Editorial: The Legislative Building

By Steve Tuttle

The editorial page columnists have had a jolly good time poking fun at a consultant's recommendation that the General Assembly spend $5.1 million fixing up the Legislative Building with new furniture and fixtures. One of the best lines was by Jim Jenkins in the Raleigh paper questioning the proposal to buy new desks for each of the 50 senators at $8,000 a pop. “One presumes,” he wrote, “(that the desks) will arrive not from the Mayflower Transit people but from the Mayflower itself.”

Admittedly, some of the proposals are ridiculous, notably the $200 trash cans for each of the 170 legislators. And the legislative panel that received the report did the right thing by quickly burying the consultant's proposal in a subcommittee.

But we shouldn't drop the idea of renovating the Legislative Building, which at 36 years old is badly showing its age. The desks and chairs in the House and Senate chambers are worn out. The carpets are threadbare. The vote-recording system is unreliable and often breaks down because it relies on technology that was state-of-the-art when cars had tailfins.

From the day it opened the Legislative Building has been a blessing and a curse. It was designed by famed architect Edward Durell Stone, whose other creations include the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington. And when it opened in 1963 it was praised by architectural critics as a modern marvel combining form and function with a striking, almost exotic appearance.

But most people who actually work in the building or visit it regularly will tell you that it's more of a mystery than a marvel. It's easy to get lost in because the four interior courtyards are identical and the room numbering system is confusing. It's dangerous; a pupil in a tour group fell through one of the glass pyramids on the roof and was killed. Dozens of visitors have unwittingly tumbled into the floor-level fountains. And it's a wonder that an OSHA inspector hasn't condemned the galleries because the low railings make it quite easy to fall onto the chamber floor below.

As importantly, the Legislative Building needs modern technology to speed up the legislative process and to reduce the mountains of paper that pile up in the chambers. Legislators can and should have laptop computers at their desks.

Making those prudent investments won't cost anywhere near $5.1 million, but it will cost a tidy sum. The General Assembly should press ahead with renovating the Legislative Building, and not worry about the columnists and their jokes.