Lawmakers have wasted no time filing a number of bills that they hope will become law during the 2013 long session of the General Assembly.

Companion bills that would change the state’s unemployment insurance program have been filed in both the Senate and the House.  Click here to see the House bill. Click here to see the Senate bill.

A bill has been filed in the House that would provide temporary funding for group homes.

A bill to write North Carolina’s right-to-work law into the N.C. Constitution has also been introduced. That bill also includes a separate proposed constitutional amendment that would prohibit collective bargaining by public employees.

While we’re on constitutional amendments, proposed amendment banning eminent domain abuse has been introduced in the House, and a proposed amendment limiting the terms of the top leadership posts in the House and the Senate has been filed. Yet another proposed change to the supreme law of the state would have the governor appoint the superintendent of public instruction rather than having that position filled by election.

Another bill would set aside $10 million for compensation for victims of the state’s forced sterilization program that ended in the 1970s. A similar bill passed the House last year, but went nowhere in the Senate.

Another bill would require local governments calling for special elections to hold them on primary and general election dates.

Others include:

— Bills banning the state’s participation in the health benefit exchange program portion of the federal Obamacare law. Similar versions were filed in the House and the Senate. It would also reject the Medicaid expansion included in the bill.

— A closed government bill that would make information regarding concealed carry and handgun permits confidential. It would also allow concealed permit holders to carry guns in restaurants unless the restaurant owner has posted a sign banning such weapons.

— A bill beefing up career technical education in the state’s high schools.