North Carolina lawmakers are advancing a bill that would encourage job cuts for government efficiency, an effort similar to the one playing out nationally.
The most powerful politician in the Senate, Republican leader Phil Berger, is sponsoring the so-called . DAVE is an acronym for a new Division of Accountability, Value, and Efficiency.
It would be led by the state auditor, Republican Dave Boliek.
If the bill becomes law, all state agencies would submit reports by Oct. 1 justifying their existence and explaining any vacancies that have gone unfilled for at least six months.
"My commitment is to do this in a non-partisan way that's data-centric," Boliek said Wednesday during a meeting of the Senate Committee on Regulatory Reform.
The bill is North Carolina's answer to the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. DOGE has gutted several federal agencies and left tens of thousands of federal employees without jobs.
Berger noted that in North Carolina, the auditor would not be empowered to fire other agencies' employees.
"The auditor has no authority to discharge anyone. He has the authority to identify problems, and any discharge or any elimination of positions would be left up to the General Assembly," Berger said.
DAVE will recommend eliminating positions, dissolving offices
DAVE would be required to recommend positions for elimination, as well as state offices or agencies that should be dissolved. Those findings would be due in a report to the General Assembly by Dec. 31.
As of February, state agencies employed around . There were over 14,000 vacancies.
Ardis Watkins, executive director of the State Employees Association of North Carolina, said that 20% vacancy rate could lead to massive force reductions. But Watkins also argued that many of those positions have remained vacant due to low pay.
"There's no parameters laid out to explain exactly what's assessed, how this data would work," Watkins said. "There's genuine concern around all of this."
Gov. Josh Stein, a Democrat, has proposed a different efficiency initiative that would be housed under the Office of State Budget and Management, whose leader is appointed by the governor.
"People should know that their tax dollars are being well spent," Stein said in a . "But let's get this right. Let's use a scalpel, not a chainsaw."
Democrats worry about cuts
Senate Democrats are against the bill, and question the use of artificial intelligence, which is explicitly permitted in the bill.
Sen. Lisa Grafstein, a Wake County Democrat, said she worried the process would be 鈥渄emonizing state employees鈥� by 鈥渓ooking at them as numbers on a spreadsheet.鈥�
鈥淏ehind every one of these jobs, we have a reason, community, a team, and it strikes me as actually very inefficient to summarily negate the work that went into identifying these needs,鈥� added Sen. Sophia Chitlik, a Durham Democrat.
"I think we're here to create middle class jobs and not to destroy them," she continued.
DAVE would shut down at the end of 2028. It passed its first committee Wednesday along party lines and will next head to the Senate Rules Committee.
Berger did say during Wednesday's meeting that the DAVE Act will likely need to be tied into the upcoming state budget because it would require additional positions in the auditor's office.
