One common concern about the relatively low pay for serving in North Carolina's part-time legislature is that requiring most members to hold other jobs creates ethical dilemmas and financial conflicts of interest.

Some committees where laws originate are loaded with representatives of the industries they regulate, such as insurance.

The advantage to the public is that lawmakers offer expertise in their field of work, which helps to educate their colleagues.

But it also allows members to push laws that promote their profession, or even help themselves.

Last year, for example, House Speaker Jim Black, a Matthews Democrat and optometrist, slipped a law into the state budget requiring eye exams for pre-kindergartners.

Also last year, two lawmakers who sell all-terrain vehicles opposed a law forbidding children younger than 8 to ride ATVs.

One of them, Republican Rep. Cary Allred of Burlington, protested angrily when his impartiality was questioned.

"Don't start pointing fingers at me when there are so many others in here" with potential conflicts, he said during a debate on the ATV bill. "I think we citizen legislators are supposed to talk about what we know about."

Under state law, legislators are free to propose and vote on laws that affect their livelihood.

And if they abstain from debates on laws that affect them, that deprives the legislature of their expertise, and their constituents lose a voice.

"It is hard to think in two directions: the common good, and your own self-interest," said Bob Hall, executive director of the private watchdog group Democracy North Carolina. "It's inherent when a person has an economic interest and they're trying to debate the public interest in regulating their business."

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