An effort this week to help drum up interest in a bill to support past victims of forced sterilization in the state had an unfortunate opening line.

“Good Morning Eugenics Supporters,” read the e-mail sent from Rep. Larry Womble’s office.

Womble, a Winston-Salem Democrat, has been a longtime supporter of reparations for the more than 7,600 estimated people who were sterilized in the state’s former eugenics program. He also is a key sponsor of a bill calling for, among other things, the development of counseling services for eugenics victims, reports April Bethea of The Charlotte Observer.

That bill will be heard Tuesday by the House Education committee. The e-mail urged recipients to attend the meeting to show their support.

Tiffany Jones, an intern in Womble’s office who sent the e-mail, said the message was meant to notify bill supporters and the media that it was on the calendar.

She said the opening line hadn’t drawn any complaints, but noted “it wasn’t intended to offend anyone.”

State legislators have now asked for $363.2 million.

Eleven more bills filed since Dome last checked have added another $181.3 million in requested spending, even as the state faces a $2 billion shortfall.

The largest request of the most recent batch — or any bill to date — is $173 million for compensation of victims of the state's eugenics program. That's $154 million more than the amount requested in a similar House bill for compensation.

The smallest requests are $50,000 each for the Arthritis Foundation to run programs in Charlotte and Our Children's Place to run a prison mothers program.

Other spending bills would pay for a community college mentoring program for minority males, help run a heart institute at East Carolina University, support the International Home Furnishings Market in High Point, fund programs at the N.C. Arts Council, build a John Coltrane Music Hall in High Point and build a new campus for Stanly Community College.

Another bill is a companion to money already requested for the state Housing Trust Fund.

In all the requests amount to 18 percent of the estimated shortfall.

The bills also call for another $4.9 million to be spent next year, bringing the total to $32.9 million for 2010-11 requests.

Ongoing coverage of spending bills is available here.

A bill filed today would give victims of the state's sterilization program $20,000 each.

The legislation, filed by four House Democrats, would make one-time cash payments to the estimated 2,000 to 2,800 North Carolinians sterilized by a state eugenics program that ran from 1929 through the 1970s.

The total cost could be between $40 and $56 million.

Rep. Larry Womble, a Winston-Salem Democrat and one of the primary sponsors, said that he expects a lot of resistance from legislators worried about the state's potential $2 billion shortfall. But he said compensation is the right thing to do.

"The state committed a wrong against innocent people," he said. "This was worse than Nazi Germany."

A working committee came up with the figure on its own, since it could not find any similar compensation efforts to model. Womble said that he considers it far too low, but it was the best they could do.

"There is no amount of money that can restore their dignity or replace what the state took away from them," he said. "Their bloodline has been cut. They cannot continue their family name because the state did this horrific thing to the insides of their bodies." 

A few more bills have been filed in the House:

H.B. 15: Military Family Assistance Center / Funds, Rep. Cullie Tarleton

H.B. 16: Retired Judge May Perform Marriage, Rep. Russell Tucker

H.B. 17: Asheboro Satellite Annexation, Rep. Harold Brubaker

H.B. 18: Speech Language Pathologist Qualifications, Rep. Bill Faison

H.B. 19: MLK's 80th Birthday / Obama Inauguration, Reps. Larry Womble, Paul Luebke, Jennifer Weiss, Earline Parmon

H.B. 20: Compensate Eugenics Sterilization Survivors, Reps. Womble, Parmon, Ronnie Sutton and Martha Alexander

An exhibit will chronicle the state's eugenics programs.

The N.C. Department of Health and Human Services will unveil an interactive exhibit at the N.C. Museum of History tonight that features interviews with victims and historians.

North Carolina began its eugenics program in 1929 with a law that endorsed sterilization of people who had epilepsy and physical and mental illnesses. But it was also used against young girls who had engaged in premarital sex.

The program did not end until 1974. Research by Dr. Johanna Schoen featured in the exhibit shows that it continued even though eugenics theory was largely discredited by then. 

One woman featured in the exhibit was told her family's welfare benefits would be canceled if she refused to be sterilized.