The North Carolina General Assembly is a “very dynamic and chaotic place,”, especially leading up to the start of a new session, N.C. Senator Amy Scott Galey said.

“Once you get inside this building, it is very unpredictable what kind of expectations are going to be put on your time, where you’re going to go and what meetings you’re going to sit in,” Galey told The Alamance Fabric in an interview in advance of the short session.

Galey grew up in northern Alamance County. After graduating from Western Alamance High School, she attended UNC-Chapel Hill, where she earned her bachelor’s degree in 1989 and a law degree in 1994. That same year she married Fred Galey, an Air Force pilot, and initially lived in South Carolina. In 2009, they moved to Alamance County to raise their three children on a property that once belonged to her grandparents.

“It was wonderful to be home,” Galey said. “It’s just very reassuring and comforting to come back into a close-knit farming community where everybody had known each other for generations.”

Knowing the area so well also made her acutely aware of how much things had changed since she’d left, she said.

Concerned about the rapid growth and other changes in the area, Galey ran for county commissioner in 2016 and won. She served as chair of the board for three years before successfully running for the state senate in 2020.

Now, in her third term, Galey serves as Senate Majority Whip and chairs the Senate Committee on Health Care alongside fellow GOP members Sens. Jim Burgin and Benton Sawrey.

In an interview with The Alamance Fabric, Galey talked about her leadership roles, legislative priorities, and views on key policy issues including public safety, education and health care.

The following questions and answers have been edited for clarity and brevity.

The Alamance Fabric’s Laura Brache: You serve as the Senate Majority Whip. For our readers who aren’t familiar with the daily workings of Raleigh, what does that role mean?

Amy Galey: I was elected to that by the Republican senators. There are 30 of us. And so they chose me, and that means that I work with them to help them accomplish their goals. 

I communicate policy priorities from the leadership to the membership and also the other direction – from the membership to the leadership. And I especially want to see my colleagues be successful. I want to see them reach their goals and so I make an effort to go to their fundraisers and to visit them in the district over a cup of coffee or a meal. I think that’s really important in building those relationships.

And somebody from home might think, ‘Well, how does that help me? How does that help Alamance County? What do I care? Why does northern Randolph County care?’ Well, it helps me to build goodwill.

One of the things about a legislative body is that you cannot do anything by yourself. It takes the buy-in to accomplish… There are a lot of people who can stop things from happening, but it’s very difficult to get something changed. Being a majority whip helps me to build those relationships and work with other people and move policy forward that’s going to help my district and help the state of North Carolina.

LB: From your perspective, what are the three most important issues for Alamance County constituents right now? What are you doing to address them?

AG: One important thing is crime and public safety – making sure that the people of Alamance County are safe and that we have as low crime as possible. We’ve been working on addressing issues with mental health and involuntary commitment to make sure that those who have mental health problems that are leading to them acting out in ways that are harmful to the people around them, making sure that they get treatment if necessary, but I’ll say that they’re held accountable and that they are separated from the general population if necessary, including incarceration. Some people are dangerous and need to be either hospitalized or locked up so that the rest of us are safe from them. 

Another is jobs and the economy. We’re blessed in Alamance County to have a lot of jobs. That’s not true for every corner of the state. There are a lot of parts of the state that are pretty economically depressed. So, I work with others to make sure that the wealth is shared across the state. 

But also, as part of jobs and the economy, I think it’s incredibly important that we have an education system that prepares people for the workforce. 

So, supporting public education and other forms of education, including making sure that school choice is available for everybody, that every child has the opportunity to learn in the environment where they learn the best, where they feel safe and they feel that their learning needs are being addressed.

This is not in a particular order, really, but the third thing is health care. Increasing access to health care and decreasing cost. Health care is so expensive in this country and we are struggling to understand why and also how to decrease the cost – or at least not have it accelerate at the degree that it has been over the past 20 years. So a part of decreasing the cost is increasing access. The more providers we have, the more opportunities we have for people to connect with the health care system by law of supply and demand, then the supply increases, then the costs go down.

LB: I want to jump to education real quick because you were talking about how that is one of your priorities: The [Alamance-Burlington] school system recently proposed a budget requesting a slight increase in county funding – though lower than last year. As a former county commissioner and our current state senator, how do you view the state’s responsibility in easing the financial burden on local counties to ensure our public schools have safe facilities and well-paid staff – especially without a state budget?

AG: Well, we do have a state budget. We just don’t have a new state budget. So, if we don’t pass a new budget, then the old budget continues in its place. And the amount of new spending represents only about 3% of the total base budget. So while it’s not good that we have no new budget, it’s not correct to say that we don’t have a budget. We do have a budget. People are getting paid. It’s just we haven’t been able to implement our policy priorities with new funding. 

North Carolina still doesn’t have a budget. Here’s how that affects everyday life.

You mentioned the facilities. So, facilities are a county responsibility. Although the state has stepped in like with lottery funds and supplemented the money that the county spends, we do have state supplements that have come in over the years to augment the local funds, but ultimately the facilities are a county responsibility.

There’s been a lot of controversy lately about teacher pay and education spending in the state of North Carolina. It’s really important to know that if you look at the percentage of the amount of money that is spent by the state – not considering federal money or county money – North Carolina ranks 19th in state spending on traditional K-12 education. We have another statistic that’s been floating around – that is not true – that’s based on an algorithm that uses variations in labor costs across the country that shows North Carolina as being near the bottom in teacher salary, which is not true. We’re 19th in state spending if you take out the federal and the local amounts. In other places around the country, local governments spend far more than we do in North Carolina on local public education. 

When I left the county commissioners in 2020, Alamance County ranked in the top 10 in the local teacher supplement. And I felt very proud of that. A lot of people worked very hard to make that happen over the course of say 8 to 10 years, and I had 5 years part in that. It saddens me a lot to see how we have fallen very far out of that statewide ranking in the local supplement.

One of the arguments that people make for increasing teacher pay without consideration of achievement being tied to it, just raw dollars of teacher pay, is that teachers won’t come to North Carolina because they’re not going to be well paid. Well, there’s no evidence that teachers are leaving North Carolina to make more money in other states. Alamance County is nestled between Chatham County, Guilford and Orange and then we’re very close to Chapel Hill-Carrboro where they have a much larger per pupil spending. So we have a lot of competition.

So, teacher pay, setting a goal to be the highest in the Southeast, I disagree with that. I don’t think that is a legitimate policy goal, especially when you don’t tie in any kind of factor of academic achievement to it. But as far as the county goes, I think that it’s an important policy goal to make sure that we retain and attract high quality teachers and don’t lose them to neighboring counties.

LB: The state constitution requires a “sound basic education.” What does that mean to you?

AG: To me, a sound basic education means school choice and being sure that each child has the opportunity to go to a school where they learn the best. We do not fund systems, we fund an education for a child.

North Carolina has a very vibrant and diverse educational framework. We have traditional K-12 public education, like Western Alamance High School or Eastlawn Elementary School. We have charter schools, which are also public schools. And [Alamance County has] three of the oldest in the state: We have Clover Garden, Hawbridge and Rivermill. And then we have a number of new ones as well. And then private schools.

We have made private education within reach for more families by starting and expanding the Opportunity Scholarship.

Who is getting school vouchers in Alamance County?

The Opportunity Scholarship gives parents and families the option to send their child outside of the attendance zone for the traditional K-12 and find that educational fit that’s really the best for them.

LB: What’s your opinion on the Supreme Court’s decision on Leandro?

AG: The decision before that had said that because there was mention of ‘a sound basic education’ in the Constitution, that that was itself an appropriation and that that gave the court system the rationale where they could spend money. And they could come up with a plan and they could appropriate funds. And I always thought that was a ridiculous argument.

I don’t think that that’s what the Constitution does. I don’t think that’s the way our government works. If people don’t like the decisions of the General Assembly, they can get a new General Assembly. We have a very vigorous and well-thought-out process for elections in the United States of America. The remedy is not to go to a court and have a judge – one judge – implement sweeping spending of hundreds of millions of dollars without regard to the impact on other programs or other things.

Either we have to raise taxes – which I will not do – or other programs, other priorities they’re going to have to be weighed. And priorities have to be set. So, that push-and-pull between interests and policy-making is incredibly important and it’s what we do in the General Assembly all the time. One judge with just one case in front of them is not equipped to make those kinds of policy decisions and make those kinds of judgments and appropriations.

Those are the kinds of really important decisions that need to be made in a legislative body and not by one judge who only has the litigants – the people in the lawsuit – in front of them.

LB: Alamance County is roughly 16% Latino. You supported Senate Bill 153 which required cooperation by local law enforcement with ICE – critics say this damages relationships with Latino communities and separates families. What do you say to that criticism?

AG: I’ve heard that Latino families support that. The folks who have obeyed the law and come here legally, they also want to live in an orderly and well-maintained community with low crime. They want to have good schools. They want to have access to the ‘American dream.’

The whole ICE program is for when a person has gotten in trouble with the law and comes into contact with the law enforcement, then the immigration status is checked and then ICE is contacted. My understanding has always been that it was not going to be raids on small communities or targeted license checks at certain crossroads. And I don’t generally support that. But we are a country of laws and the laws need to be enforced, including immigration laws.

I went to the border in Texas with Sheriff [Terry] Johnson. He invited me to go on a non-partisan, bipartisan trip. I was honored to go with him and I learned that at the border crossings people will turn themselves in to a [Border Patrol] agent. They just cross and they turn themselves in and then they’re given a status that’s some kind of pending status, which is not the same thing as asylum. Is not the same thing as being here legally. It’s just they haven’t seen a judge yet. And then they’re flown around the country and they settle into communities where – I’m sure they are hard working people who are looking to access the same freedoms that I’ve enjoyed my whole life and probably take way too much for granted – but there’s still a cost to illegal immigration. There is a cost to our school system.

I visited Graham Middle School last year, and I visited Eastern Alamance High School. I asked administrators and teachers, ‘What’s your biggest challenge?’ And they said it’s children who don’t speak English or in English as a Second Language. And that’s a disservice to them, but it’s also a disservice to the other students in the classroom. 

You talk about a sound basic education and the right for children to get one. Well, the children who have been enrolled in the Alamance-Burlington School System since they were 6 years old and are now in 10th grade and trying to learn Earth Science, they have the same right to a good education as anybody else. And when you have the classes filled with students who can’t speak English – and I’m getting this from the teacher and the principal – that creates issues for all of us. And so, illegal immigration takes its toll.

We worry about affordable housing. People can’t find an apartment. People can’t find a home that’s of decent quality. Well, we have millions of people who have come into our country illegally. And that presence has had an impact on the networks that support all of us.

So, I don’t disparage anybody. I think that there is value, of course, there’s value in all human life. And I want everyone to live a happy life where they thrive, and find employment or work that is meaningful to them. And it’s true that our country has an engine that runs off of the labor of people who’ve come here illegally, like the restaurant industry and construction industry and agriculture. It is true. And I’m grateful for the work that people do in those industries. But that doesn’t mean that it’s right. That because it exists doesn’t mean that that’s the way it should be and that it’s the way it always should be.

LB: There are nearly 56,000 people on Medicaid in Alamance County. What does the future look like in the next year for those families?

AG: There’s a work requirement that is coming from the federal government  – that I agree with. We first had a work requirement for Medicaid in the Clinton administration. Bill Clinton, when he was president, championed a Medicaid work requirement. 

Once it was implemented, it showed that when the Medicaid recipient went to work that the general well-being of the entire family was improved. Mental health outcomes were better, that the children did better in school if there were children in the home, which there probably were if they were on Medicaid in the early 1990s. So there were benefits. And then the Obama administration is the one that ended the work requirement. So, families in Alamance County will have to either volunteer and get documentation or they’ll have to find a job.

LB: In the past, you have expressed support for legalization of marijuana for medical purposes, but not for recreational use. Is that still your stance?

AG: I did vote to legalize medical marijuana.

I’m not a big fan of the marijuana agenda, generally, but we heard really compelling testimony from people who came to the General Assembly, especially soldiers, people with PTSD, who talked about being handed like a palm full of really serious drugs from their psychiatrists that made them sick and had all kinds of different bad side effects. But then they were able to find the relief that they needed from marijuana. 

I think that if it helps somebody to feel better, if somebody has cancer and they can’t keep food down, if somebody is suffering from AIDS or HIV and it helps them to feel better, then I think it’s medicine. People should have the option to try it. There’s a lot of controversy about whether or not medical marijuana even works, but if somebody wants to try it and it helps them, you know, go in peace. What’s it for me to say?

I think that as marijuana use becomes more and more socially acceptable that we will learn more and more about how dangerous it is. I just am really concerned about the young people in our country. There are so many things with the availability of THC and marijuana and other psychoactive drugs, plus the internet, social media and all of that. 

I’m glad that my children are grown, but I worry about all those families out there that are really struggling to figure out what’s an appropriate boundary. And also, how do you enforce it? And also, how do you enforce it in a community where people don’t always share your values?

LB: You personally pleaded for Sam Page not to run against Phil Berger. You cautioned that the financial fall out would hurt the supermajority. He ran anyway. Do you still have those concerns?

AG: I am so impressed by my colleagues and their ability to connect to their communities and to lean on the support that they’ve earned and that they’ve built up over the last 10 to 15 years. I think that we’re all working really hard and I think that the funds are going to be available for us to be successful across the board in the Senate and protecting the supermajority.

I just want to say, and I’ll say this for this record: I have a lot of thoughts about that and the way things have turned out. I have not spoken personally with Sam Page and so I will not say anything about it that I haven’t had the opportunity to say to him first.

But I understand that there’s been concern from some people that I intervened or attempted to insert my opinion into that race. What people don’t understand is that I represent Burlington, I represent Gibsonville, and [they overlap] into Guilford County. And the person who occupies that seat has a big impact on how I am able to do my job to represent my district in Alamance County.

So, not that long ago, Food Lion’s parent corporation opened a $800-and-some-million facility in Eastern Guilford County and that facility would not have been put there except for the work of Phil Berger. And that is $819 million into the taxes for the city of Burlington, which I represent the majority of the geography of Burlington. Having that asset there for Burlington in the long term is going to be hugely beneficial, not just to Burlington, but to Alamance County as well. And so that is why I was so concerned about the outcome of that race – because it has a huge impact on my ability to represent my constituents.

LB: What are things you wish more people in your district knew or understood about yourself, how the legislature and how it works, or the work you do overall?

AG: I think I would really like for people to know more about using your General Assembly members as a resource.

If you have a question or concern about something, give us a call and we can at least contact them.

We might not get the answer that you want, but at least we can give it a shot. And more often than not, we’re able to help people.

If it’s a federal thing – Social Security, income tax refund, immigration – if it’s a concern about one of those things, I won’t be able to handle it in my office. But I can refer it to U.S. Sen. [Ted] Budd or Sen. [Thom] Tillis or Congressman [Richard] Hudson. We know their people.

I really like to try to help the people of our district with their questions and concerns.
The best way to contact the office is through the General Assembly’s website ncleg.gov. I don’t like for people to try to use social media to contact me because it’s really a campaign tool. It’s not a governing tool and I don’t really check it that often because, like a lot of people, I’m pretty busy. I try to keep up with things but that’s not the most effective way.

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