SALISBURY — Rowan County representatives filed more bills during the past few days as primary sponsors, with effects ranging from deferred acceptance to UNC system schools for military members to making changes to the state firefighter and rescue squad pension fund.

House Bill 69, or the Veteran Educational Promise Act was filed by Representative Grant Campbell on Thursday. The bill aims to increase educational possibilities, primarily by requiring University of North Carolina system institutions to allow service members to defer their admissions by between two and five years, depending on their service status.

The bill would require universities to allow members of reserve components of the Armed Forces to defer their admission by up to two years. Active-duty service members would be able to defer their admissions by up to five years from their entry date.

The bill also adds the Space Force to the definition of Armed Forces and requires UNC schools to provide in-school tuition to all N.C. service members, regardless of their current residency status, if they fulfill certain requirements tying them to the state.

House Bill 37, titled Enhance Firefighter Benefits and Representation, was filed by Representative Julia Howard and aims to increase the pension for state firefighters and rescue workers.

The bill would increase the monthly pension benefit from $175 to $180 for eligible firefighters and rescue squad workers.

The bill would also change the composition of the NC Emergency Services Advisory Council, making it so that the state is required to include a member of the N.C. State Firefighters’ Association among the 21 members, making it so that the state’s fire service agency has a representative on the EMS board. The member would replace one of the six required members that represent the general public, credentialed and practicing EMS personnel, educators, local public health officials or other interest groups in North Carolina.

HB 37 was cosponsored by a long list of bipartisan representatives including Representative Harry Warren.

House Bill 48, titled Increase UI Max Benefit/2025 UI Tax Credit was introduced by Howard on Wednesday, with Warren representing another primary sponsor, and would temporarily ratify the effects of former Governor Roy Cooper’s Executive Order 322, which increased the unemployment benefit cap from $350 to $600 per week in the wake of Hurricane Helene.

HB 48 states that any executive order that “purports to expand unemployment insurance benefits” is declared “void ab initio,” meaning that it would be considered void from its beginning.

The bill would then repeal the executive order’s effects on March 1, with the bill reducing the cap to $400 on March 2.

The bill would also create a tax credit for contributions made by employers to the Unemployment Insurance fund for 2025.

That executive order was also the subject of another action in Senate Bill 382, passed in 2024, which made it so that the governor was unable to modify the Unemployment Security Law, which set the $350 cap. That portion of SB 382 also went into effect on March 1.

House Bill 53, titled Increase Accident Thresholds/Safe Driver Plan, was filed by Warren on Wednesday and would increase the property valuation involved in certain at-fault accident and traffic violation definitions, which affect insurance premiums.

The bill would increase major accidents to ones causing more than $5,975 in damages, intermediate to ones causing between $3,570 and $5,975 and minor to ones less than $3,570.

Campbell also filed House Bill 32, which matches a bill filed earlier by Senator Carl Ford that would move China Grove’s municipal elections from odd years to even years and change the current members of the town council’s terms accordingly.

As it currently stands, the bill would extend the sitting members of the council’s terms by a year in order to effect the change, meaning the terms for Don Bringle, Arthur Heggins and Cheryl Sheets would expire in 2026 while the terms for Rodney Phillips, Wayne Starnes and Lee Withers would run through 2028.

China Grove officials have been exploring the change for over a year. Members of the council have cited a potential increase in voter turnout and a decrease in costs for the town to hold their own elections as reasons to make the change.