New look likely for 'old boy' decor in mansion

While Gov.-elect Beverly Perdue hasn't had a lot of time to check out her new home, she's already kicking around ideas for a few changes to the Executive Mansion.

There's an office in the downtown Raleigh home that's a tad too masculine in decor for her taste, she said on Wednesday. So she's thinking about brightening it up, perhaps with a coat or two of paint.

Perdue also has asked the groundskeeper at the mansion to put a swing set on the grounds for her grandchildren and the staff's children when they visit.

"It just reflects her family values," said Chrissy Pearson, one of Perdue's staff members.

Perdue said that after she takes office she hopes to walk through the house on Sunday with a friend to see what needs to be changed for her personal taste.

Price gets parks post

North Carolina's senior Democrat in Congress has expanded his reach on the powerful House Appropriations Committee.

U.S. Rep. David Price, a Chapel Hill Democrat, was added to the spending panel that oversees environmental issues and the national parks. Price was named this week to the House Subcommittee on Interior, the Environment and Related Agencies.

The subcommittee's jurisdiction includes the Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA's largest research facility is in Research Triangle Park. The National Institute of Environment Health Sciences also is in RTP.

Price will continue his role as chairman of the subcommittee on Homeland Security. That post gives him jurisdiction for the nation's spending on airport security, border security, federal emergency response and other homeland security issues.

He also will keep his post on the Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development and Related Agencies.

Hackney makes the cover

Speaker Joe Hackney is an unusual pick for cover boy.

The Chapel Hill Democrat, a mustachioed cattle farmer and divorce lawyer, is not as good-looking as Brad Pitt, as charismatic as Will Smith or as omnipresent as Barack Obama. But Governing magazine is not GQ, Entertainment Weekly or, um, every magazine currently in publication.

Its cover story, "Legislatures in 2009" (see what we mean?), highlights Hackney as a "squeaky clean" reformer who came to power as former Speaker Jim Black fell from grace.

Still, the magazine says Hackney was not the consensus choice. "He attributes that to his cleaner-than-thou image," the article reports. " 'When you're running for speaker,' he says, 'that's a help with some people and a hindrance with others.' But most members recognized the chance Hackney's reputation offered them to begin rebuilding public trust. He was elected speaker after four caucus ballots."

The article notes that Hackney has grown more business-friendly as his district has shifted away from Chapel Hill and into rural Chatham County, though he remains "perhaps the leading environmentalist" in the House.

It also says he has opened up the legislative process, allowing more time for debate and study and avoiding running roughshod over the Republican minority.

GOP post in his sights

A former Lee County commissioner is pondering a run for GOP chairman.

Chad Adams, who served on the Lee board of commissioners from 1998 to 2006, said he has been approached about replacing outgoing state party Chairwoman Linda Daves.

"The first couple calls, you think they're just being nice," he said. "But then a number of other calls came from people that I think a lot of, so I went home and talked to my wife."

Adams, 41, served as chairman of the Lee County Republican Party from 2000 to 2002 and as treasurer in the 1990s. A fifth-generation resident of Lee County, he is development vice president for the John Locke Foundation, raising money for the conservative think tank. He also serves as director of the related Center for Local Innovation, which focuses on local government.

If he ran, Adams said, he would focus on recruiting candidates for local office, boosting fundraising for the party and getting back "the conservative mantle on fiscal policy."

Former state Sens. Woody White and Fred Smith are considering a run for chairman, and Guilford County stockbroker Marcus Kindley is already running.