Local bill changing how Wake County commissioners are elected moves forward
A state bill that would change how Wake County commissioners are elected received a favorable vote from its first North Carolina General Assembly committee, despite objections from some Wake County Democrats.
State Rep. Erin Paré, the sole Republican in Wake County’s legislative delegation, filed the local bill to make the Wake County commissioners elections nonpartisan and require that commissioners be elected by district, instead of by the county at large.
It’s the most recent attempt by the state to change how Wake County commissioners are elected since Democrats took control of the seven-person board in 2014.
“It’s very unlikely that the GOP will take control of the Wake County Board of Commissioners,” Paré said when The News & Observer previously asked if the bill was aimed at getting Republicans elected. “This is not about electing a certain person from a certain political party.
“This is about the people of a district having the confidence in the system,” she said. “That this is not a taxation without representation situation. That they have someone that they can go to. That (someone) is representing them and their interests.”
The Wake County Board of Commissioners held a work session Monday morning that included a meeting with the county’s lobbyist, Philip Isley, a former Raleigh City Council member.
“It’s capable of moving,” Isley said of the bill.
“There’s still a right good ways for that bill to travel and there are opportunities or amendments that might make it a little more palatable, or less palatable,” Isley said. “So it is a long process, but these are some of the first bills that are actually moving.”
‘Bad precedent’
More than 30 people signed up to speak during the House Local Government committee meeting Tuesday morning, including former elected officials and commissioner candidates.
“Wake County is now larger in population than eight states,” Paré said. “And it’s larger than every U.S. House district. One of those states, Montana, now has two congressional districts. Yet we require all candidates to run countywide in Wake. And that does not make sense. The voices of smaller towns and communities around Wake are overwhelmed by Wake’s population centers.”
Donna Williams, chair of the Wake County Republican Party, attended the committee meeting and said residents “deserve transparency and honesty, that’s that.”
“These are citizens that are very much wanting to be represented in an equal and fair way in Wake County,” she said in an interview with The News & Observer.
Former Wake County Commissioner Phil Matthews, who lost reelection in 2014, said if Wake County school board election is nonpartisan, the commissioners election should be too.
“I can find no reason in God’s will why anybody would be against this bill,” he said. “It serves the people.”
State Rep. Julie von Haefen, a Democrat who serves on the committee, voted against the bill and said it sets a bad precedent for the state.
“I would hope that the members of this committee will consider that when voting on this bill,” she said. “If we vote for our county commissioners to be nonpartisan, what’s to say that this won’t happen in your county?”
The bill ‘came out of left field’
On Monday, Wake Commissioner Vickie Adamson said the bill “came out of left field.” She said one of the reasons provided for having nonpartisan commissioners is that unaffiliated voters make up the largest voting block.
“If that’s the case, why wouldn’t the (races for) judges and the legislators coming from Wake County also be nonpartisan?” she said.
She noted other North Carolina counties also have large blocks of unaffiliated voters.
“So why would you laser-focus in on us if this is a huge problem that requires legislative action without us requesting it?” she asked.
The Wake County Democratic Party also released a statement in response to the bill, condemning it for a lack of transparency, its “unmerited challenge” to Wake County’s local control and “obvious intent” to single out Wake County.
“In summary, as our commissioners are out working on behalf of Wake County, a Republican member of the N.C. House files a bill to remove local control of Wake County governance, drastically changing how Wake’s voters elect their Board of Commissioners,” according to the statement. “This is nothing other than an extreme NC GOP partisan attempt to suppress votes and assert control over local Wake County affairs.”
Kyle Ingram contributed to this report.
This story was originally published February 20, 2023 at 2:16 PM.
