Photo by George A. Hoffman Jr.
A copy of Antonio Canova's statue of George Washington dressed as a Roman general sits in the N.C. General Assembly building along with the bust of Matt Whitaker Ransom, a United States senator from 1872-1895, inside of the 13 star flag.
The real story, she says, is that the state has been fighting to maintain existing services, not spending lavishly on additional frills.
“It's not like state budget and things that it pays for has been improving or growing dramatically in the past few years,” Mejia says. “We haven't been doing tremendous expansions in the quantity or quality of state services. We've just been keeping up basically.”
Mejia argues that state legislators have allowed the tax base to gradually erode and that economic struggles have forced tough political decisions.
She says the spending debate should be reframed from focusing on “government” to honing in on the services it provides such as health care, schools and public safety.
Last year's study found that spending was at its lowest point in 13 years.