A Busy session, historic decisions: General Assembly finally adjourns a session that's been hard, and noteworthy

As the General Assembly ended its session yesterday and adjourned for the year, Gov. Bev Perdue signed into law one of the year's most significant pieces of legislation.

The legislation, known as the "Racial Justice Act," allows death-row inmates to use statistics to try to prove that racial bias played a part in the imposition of capital punishment. Perdue signed the bill amid fanfare and was flanked by the bill's supporters at a public signing ceremony.

It was in stark contrast to the signing of another major bill, the $19 billion state budget that legislators passed last week. Perdue signed the budget on Friday afternoon, with no public ceremony and no formal press release.

The difference in the handling of the two bills provides a good summation to the 2009 legislative session. The six-month session was largely defined by a fiscal crisis that caused legislators to cut spending and raise taxes by $1 billion. When they finally settled on the budget -- more than one month into the fiscal year -- few legislators, even Democrats who supported it, believed that it was anything to brag about.

But at the same time that they were trying to shovel the state out of its worst budget hole in a generation, legislators found the time and the political will to pass several other momentous bills that represent major shifts in state policy.

Rep. Joe Hackney, the Democratic speaker of the N.C. House of Representatives, said that the 2009 session "will be looked back upon as a session which was hard for all of us, but perhaps historic."

That's because Democrats succeeded in passing major bills that had been unsuccessful in previous years. They include the Racial Justice Act and a statewide ban on smoking in bars and restaurants.

The Racial Justice Act was heavily pushed by two Winston-Salem Democrats, Reps. Larry Womble and Earline Parmon. With its passage, North Carolina becomes just the second state, after Kentucky, to allow defendants to use statistics from other cases to argue that there is racial bias in the administration of the death penalty.

If a judge finds significant racial bias, a death sentence can be converted to a sentence of life in prison.

The North Carolina chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People hailed the law yesterday as a landmark step toward ending what it says is a pervasive pattern of racism in the criminal-justice system.

Perdue, a Democrat who supports capital punishment, agreed.

"While our criminal-justice system will continue to have the death penalty, racial disparities have no place, no place whatso­ever, in North Carolina's criminal-justice system," she said.

GOP legislators and district attorneys in the state opposed the law, saying that it will become much more difficult to obtain death sentences for the worst criminals.

Similarly, most Republicans protested the new smoking ban, which Rep. Hugh Holliman, D-Davidson, had been trying to pass in various forms for the past five years. He narrowly succeeded this year, and when the law takes effect on Jan. 2, 2010, smoking will be illegal inside nearly all bars and restaurants.

It's a once-unthinkable policy shift for a state that continues to lead the nation in tobacco production.

The only exemptions in the smoking ban are for cigar bars, country clubs and nonprofit fraternal groups. Near the end of the legislative session, some legislators briefly tried to carve out an exemption for hookah bars, but they withdrew their effort before it ever reached a vote.

Republicans criticized Democrats in the House and Senate for using their majorities to block bills supported by Republicans, including proposed constitutional amendments to ban same-sex marriage and limit the power of government to condemn property using eminent domain.

Overall, 470 new laws have been enacted in 2009, and as of early last night, another 108 bills were on Perdue's desk awaiting her signature.

The legislature is not scheduled to reconvene until May for its so-called short session. That session is devoted mainly to adjusting the state budget and considering bills that were approved by one out of two chambers in 2009.

■ James Romoser can be reached at 919-210-6794 or at jromoser@wsjournal.com.

This year in Raleigh

Here is a list of major bills considered during the just-ended legislative session:

Bills that passed

Name: No Texting While Driving, House Bill 9.

What it does: Bans people from sending text messages or checking e-mail while driving.

Status: Signed into law. Will take effect. Dec. 1.

Name: Comprehensive Sex Education, House Bill 88.

What it does: Requires schools to teach students more information about contraceptives and sexually transmitted diseases. Focus remains on abstinence until marriage. Parents can remove children from the new comprehensive classes.

Status: Signed into law. Will take effect in the 2010-11 school year.

Name: Anti-bullying Policies, Senate Bill 526.

What it does: Requires schools to adopt anti-bullying policies that explicitly protect certain characteristics, including sexual orientation.

Status: Signed into law. School districts have until the end of the year to adopt their policies.

Name: No Smoking on Prison Grounds, Senate Bill 167.

What it does: Extends a ban on smoking in prisons to cover the entire premises of all prisons. Also bans cell phones

Status: Awaiting governor's signature.

Name: Health Plan Bailout, Senate Bill 287.

What it does: Takes emergency steps to bail out the State Health Plan, which provides health insurance to state workers. Pumps $675 million into the plan, and cuts benefits and increases premiums for employees on the plan.

Status: Signed into law and has taken effect.

Name: Coastal Insurance Plan, House Bill 1305.

What it does: In the event of a catastrophic hurricane along the coast, homeowners across the state would have to pay a surcharge to help pay for damages if a state plan known as the Beach Plan isn't sufficient to cover the damages.

Status: Awaiting governor's signature.

Name: Ban Salvia, Senate Bill 138.

What it does: Bans the recreational use of salvia divinorum, a mintlike herb that can be smoked as a hallucinogenic.

Status: Awaiting governor's signature.

Name: Apple Incentives, Senate Bill 575.

What it does: Creates $46 million worth of tax breaks for Apple Inc., which agreed to build a data center in Catawba County. The center would create about 50 jobs. Apple must invest about $1 billion over nine years.

Status: Signed into law and has taken effect.

Name: Nonpartisan School Board, House Bill 833.

What it does: Changes the Winston-Salem/Forsyth County school board from a partisan board to a nonpartisan one. The board was one of the few school boards in the state whose members were elected on a partisan basis.

Status: Will take effect starting with the 2010 school- board elections.

Name: Grandfather Mountain State Park, House Bill 128.

What it does: Authorizes Grandfather Mountain to become a new state park.

Status: Signed into law and has taken effect.

Bills that died

Name: Yadkin River Trust, Senate Bill 967.

What it does: Create a "Yadkin River Trust" that would take control of four hydroelectric dams on the Yadkin River currently operated by Alcoa Inc.

Status: Passed the Senate, but voted down by the House.

Name: Unborn Victims of Violence, House Bill 1503 and other similar bills.

What it does: Would create a separate criminal offense for injury to a fetus during the commission of a crime against a pregnant woman.

Status: Never got a hearing before any legislative committee.

Name: Marriage Amendment, Senate Bill 272 and House Bill 361.

What it does: Would provide for a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

Status: Never got a hearing before any legislative committee.

Name: Eminent Domain Amendment, House Bill 1268.

What it does: Would provide for a state constitutional amendment prohibiting government from using eminent domain to take property for the sake of economic development.

Status: Approved by two House committees but never got a vote in the full House.

Name: Companies that Profited from Slavery, House Bill 691.

What it does: Would require companies that have contracts with the state to disclose any profits they once gained from slavery.

Status: Never got a hearing before any legislative committee.

Bills eligible to return in the 2010 session

Name: Annexation Reform, House Bill 524.

What it does: Would make many changes to the state's annexation law to add new protections to residents. Would allow residents targeted for annexation to trigger a referendum of the city and the annexation area before the annexation could go forward.

Status: Passed the House; remains eligible in the Senate.

Name: Wind Energy, Senate Bill 1068.

What it does: Would explicitly ban the commercial production of wind energy on the mountain ridges of Western North Carolina.

Status: Passed the Senate; remains eligible in the House.