Trudy Brown has resigned from the N.C. Board of Electrolysis Examiners after the N.C. Board of Ethics found that her efforts to push a bill aiding electrologists who use lasers amounted to using her professional position for personal gain.

Brown was chairwoman of the board, which licenses and regulates electrologists. She is an electrologist with offices in High Point and Greensboro.

Brown got into trouble for asking her colleagues to contribute $5,000 each to help raise a total of $100,000 to pay for efforts to get the legislation passed.

Last month, the ethics board found that Brown's actions benefited those electrologists who use or want to use the lasers and hurt those who don't.

The bill cleared the House last year, but has not passed the Senate.

Brown said in her resignation letter to House Speaker Jim Black, who had recommended her for the board, that she did nothing wrong and was only trying to protect North Carolina consumers by working to pass the legislation.

Black's e-mails may be lost

Federal authorities investigating several controversies related to Black's political and legislative activities may not get their hands on hundreds of documents they sought from the House leader.

Dennis McCarty, the legislature's information systems director, said Tuesday that e-mail messages from 2000 through 2002 may not be retrievable from legislative computer systems. He said the system was not designed to protect them, as it does legislation and financial documents.

"We're really going back in time where we never intended to go," McCarty said.

In October, federal authorities served subpoenas on Black's legislative office seeking written and electronic documents on nearly 30 relevant parties that go as far back as Jan. 1, 2000. The three missing years of e-mail messages would cover some periods of legislative activity of interest to federal prosecutors.

In late 2002, for example, then-Rep. Michael Decker of Forsyth County had been rebuffed by House Republicans in his bid for a leadership position, setting in motion his switch to the Democratic Party. That switch helped Black remain speaker in a power-sharing agreement with Republican Rep. Richard Morgan of Moore County.

So far, Black's office has turned over roughly 3,500 pages of documents in response to the subpoenas. Black's attorney, Ken Bell of Charlotte, had said in January that the office had expected to turn over more documents once the older e-mail messages were located.

McCarty said it is still possible the messages could turn up, but he could make no promises.

"We're working on it like crazy," McCarty said.

Crafts in the mansion

Mary Easley is turning the Executive Mansion into an art museum.

Well, sort of.

On Tuesday, North Carolina's first lady announced the Governor's Craft Exhibition, which will put the works of more than 20 North Carolina artists on display at the mansion in Raleigh.

"North Carolina is proud to be home to many of the best artists in the nation," Easley said in a statement. "The Governor's Craft Exhibition will showcase this amazing talent ..."

The exhibit can be viewed as part of a tour of the mansion. To schedule a tour, call 807-7948. For more information about the exhibit, visit www.ncculture.com.

Groups push higher wage

A coalition of groups who support increasing the state's minimum wage is announcing a new statewide campaign today.

North Carolinians for Fair Wages includes the N.C. NAACP, N.C. Council of Churches, N.C. AFL-CIO and the Institute for Southern Studies. They want to convince lawmakers this year to support an 85-cent increase in the minimum wage, which would bring it up to $6 an hour.

The House passed the increase as part of legislation that also provided a health insurance tax credit to small businesses, but the Senate so far has not signed on.

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