Category Archives: Uncategorized

Refund and release questions are the most popular and most difficult questions I receive from North Carolina tax officials.  Rarely do these questions have easy answers.

In 2013, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released the Uniform Administrative Requirements, Cost Principles, and Audit Requirements for Federal Awards (the “Uniform Guidance”), which consolidated and streamlined the various federal policies governing the award and administration of federal financial assistance (i.e., federal grants) into a single title of the Code of Federal Regulations: 2 C.F.R. Part 200. The Uniform Guidance is revised and updated every five years to clarify the existing requirements and meet changing needs.

As a child of the 80’s, questions about the Machinery Act’s treatment of burial grounds immediately bring to mind the classic horror movie Poltergeist. (TL;DR for younger readers: don’t buy a house built on an old cemetery.)  I don’t have any great ideas about how to deal with malevolent ghosts. But I do have thoughts on how to apply the revised exemption for private burial property that took effect starting with the 2022 tax year.

North Carolina counties and municipalities and a handful of other special purpose local governments (collectively, local units) are authorized to engage in certain public enterprise activities. A public enterprise is an activity of a commercial nature. When a local unit owns or operates a public enterprise it acts in a proprietary capacity and has more flexibility to treat the enterprise like a private business venture than a traditional government function. Water and sewer services are common public enterprises.

The Machinery Act has long required counties to advertise their delinquent real property tax liens in local newspapers each spring.  GS 105-369. I’ve discussed the advertising process here and here and here.

Many local government procurement officials are familiar with the requirements for the licensure of general contractors in North Carolina. An individual or entity is a “general contractor” when they bid upon, construct, or superintend the construction of any building, highway, public utilities, grading or any improvement or structure and the cost of the undertaking is forty thousand dollars ($40,000) or more.

Two men fined in 2018 for failing to stop at red light camera locations in Greenville, NC filed declaratory judgment actions arguing that the program violated the Fines and Forfeitures Clause of the North Carolina Constitution because the local school board received less than the clear proceeds of the civil penalties the city collected. The Court of Appeals in Fearrington v. City of Greenville, 282 N.C. App.

When property is owned by a single party, it’s easy to determine who is personally responsible for delinquent taxes.  It’s the owner as of the date of delinquency (usually January 6) and all subsequent owners.  GS 105-365.1.But what if the property is owned by multiple parties? May the county force one of the two owners to pay the entire delinquent tax bill? What if the owners are married—may the county target one spouse to pay the entire tax bill?

As detailed here, as part of nationwide settlements (and bankruptcy resolutions) with major opioid manufacturers, distributors, and retailers, North Carolina local governments are expected to receive over a billion dollars in funding over an 18-year period to address the ongoing impacts of the opioid epidemic in their communities (collectively “opioid settlement funds”).

This is the second part of an exploration of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA). In the first part of this series, we explored the types of pregnancy-related conditions covered under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) and the requirements around notification, documentation, and confidentiality. Now, let’s dive into the heart of the matter: how employers can navigate the process of finding reasonable accommodations and understanding when they may be excused from offering one.