NC budget fires Environmental Management Commission

North Carolina's base appropriations budget, ratified Thursday, fires all current members of the state's environmental rule-making board effective next Wednesday.

The move gives Gov. Pat McCrory and the Republican-led legislature, which has targeted environmental regulation as a drag on business, a clean slate to remake the powerful Environmental Management Commission. The commission is charged with adopting rules protecting air and water resources.

The budget pares the commission's 19 members to 15, nine appointed by the governor and six by legislators. It retains most of the specialty positions on the board, such as experts in air and water pollution, biology, agriculture and manufacturing.

McCrory named Charlotte attorney Benne Hutson, whose term was scheduled to end in mid-2014, as EMC chairman effective July 8. Ten members' terms expired June 30.

The budget also fires all but four members of the 15-member Coastal Resources Commission, which adopts rules and policies on coastal development.

Expertise to be represented on the board would continue to include coastal development, engineering, agriculture, fishing and forestry. The board will no longer have designated seats for marine ecology and conservation.

The legislation also pares the state Clean Water Management Trust Fund board from 21 to nine members, but adds language charging the board with land preservation in addition to protecting water resources. The fund had been the state's largest conservation grant source until recent years, when appropriations to it were slashed.