Shaking up the establishment
Bob Orr, the mastermind behind the lawsuit against the incentives offered to Dell, is in the process of planning another suit. The latest target for the former N.C. Supreme Court justice is Amendment One, passed last November.
Orr says the ballot language used to describe the legislation hid the fact that people would give up their right to vote on bond issues. He has not said when he could file.
Amendment One allows cities and counties to create "development districts." Local governments could then issue bonds without taxpayer approval to support development projects in those districts. Taxes from those districts would repay the bonds.
In other Orr news, lawyers for Dell and for state and local governments issued motions to dismiss the Dell lawsuit today. One of the issues they cited as a reason it should be thrown out is that the N.C. Institute for Constitutional Law is not a business hurt by the incentives so it has no reason to file.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court last week decided to take a case, Cuno v. DaimlerChrysler, very similar to the one filed against the Dell incentives. It looks at whether incentives violate the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution and should be decided in June. Lawyers for both sides say the outcome would affect the state’s incentives laws.