – locking in corporate income tax cuts and making our state increasingly reliant on sales taxes.
Property Tax Levy Limit Amendment
Passage of the Property Tax Levy Limit Amendment would have no immediate effect, either. The legislature already has enormous power over what local governments can do, including the ability to enact laws limiting the amount by which property taxes may be increased. But enshrining in the state Constitution a requirement that the legislature exercise this power over local elected officials would prevent future General Assembly sessions from giving greater discretion to local governments to determine their own property tax rates based on community need.
As environmentalists, we value having a government that invests in protecting our natural resources and the people who live in it. We want our state and local government to be able to raise revenue for a host of priorities such as:
- Recovering from disasters
- Making infrastructure improvements
- Maintaining state and local parks
- Monitoring water quality
- Conducting regulatory inspections
- Cleaning up contaminants
- Providing sufficient funding for the Department of Environmental Quality to fulfill its mandate to protect the state’s environmental resources
We’d like to see a future in which lawmakers can still engage in heated debate about the best ways to raise revenue, and not have their options foreclosed by constitutional amendments that restrict their options.
Don’t let the current N.C. General Assembly constrain the ability of future state lawmakers to address the needs of our state and its people, needs we may not be able to envision today. Vote AGAINST against all three amendments.
About Us: The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with tens of thousands of members and supporters in North Carolina. We help people from all backgrounds explore nature and our outdoor heritage, and work to promote clean energy, protect wildlife, safeguard the health of our communities, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action.