Legislative update: Waiting for a state budget

A note from us

Welcome to Awake58 — a weekly newsletter with the latest updates on community college news and events. If you were forwarded this email, you can sign up for the Awake58 newsletter here, and you can find last week’s edition on our website.

This week’s edition is by Ben Humphries, reporter and policy analyst at EdNC.

One quick note: This is our last regular edition of Awake58 until August, but we’ll be back in your inbox with a special edition when the state budget is released. Happy summer!

An update from the General Assembly, where negotiations on the state budget continue… Register for the 2026 Dallas Herring Lecture, featuring Dr. Vicki Karolewics, president of Wallace State Community College… Careers Electric launches at 10 NC community colleges… Plus, a closer look at a mentor program in Alleghany County…

Good morning — Ben here. We’ve heard that our readers are eager for a legislative update, so I’m writing you from the Legislative Building in Raleigh. As always, please come say hello if you see me wandering the halls.

Unfortunately, the only community college-related legislative news I can share is the lack of news. For consecutive weeks, Republican leaders have pushed back their estimated release date of a finalized budget. The most recent word on the street is that they hope to release it by the end of June — next week.

However, last week, Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, said there is still a ways to go.

“We’re nowhere close to being finished, but we’re making progress,” Berger told reporters, according to NC Newsline.

As a reminder, North Carolina has not passed a state budget since 2023 and was the only state in the country not to pass a state budget last year. In the meantime, the state has operated on a mix of continuing budget resolutions, and community college employees did not see raises last year.

On to some community college-specific updates. The last time I was in your inbox, I wrote about the Workforce Act, a bill supported by myFutureNC that would fund ApprenticeshipNC, NCcareers.org, NC Workforce Credentials, and an expansion of transfer technology, at a total cost of $9.1 million.

So far, that bill hasn’t moved since it was filed, but supporters shouldn’t necessarily fret — it’s still possible provisions from the Workforce Act may end up in the budget. At this point in the session, not many appropriations bills are moving through committees because funding negotiations are going on behind closed doors.

And Propel NC, the North Carolina Community College System’s (NCCCS) proposed funding model, has support among legislators. In May, Sen. Tom McInnis, R-Moore, told me he is 100% supportive of Propel NC. As for the system’s funding request, he had “heard nothing negative” at that point.

NCCCS President Jeff Cox told me in May that he was confident the Propel NC request would be at least partially fulfilled in the budget, and said the system has planned for “several different scenarios that would work if we get partial funding.”

At this point, I’m mostly waiting around like you are. No one can really say when the budget is coming, but leaders have indicated it will be fast-tracked and passed quickly when it comes.

For now, Awake58 is going on summer break — but look out for a special edition when the budget is released.

Thanks for reading,

Ben Humphries
Reporter and policy analyst, EdNC

---

EdNC reads

---

Around NC

---

Other higher education reads

---