The House Finance committee began what promises to be a long day of debating whether to pass $940 million in new taxes.

"Is there any part of this bill I'm going to like?" asked Rep. Curtis Blackwood, a Matthews Republican.

"There's nothing in any of this that anybody likes," said Rep. Pryor Gibson, a Wadesboro Democrat. "This is the least painful thing that we could come up with...There's no pride in this document."

Opponents found fault with the taxes. The taxes would hurt business and state residents. The budget cuts aren't as painful as Democrats have led on, and the tax package is unfair since Republicans weren't in on the discussion, opponents said.

"You made cuts to where you know enough people would scream," said Rep. John Blust, a Greensboro Republican. 

Supporters of the tax countered that the package was the only way to fend off the  most hurtful cuts to education and social services.

"With this package, we restore the thigns that make North Caroilna great," said Rep. Deborah Ross, a Raleigh Democrat. 

House members had concerns about a bill that would add teachers who are convicted of having sex with students to the sex offender registry.

Currently teachers or school employees are added to the registry if they are convicted of taking indecent liberties with a student younger than 16. The bill would cover all K-12 students.

Rep. Curtis Blackwood, a Matthews Republican said he was worried about a scenario in which high school students are dating. One student graduates and goes to work for the school.

"He or she is going to be labelled a sex offender for continuing the relationship," Blackwood said.

Rep. Rick Glazier, a Fayetteville Democrat, said the indecent liberties law includes a provision that the incident is a felony only if the age difference is four years or greater.

"This statute is about a teacher having sex with a student," Glazier said.

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Recent House bills of note:

H.B. 338: Stimulus Funds/Contractors Must Use E-Verify, Rep. Pat McElraft

H.B. 339: Taxpayer Transparency Act, Reps. McElraft, Pat Hurley, Curtis Blackwood and Hugh Blackwell

H.B. 344: Employers Must Use E-Verify Program, Reps. Wil Neumann and George Cleveland

H.B. 351: Party Change During Early Voting, Rep. Cary Allred

H.B. 361: Defense of Marriage, Reps. David Lewis, James Crawford, Pearl Burris-Floyd and Dewey Hill

H.B. 362: Access to Higher Education, Rep. Pricey Harrison, Paul Luebke, Rick Glazier and Verla Insko

A bill would make it a crime to smuggle illegal immigrants.

Rep. Curtis Blackwood filed legislation this week that would make it a felony to transport for profit a person reasonably believed to be in the country illegally.

The Union County Republican said that he was not aware of any large-scale smuggling operations into North Carolina, which is more than 1,200 miles from the Mexican border.

But he said that the new law would give local law enforcement officials another tool when dealing with illegal immigrants.

"It makes perfect sense that if you're smuggling illegals in, you're breaking the law," he said.

The law also includes wording that says the person charged must have reason to believe they were smuggling an illegal immigrant other than the person's race, religion or nationality.

Correction: An earlier version of this post misstated his county.

The SEIU PAC spent $410,569 on North Carolina races in 2008.

The political action committee of the Service Employees International Union, which is affiliated with the State Employees Association of North Carolina, spent $323,069 on independent expenditures, including mailers and phone banks, and gave $83,500 to candidates, according to campaign finance reports.

The biggest expense was $147,279 spent on mailers opposing Republican gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory. The union did not spend on any other statewide races.

The group also spent $100,568 on unsuccessful candidate Chuck Stone, who came in fourth out of five Democratic primary candidates for Democratic Sen. John Kerr's seat in May.

And it spent $40,510 opposing Republican Rep. Curtis Blackwood and supporting a primary challenger and $34,711 on opposing incumbent Republican Rep. Leo Daughtry and supporting a Democratic challenger.

Among direct contributions, the union gave to 33 Democratic candidates and three Republicans and donated another $4,000 to the N.C. Democratic Party.

SEIU donated to a dozen Democratic incumbents who were unopposed in either the primary or general elections, including $4,000 apiece to Senate president Marc Basnight and House Speaker Joe Hackney.

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Like an extra scene after the credits, the legislature came back today.

In its first act, the House seated newly appointed Rep. Ken Furr. The Albemarle Republican replaces former Rep. David Almond, who resigned last month after a personnel complaint.

After the governor's veto message was read, Rep. Cullie Tarleton took the opportunity to praise Appalachian State University's football team for its upset win over the University of Michigan last weekend.

"This was the all-time football upset," said the Blowing Rock Democrat.

Rep. Curtis Blackwood then thanked his colleagues for their thank-you notes and flowers after his father's funeral.

Oh, and that veto? The House went into recess so that Democrats could go back to caucus at 2:45. House Republicans will caucus at 3 p.m., "so we can find out what the Democrats" are doing, as Minority Leader Paul Stam put it.

No word yet on what House Democrats are thinking about the veto, but if they had walked in with the votes for an override, they probably would have just done it.

State college campuses could soon go smoke-free.

Under a bill that passed in the House today, the University of North Carolina Board of Governors would be allowed to write smoking policies for dorms, buildings and grounds.

House Majority Leader Hugh Holliman, who lost a fight earlier in the session for a smoking ban in restaurants, stressed that the bill would not force all campuses to go smoke-free.

"This bill is permissive, it is not mandatory," he said.

The House approved the bill 104-3. It now heads back to the Senate for concurrence.

Update: The three noes were from Republican Reps. Curtis Blackwood of Matthews, George Cleveland of Jacksonville and Bryan Holloway of King.

Correction: An earlier version of this post misstated where the bill goes next.