Meredith Norris is truly a treasure; no wonder Speaker Jim Black liked keeping her around. Norris’ latest insight into Black’s political machine in Raleigh concerns North Carolina’s lobbying laws, or lack thereof. Here’s Norris spinning the rather modest set of lobbying reforms the legislature passed in August, you know the disclosure requirements that exposed payments to Black insiders from lotto companies, among other things:
“This issue has been brewing for the past couple of years because the Sec. of State decided she needed an issue to ‘make her own’ and formed a lobbying study commission — not sanctioned by the legislature,” Norris said in e-mail Aug. 12 to Ronnie Bryant, president of the Charlotte Regional Partnership, one of seven such economic development partnerships serving the state.
Norris also wrote, “NC does have relatively lax laws compared to other states, but as I have said, it works well here, and there have been no mishaps with the lobbyists or the legislators.”
Whoops!
And you’ll recall Ronnie Bryant, the Regional Partnership chief who came to Charlotte in the summer from Pittsburgh. There Bryant’s singular achievement seems to have been building a $20 million fuel-cell plant that was never occupied. Poor guy lands here and within days Norris, CRP’s lobbyist, is filling his head with the world according to Jim Black.
