New Republican Majority Can Remake General Assembly Staff

Some states have permanent partisan staff; N.C., others use nonpartisan model

RALEIGH (By Karen McMahan, Carolina Journal Online) — The incoming Republican majority at the North Carolina General Assembly will have to decide how best to deploy the legislature’s professional staff to achieve its policy goals.

Since Democrats held continuous control of the General Assembly for more than a century — with the exception of four years in the 1990s when the parties shared power — and the majority party controls the size, organization, and composition of legislative staffing, the GOP has not held this much sway over staffing in modern history.

While other states use a variety of models to handle administrative and policy-making duties, Republican legislative leaders contacted by 'Carolina Journal' — including the party’s nominees for speaker of the House, Thom Tillis of Mecklenburg County, House majority leader, Paul Stam of Wake County, and Senate president pro tem, Phil Berger of Rockingham County — declined to respond to questions asking what changes, if any, they plan for the 2011 session.

(Tillis told 'The News & Observer' that he expects few members of the policymaking staff would be replaced by the incoming leadership.)

Even so, Republicans could modify significantly the structure and personnel of the legislative staff, or leave the existing system in place.