Election board secrecy OK'd

House panel says report, without names, would be disclosed

A House committee approved legislation Wednesday that would keep secret any advisory opinion issued by the State Board of Elections and information gathered in election complaints

The proposed changes drew a sharp rebuke from Bob Hall, research director for Democracy North Carolina, a campaign finance watchdog.

"It's just crazy," he said.

Rep. Melanie Goodwin, a Rockingham Democrat and chairwoman of the committee, said she sought the changes to encourage candidates and others to make sure they are following the law. She said some are afraid to do so because they fear their queries could be used against them. The legislation is patterned after the new state ethics law, which also closes off advisory opinions and investigative materials.

"We are trying to address that so people will feel encouraged to take part in the process," she said.

Those opinions would become public in an annual report, but the names of the parties involved would not be disclosed.

House Minority Leader Paul Stam, an Apex Republican, said the legislation would prevent candidates from learning what their opponents were doing during the campaign. Candidates could get clearance from the board for tactics that could win the election, and their opponents would be prohibited from learning about their methods until as much as a year later.

"This is about the future, and I don't think the future rules of the race ought to be secret," Stam said.

The legislation, which must go through another committee before it reaches the full House, also would prevent the State Board of Elections from releasing any information regarding its investigation into an election complaint until a hearing is held.

Hall called that unnecessary. He said the board already is required to close off information once an investigation uncovers possible criminal conduct. Shutting down access to information on cases that involve noncriminal matters, he said, makes it less likely that those who may have additional information could come forward.

The committee also approved legislation that brings the reporting threshold for campaign contributions back to $100 per person in an election. Last year, in the wake of a scandal in which optometrists were flooding legislative campaigns with $100 checks that had the payee lines blank, lawmakers lowered the threshold to $50.

Rep. Paul Luebke, a Durham Democrat, said the $50 limit needlessly created more paperwork for candidates and their staffs.

Rep. Carolyn Justice, a Pender County Republican, opposed the legislation, saying the latest political scandal involving Rep. Thomas Wright, a Wilmington Democrat, showed the need for better reporting. On Tuesday, the election board found that Wright had failed to disclose campaign contributions, accepted illegal corporate contributions and perjured himself in filing false campaign reports.

"I would just think that today of all days we would want to go the other way," Justice said.