RALEIGH — The North Carolina Senate passed the DAVE Act on April 8, and the bill will now head to the House for consideration.
The Division of Accountability, Value, and Efficiency Act, or DAVE Act, would set up a division within the state auditor’s office to examine state agency spending, as well as recommend any cuts and changes to improve government efficiency.
Sponsorship of the DAVE Act (Senate Bill 474) is led by Senate Leader Phil Berger (R-Eden) and Sens. Tim Moffitt (R-Henderson) and Steve Jarvis (R-Davidson).
“Funds sent to state agencies come out of the pockets of North Carolinians,” Berger said in a press release. “Requiring a review of state agency operations and staffing is the right thing to do to ensure that those tax dollars are not wasted.”
Following the addition of a handful of amendments, the bill passed the Senate 29-17. The vote was mainly down party lines; however, former Senate Minority Leader Dan Blue (D-Wake) crossed the aisle to vote in favor of the bill.
An amendment filed by Sen. Lisa Grafstein (D-Wake) took aim at the bill.
“An Act to do absolutely nothing useful while failing to address the growing challenges that our higher education institutions face in the wake of the disastrous education policies of the NC GOP, the dismantling of the U.S. Department of Education, rescinding of NIH grants, and general chaos wrought by the Trump Administration for the purposes of attacking freedom on campus and creating a chilling effect on colleges and universities and their administrators, professors, students, and staff,” Grafstein’s amendment read.
The amendment would have changed the DAVE Act’s short title to “An Act to Do Absolutely Nothing.”
Under the DAVE Act, state agencies would be required to report on how they spend taxpayer funds and include a list of vacant positions of six months or more.
The state auditor’s office would be directed to produce a report for the General Assembly that includes recommendations on the dissolution of an office or elimination of positions. Once received, any agency changes or cuts would lie with the legislature.
State Auditor Dave Boliek expressed support for the measure during a Senate committee meeting earlier this month, saying the bill “puts the legislature together with the executive branch and the state auditor’s office to get real results” and that it is a “data-centered approach that gets real, impactful results.”
The auditor’s office is also granted the ability to use artificial intelligence (AI) to analyze data they receive.
During a committee meeting discussion on the bill, there was some resistance to the use of AI, with Sen. Caleb Theodros (D-Mecklenburg) raising specific concerns about transparency with what data is put into AI as it relates to providing context of results produced.
In a March interview with North State Journal, Boliek said his office was already looking at potential uses for AI, but he said such technology has “got to be used effectively” to find outliers and patterns that are useful and that can be contextualized.
