The North Carolina Senate Finance Committee met Wednesday with an agenda that included a bill to eliminate sales tax on textbooks assigned by course instructors for postsecondary students.
After more than four months since the original filing of the bill on March 21, Sen. Daniel Clodfelter, the chair of the Finance Committee, agreed to include the legislation on Wednesday’s agenda. In preparation for the hearing, Sen. Harry Brown, the sponsor of the bill, invited student body leaders to attend the hearing and speak in support of the proposed sales tax relief.
As chair of the committee, Clodfelter allowed the bill to be heard near the end of the meeting. Bobby Mills, Student Body president and the scheduled speaker in support of the bill, had already left to attend another meeting. Greg Doucette, Student Senate president and senior in computer science, spoke instead. He emphasized the overall financial burden of textbooks on students.
“Textbooks cost each student an average of $900 each year,” Doucette said. “This bill would save students over $60 on average each year.”
After fielding questions from fellow committee members, Brown asked the senators to look to the 12 states that have already eliminated sales tax on textbooks for postsecondary students as a model for how it could be done in North Carolina.
Although Clodfelter allowed a brief discussion on the legislation, he chose not to have a vote taken on it in the committee.
Mills said he still believed it was worth his time to attend the hearing and show his support of the legislation for other reasons.
“I wanted to show my support because of the principle of the bill,” Mills said. “They might not support this, but it is an opportunity to show how students are greatly affected by the increasing cost of education.”