July 2, 2026 | Proudly representing Guilford County and the 57th District

Greetings!

NC FINALLY will soon have an updated budget for our state: SB257. GOP leadership missed not one but TWO 6/30 fiscal deadlines and they have forced the state to “make do” with an operating budget from 2023.

My first takeaway is that any CFO who failed to deliver a budget by a fiscal deadline would have been fired. Midterms are four months away.

I found out Sunday afternoon (via a social media post) that the budget was finally ready and we would vote on Wednesday. We received the materials Tuesday at 11am. The budget bill is 634 pages, alongside a 716-page conference-committee report. That is simply not enough time to adequately review how the state intends to spend $34 BILLION of YOUR tax-payer dollars, nor enough time for the broader public to be made aware and have opportunity to opine.

My second takeaway is that this closed-door, few-GOP-member-involvement process is a disservice to our state.

I spoke with WXII about my frustration with this process, which I encourage you to watch.

Click on the image above to read the article and watch the news clip.

My third takeaway is that this budget is OK. Just OK.

It’s not Gov Stein’s recommended budget and it’s not what Democrats would have written. It’s also something that EASILY could have been – and should have been – negotiated and signed into law June 30^th, 2025, on schedule. That being said, my job here in Raleigh is to weigh all of the pros vs the cons and what is best for my district so here’s why I ultimately voted a reserved yes:

Positive Highlights:

• Personal income tax: Reduces the personal income tax rate to 3.49% in 2027, 3.24% in 2030, and 2.99% in 2033; this is a positive because we all like reduced taxes and the House successfully slowed down these decreases to be fiscally responsible for what the state needs revenue-wise to invest in our state in the years ahead.
• Medicaid: Fully funds the $1B Medicaid Rebase request and Medicaid technology modernization; reinstates $9M in funding for Healthy Opportunities Pilot (HOP) that they haphazardly halted last year, a successful pilot providing evidence-based, non-medical interventions related to housing, food, transportation and interpersonal safety and toxic stress to high-needs Medicaid enrollees.
• Child care: Provides an additional $100.8M from various federal block grants for subsidized child care. Funds will go towards increasing provider reimbursement rates, implementing a statewide rate floor, and decreasing waitlists.
• Educator pay: $528M to provide teachers with an average salary increase of 8% (see my caveat below) and increase starting base teacher pay to $48k.
• A $1,750 one-time bonus for non-teacher schedule employees earning $65k or less and a $1k one-time bonus for non-teacher schedule employees earning more than $65k.
• A $1k one-time bonus for teachers with 16+ years of experience and a $500 one-time bonus for teachers with 0-15 years of experience.
• Guilford County is added to the Teacher Supplement Assistance Allotment for FY 2026-27
• State retirees: A 2.5% one-time supplement (bonus) for retirees.
• Law enforcement pay: $117.8M for law enforcement-related salary increases, including a total salary increase of 13% for most State sworn law enforcement and correctional officers. $40.1M for a $1,750 one-time bonus for local law enforcement.
• Housing: $25M allocated to the Workforce Housing Loan Program (WHLP)
• Datacenters: Repeals a sales and use tax exemption for electricity used in datacenters, a request of Gov. Stein.
• SNAP/SUN Bucks/Food Insecurity: Ensures that we can keep SNAP with federal cost shifts, provides funding for admin cost and staff for DHHS to cover these. Funds $5M in SUN bucks, which provides $120 per eligible child to purchase food during the summer months when schools are out. $9M investment to all food banks statewide.
• WNC Helene relief: Supports Hurricane Helene recovery efforts by providing over $700M in additional relief funding. Having spent my childhood in WNC, I will always support these investments for our mountain neighbors to fully recover.

Negative Highlights:

• State employee pay: A 3% across-the-board increase for most State agency employees, University employees, and non-teacher State-funded local employees is below inflation and no retroactive pay or one-time bonuses to make good for last year. This is woefully inadequate.
• Tenured educator pay: They did not fix the salary freeze for educators in years 15-24, where sadly their salary is frozen at $68,184. This is a disservice to our most seasoned educators who are teaching our new teachers and ensuring knowledge transfer for decades to come. Such a shame! Also, the GOP messaging of “historic 8% educator pay raises” is misinformation; this is an average, and a teacher with 15 years of experience receives merely 5.5% over the biennium, so the “historic increase” will be quite different in reality on a seasoned educator’s single paycheck.
• No educator master's pay: They did not reinstate a pay bump for educators who have master's pay, which I believe we should support educators who invest in their continued education to in turn improve their effectiveness in their classrooms for our children’s futures.
• Anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers: $9.2M allocated to Carolina Pregnancy Care Fellowship and Human Coalition, two anti-abortion non-profits with pregnancy crisis centers across our state, many with no healthcare professionals and biased pro-life advocates encouraging pregnant women to keep their pregnancies regardless of what is in their best interest. Instead, I believe we should invest in birth control to actually support family planning.
• School vouchers: $750k recurring contract to pay a nonprofit, Parents for Education Freedom NC, that advocates for school vouchers, charter schools, and private schools. Apparently, its CEO’s salary is 19.3% of the org’s annual budget…

Here is a summary of all allocations to Guilford County and Greensboro:

I am proud to see the extensive financial support for critical programs in our county and city outlined below. I personally was involved in the financial asks for GTCC’s aviation center, the Nussbaum Steelhouse, and Folk Festival. I’m very proud that my bipartisan efforts paid off in those investments to our community.

I welcome any questions you may have on this budget; I know it’s incredibly hard to digest. I encourage you to do keyword searches based on topics of interest to you and read upcoming news coverage that will outline various subsections. Otherwise, I hope you and your loved ones have fun plans in store to celebrate our country’s 250^th anniversary this Fourth of July. I always spend the 4^th in the beautiful mountains of WNC; the mountain air truly does soothe my soul. There is so much to celebrate and yet so much more to do. Pause to celebrate and take those deep breaths, then resume. We all have a role to play to protect our Democracy and ensure America – and North Carolina – is the best it can be for the next 250 years ahead.

Sincerely,

Tracy

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