A House bill approved Monday night would allow the unemployed to collect both severance pay and unemployment.
HB 1090: Currently, severance pay is considered the same as regular wages. The reality, said Rep. William Wainwright, is that a person only gets severance pay if they are out of work.
"Many employers have stated that severance pay is a matter between the employer and the employee," said Wainwright, a Havelock Democrat. "The employee is legitimately unemployed."
The cost of the change would be a small fraction of the amount paid for unemployment benefits, Wainwright said.
HB 1190: Shifts the burden for storing DNA evidence from the clerks of court to the law enforcement agency that is investigating a case. Law enforcement is better equipped to store the evidence, said Rep. Rick Glazier, a Fayetteville Democrat and co-sponsor of the bill.
The bill specifies which evidence should be preserved and for how long. It also includes penalties for the possibility that evidence could be willfully and maliciously destroyed.
Rep. Paul Stam, an Apex Republican and co-sponsor of the bill, said the bill was meant to help courts reach the correct result.
"It's about guilt and innocence about separating the sheep from the goats, about convicting the guilty and acquitting the innocent," Stam said.
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