Noah Jabusch
Cherie Berry — best known as the “Elevator Lady” — whose portrait appears inside every elevator inspected by her office, has announced that she will not seek reelection in 2020. Berry has served as North Carolina’s Department of Labor Commissioner since 2001, when she ran a campaign focused on opposing what she saw as unnecessary regulations.
Over the years, Berry has consistently delivered on this agenda, often to the detriment of workers. One crucial area where her office has fallen short is its obligation to investigate companies that fail to pay their workers.
According to News and Observer, the department often stops short of recovering workers’ wages. It stops investigations into companies that have gone bankrupt, without looking for existing assets, and it doesn’t exercise its authority to sue and levy fines against still-solvent corporations. As a result, 40% of the fully-investigated claims in 2014 did not receive the help they requested.
This is a serious failing on the department’s end, and it runs especially to the detriment of people who are economically disadvantaged. For many workers, a reliable paycheck is essential to paying rent, utilities and other essential bills every month. When a company runs dry on money and refuses to pay up, that can cause immediate havoc on their livelihood and also make it financially impossible to pursue the company in court.
The Department of Labor was designed to help these workers who are unable to fix the matter on their own, but over the course of Berry’s tenure, the department has failed to do so. Despite this, Berry has won reelection four times, often by a narrow margin.
This may, in part, be a result of less informed voters’ propensity to vote based on name recognition alone. This trend plays decidedly in Berry’s favor, seeing as she created a policy in 2005 requiring the commissioner’s photo to be placed in every single elevator, and saw her vote totals improve in areas with a high-concentration of elevators during the 2008 and 2012 campaigns.
Fortunately, North Carolina voters will have the chance to bring in a new face in 2020, ideally someone who will fully exercise the powers of the labor commissioner’s office. Two people have already pitched their names into the ring, including Wake County’s own Board of Commissioners chairwoman, Jessica Holmes.
Although this office is relatively obscure in most people’s minds, it does incredibly important work for North Carolina’s workers. In addition to wage recovery, the Department of Labor also regulates occupational safety, employment discrimination and of course, the safety of elevators and amusement structures like skate parks and playgrounds.
Berry has served in her position for a long time and helped many people while doing so. However, the people of North Carolina deserve a labor commissioner who will actively fight for their rights, rather than stop investigations early, and ensure that companies aren’t taking advantage of workers who have little recourse to fight for themselves.