The making of law in North Carolina is an insider game, full of murky corners and byzantine turns to the point that only the obsessive manage to keep track of it all. While in name all of our representatives wield power in the General Assembly, in reality an enormous amount of the ultimate decision making lies in the hands of a very small number of individuals. In the state Senate, for instance, Marc Basnight of Manteo has held sway over the body for over 15 years, and has enormous sway over which bills come to the floor and which don't. While having this much power concentrated in a single individual may be dangerous, to my eyes, Basnight's decisions are on the whole more good than bad. The second in command in the Senate, however, goes by a name that oddly seems to appear just about every time a worthwhile bill I support dies on procedural maneuvering, an under-the-table slop bucket gets passed to the UNC system (specifically Chapel Hill), or, as is the case today, a particularly odious budget suddenly slams out of the Senate. That name is Tony Rand, Majority Leader of the Senate.
His influence, however, is subtle enough that it rarely makes the news and is hard to nail down when trying to describe it to others. There's no smoking gun to pin on him that doesn't involve getting into bureaucratic bilgewater to some extent. Frankly, though, I'm getting sick of his nonsense, so here's an attempt to start taking note every time Rand shivs a bill, takes writing another into secret conference, or slips questionable powers to some agency in the dark of night.
Our first installment comes from the invaluable NC Policy Watch:
The Senate gave final approval to its version of the state budget
Thursday, though even if you happened to be at the Legislative Building
in Raleigh, you would have almost certainly missed it. The Senator who
represents you had no opportunity to say anything at all about how the
state should address a $4 billion shortfall and balance the budget,
much less offer any amendments to protect human services or spare
public schools from damaging cuts.
The Senate leadership made sure of that Wednesday when Majority
Leader Tony Rand invoked a parliamentary maneuver to end discussion
after budget writers described the plan's highlights, a few Republicans
complained, and a few amendments were buried.
Under the Senate rules, ending the debate on Wednesday also ended it Thursday before it could begin.
There wasn't much discussion of the amendments either. Rand moved to
table each one not long after they were explained and several of his
Democratic colleagues enthusiastically vied to second his motion.
If you are tempted to brush all this off as a boring legislative
procedure, resist the urge. The process is not only undemocratic and
offensive, it is a symbol of the worst of the legislative culture.
For further reading on Tony Rand, while I don't have links handy, other interesting instances are: Rand killing a bill from Mickey Micheaux to give more magistrates and court staff to Durham County's horribly clogged and understaffed judicial system; Rand getting a bill to give all recipients of athletic scholarships at UNC and NCSU (and no other schools) in-state tuition; Rand giving UNC eminent domain power in all of Orange County for the purposes of building another airport. More to come, I have no doubt.
* I want to note that I spent a good while with the thesaurus trying to come up with the right word here. "Corruption" is a tad too strong for Rand, and I worry that "rot" is too. Rand is bad for North Carolina, capricious in his decision making, and infuriating in his politics, but I have no evidence that he takes kick-backs or bribes. (At least, no more than the standard campaign contribution racket.)
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