With the Senate considering landmark legislation overhauling the health care system, North Carolina groups supporting Democratic proposals are stepping up their lobbying efforts.

The North Carolina chapter of Organizing for America, the grassroots effort of the Democratic National Committee, plans to have phone banks working today in Carrboro, Raleigh, Charlotte, Hendersonville, Asheville, Wilmington and Fayetteville, Rob Christensen reports. The phone banks are part of a national effort by the Obama organization to make 100,000 calls on Tuesday.

President Barack Obama is expected to talk to people working the phone banks by way of a simulcast hook up this evening.

This morning, Congressman Bob Etheridge is holding a health care discussion at the downtown Raleigh YWCA targeted at seniors and retirees. Members of the State Employees Association of North Carolina will be at several college campuses making calls to the office of Democratic Sen. Kay Hagan urging her to pass "real health care reform." Hagan has been vague as to what form of health care legislation she will support.

After two scrubbed launches, State Employees Association of North Carolina Executive Director Dana Cope appeared on NBC's Today Show to criticize a new policy that puts state employees who are obese or smokers in a more expensive health plan.

Cope was featured in a story postponed from Thursday's and, then, Friday's shows that highlighted the changes in the state employees health plan that take effect in the next two years. North Carolina is only the second state to impose the financial penalty on the obese.

State health plan officials are aiming to both improve workers' health and bring down medical costs. Smoking and obesity are both linked to a variety of maladies that are expensive to treat. On the show, Cope emphasized his organization's criticism that the health plan is pushing penalties for bad lifestyles instead of rewards for good health.

"It’s all stick and no carrots," Cope said. "There’s a proper way to do that and it’s not all based on punishment. It should be incentives built in."

Here's a link to the whole story.  

The State Employees Association of N.C. has selected Rep. Nelson Dollar as its legislator of the year.

Dollar, a Cary Republican, received the award for his work on legislation affecting the State Health Plan and potential furloughs for state employees. The award was presented last week at the employee association's convention and was meant to show appreciation to Dollar for his work on behalf of the state's working families, said a spokeswoman for SEANC, which has 55,000 members. 

The award is presented by the association's political action committee and is named for Lisa B. Mitchell, a SEANC member who was active in building the organization's political action committee. Mitchell died last year after a battle with cancer.

Gov. Beverly Perdue says she knows state employees have been forced to do more with less but reassured them that things are getting better.

"There are rays of hope ahead for our economy, but we have a mountain of challenges right in front of us," Perdue said in remarks prepared for the annual meeting of the State Employees Association in Greensboro over the weekend, the AP reports.

North Carolina had a $4.7billion budget shortfall this year, the largest in the state's history, Perdue said.

"It doesn't matter where you work -- in our prisons, hospitals or state agencies -- you see that we're forced to cut back, to do more with less, because of a recession we inherited," she said.

Perdue said she is working with the state personnel director to improve benefits for state employees, including adding $10,000 of accidental death benefits at no cost and a hands-on wellness program. (N&O)

State employees and community activists are planning to protest a health care conference Friday morning.

The State Employees Association of North Carolina will be on the west side of 400 S. Salisbury St. on Friday at 9 a.m. to protest a meeting between health care lobbyists and Triangle CEOs, including Bob Greczyn of Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina.

The group will be calling for health care reform and a public option to make it more affordable.

"SEANC is demanding that Blue Cross put North Carolina citizens first instead of fighting a public health care option that will provide affordability, choice and competition to Blue Cross' 72.5 percent market share in North Carolina," SEANC stated in a press release.

The rally comes on the heels of another protest by SEANC last week outside of Blue Cross's corporate offices in Durham.

Update: SEANC has sent out a corrected press release, noting that the event will be at the Sheraton Hotel on Salisbury Street in Raleigh.

SEANC is airing more ads against state legislators.

The State Employees Association of North Carolina is running radio ads against Reps. Ray Rapp of Madison County and Van Braxton of Lenoir County, both Democrats. 

As part of an ongoing campaign, ads criticize the legislators for voting for a bill designed to keep the State Health Plan afloat.

"Legislators need to understand this issue is not going away," said Executive Director Dana Cope in a statement. "We will hold them accountable when they make bad decisions, and SEANC will educate constituents when their legislators decide to put a multi-million dollar nonprofit's interests ahead of North Carolina taxpayers."

Previous ads have targeted Senate Majority Leader Hugh Holliman and Reps. Margaret Dickson, Bruce Goforth and Pryor Gibson. 

SEANC is running ads against two state lawmakers.

The State Employees Association of North Carolina will run radio ads criticizing Democratic Reps. Pryor Gibson of Anson County and Bruce Goforth of Buncombe County.

The ads criticize the legislators' votes for a fix to the State Health Plan that would raise costs for state workers.

"Representative Bruce Goforth voted to raise the cost of health care for the State’s working families, making North Carolina forty-ninth in its employees' family coverage, while the State had a no-bid contract with the non-profit Blue Cross Blue Shield that pays their CEO over 4 million dollars," one ad notes.

The ads are another salvo in an ongoing fight between SEANC, which represents 55,000 state workers, and the legislature during a tight budget year.

Gibson told The Insider that he is married to a state employee and could not understand the logic of the attack.

SEANC wants a bill on the State Health Plan reconsidered.

In a letter to Speaker Joe Hackney, State Employees Association of N.C. head Dana Cope wrote that a recent ethics allegation raises questions about the way a recent House bill was handled.

In the letter, Cope alleges that an insurance company lobbied a state legislator to get the bill killed, and that the matter was referred to the State Bureau of Investigation. 

Earlier this month, the Legislative Ethics Committee reported that a lawmaker said he was approached by a lobbyist with an offer to get a constituent's debt forgiven in exchange for killing a bill. 

Though Cope names names, committee members did not identify either the legislator or the lobbyist, and neither they nor Attorney General Roy Cooper's office would confirm if the SBI was investigating.

Cope argued that the allegations over the House bill raise questions about fixes to the State Health Plan signed into law by Gov. Beverly Perdue, since the insurance company was consulted by legislators about the State Health Plan fix.

"It seems inconceivable to me that anyone would have faith in in the vote on that bill after recent events," Cope said in the letter.

He asked for Hackney to order the House to reconsider the State Health Plan bill.

The State Employees Association of North Carolina is not happy with a handful of judges.

The association, in its latest legislative newsletter, criticized judges who declined to voluntarily take a 0.5 percent pay cut. Most of the state's judges went along with the request by Gov. Beverly Perdue, who ordered such a cut for other state employees.

But Perdue does not have the authority, under the state constitution, to cut the pay of other elected officials.

About 20 North Carolina judges have refused to volunteer for the cut in pay, although some have said they will donate the amount of the cut to charitable or other causes.

That didn't sit well with SEANC.

"Those judges should be ashamed!" the association wrote in its newsletter.

Elected officials should show leadership and do their part to help the state during such an incredible financial crisis. To refuse to participate along with the working people is elitist and wrong! Every person on the state payroll should share the burden of balancing the budget. At a time when working families are struggling to put food on the table and gas in the car, it is repugnant that any elected official would not voluntarily comply with the same standard. The judges refusing to volunteer to help are a mix of Republicans and Democrats, which means the refusal is not a party line issue. 

Another SEANC ad targets Rep. Hugh Holliman.

The State Employees Association of North Carolina is running a radio ad criticizing the Democratic Majority Leader for supporting a temporary fix to the State Health Plan.

"Hugh Holliman has his priorities wrong," the ad says. "He's part of the problem when he needs to be part of the solution. Maybe it's time for new leadership in the North Carolina legislature."

It also quotes the editorial board of the Greenville Daily Reflector, which said "lawmakers should be ashamed" and called the health plan bill "unconscionable."

Another SEANC ad criticizes Rep. Margaret Dickson for supporting the bill.

After the jump, the script.

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