Moving memory-filled for Arkansans in D.C.

WASHINGTON — Thanks to pink slips from voters, there’s an unusually high demand for moving boxes on Capitol Hill this month.

Most of those headed for retirement, involuntary or otherwise, are Democrats.

And the Natural State had more turnover than most.

“We’re a delegation of six, and four of the positions are changing, so that’s a significant impact for the people of Arkansas,” said Democratic Rep. Vic Snyder, who did not seek re-election. “It is a lot of turnover.”

Come January, the state will have three new Republican House members - Rick Crawford filling Democrat Marion Berry’s 1st District seat, Tim Griffin filling Snyder’s 2nd District seat and Steve Womack filling John Boozman’s 3rd District seat - as well as a new Republican senator, Boozman, who will take over for Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln.

Only the state’s two remaining Democratic members - Sen. Mark Pryor and Rep. Mike Ross - will remain in their current offices.

As a result, four of the state’s six Capitol Hill offices spent the past week in various stages of the moving process - organizing some files to archive for posterity, shredding others that contain constituents’ private information, returning computers and other office equipment, taking down the photos, and packing up the mementos that define the personal offices of public officials.

Into the moving boxes went Snyder’s photos of the Little Rock Nine and Berry’s framed Future Farmers of America jacket from his high school days in DeWitt.

Down came the photos of the congressmen with former presidents - Bill Clinton adorned the offices of Berry and Snyder, while George W. Bush was displayed on Boozman’s wall.

And some of those Razorback hats, a requisite feature of Arkansas congressional offices, were tucked into tissue.

In Berry’s office, the hogshaped plastic headgear sat amidst a pile of more conventional hats in a leather chair, waiting to be packed. Berry planned to keep just one - a bright red feed cap bearing the logo of the Ash Flat livestock auction - for future use.

In Boozman’s office, staff members worked diligently to pare down a large supply of Little Debbie snacks provided by the distribution center in Gentry. And the former Razorback football player packed up his helmet and jersey - as well as a photo with Frank Broyles - until they find a new home on the walls of his Senate office.

The atmosphere of change was underscored by the trash bins crowding the corridors, the boxes spilling from offices, and the staff roaming the halls to check out potential office space for their bosses.

“There’s a lot of activity that has to happen in a fairlyshort amount of time,” Snyder said, “and it’s complicated by the lame-duck session.”

Snyder, Berry and Boozman must all beout of their House offices by Monday. When they return later this month for the remainder of the lame-duck session, they will have only temporary offices barely big enough for one person.

“You’ll see zombielike people roaming through the halls because they don’t really have a place to land,” predicted Snyder.

On the Senate side, Boozman will be facing his own logistical challenges, while his staff tries to conduct business from two tiny transitional workplaces.

As an outgoing House member, he will have one of those tiny one-person temporary offices. And as an incoming Senate member, he’ll have a slightly larger two-person temporary office. But thespaces will be on opposite sides of Capitol Hill - a short subway trip separating them.

Simultaneously winding down one job and starting up another takes juggling.

“It’s like we’re doing two things at once,” explained Boozman’s press secretary,Sara Lasure.

All three outgoing House members have had ample time to plan for the packing and the moving.

“There’s been some advantage of knowing this was coming for a year now,” said Snyder. “We have been planning, we have been in touch with the archivists at UALR, and it has helped us get our thoughts together.”

While his colleagues are carting away their belongings, Pryor is acting as a tour guide and mentor for new senator select.

Incoming members are receiving information on everything from parliamentary procedure to personal security to Senate history, Pryor said, but there are other important lessons to convey.

“I did a little session with them called ‘Life in the Senate,’” he said, where four senators and several spouses joined the Senate chaplain and physician to discuss the importance of maintaining both physical and spiritual health.

After that, Pryor said, “I walked them over to the Senate gym and just let them poke their heads in there because they need to take care of themselves physically.”

Over the next several weeks, each incoming senator will be paired with current senators - one from each party - to further help their transition.

Boozman praised Pryor’s role in strengthening the Senate transition process over the past six years. It’s a job Pryor and a bipartisan trio of fellow senators took on after finding their own Senate orientation lacking. And since he took office after a special election, Boozman said his orientation into the House lasted “about 10 minutes.”

“The Senate is run in a much different way; their rules are different,” he said. “So we’re trying to get a grasp as to how things are done.”

Another difference became apparent when Boozman attended his first Senate Republican caucus last week.

“When I was in my first conference meeting, you looked around and there’s 47 people,” he said. “It’s a very small number of people versus the Republican conference” in the House, with 180 or so members.

“It’s very do-able, I think, to get to know everybody well,” he said. “I think the biggest difference is just the sheer numbers.”

Other events last week included a dinner at the National Archives for the new senators, which fell the same night the new House members had a reception at the U.S. Botanic Garden. At the House event, Snyder had a chance to talk with Womack.

“This is a very exhilarating and challenging time forthem as they’re trying to arrange their personal lives and find a place to live and get acclimated to what’s going to happen here,” Snyder said.

On the House side, more than 300 members’ offices will be moved between Dec. 1 and the time the new Congress convenes in January, said Carol Peterson, spokesman for the House chief administrative officer. Her office provided a transition guide for both incoming and outgoing House members to help them as they either close up or set up shop.

“They are in their offices and ready to do business by the time they’re sworn in,” Peterson said.

On the Senate side, the process is different, with the Rules Committee overseeing the office-assignment process. With fewer offices, members have longer to move out, including Lincoln, whose staff is packing up the accumulation of her 12 years in the Senate.

In Berry’s office in the Rayburn House Office Building, the situation was similar. “We’ve got 14 years’ worth of stuff,” he said, as he surveyed the barren walls and stacks of boxes.

“When I walked in the office this week, with the place all stripped like this, it gave me a little sad feeling,” he said. “But this place is full of energy” with all the legislative activity and leadership elections taking place.

For Berry, the process of packing those boxes and sorting through the files triggered a flood of memories about legislative issues and personal meetings.

But mostly, he said, it led to recollections of specific constituent cases his staff has handled over the years, such as one involving a young girl whose health insurance wouldn’t cover needed treatment until Berry’s office intervened.

“She’s doing OK right now,” he said, “and that’s what makes this worth doing.”