Why I Love the Legislature: Legislative staffers tell us why they feel at home in the statehouse.

• Author: South, Holly
• Position: LEGISLATIVE STAFF WEEK / STAFF PROFILES - Brittany Yunker-Carlson

BRITTANY YUNKER-CARLSON

Status and Minute Clerk Washington Senate

"My job is not to go to the moon, but to get others there (and back) while looking good on camera."

Who says what you do in middle school doesn't really matter? Brittany Yunker-Carlson was a legislative page back then, and those connections helped her land what she calls her first "real" job as a committee services staffer for the Washington Senate. Now in her 10th year with the Senate, she updates daily calendars and the status of bills and takes notes for the journal.

"I like to say that I work in 'mission control' at the Senate," she says. "My job is not to go to the moon, but to get others there (and back) while looking good on camera and with no major incidents. I support the process--the mission--even if that means working into the wee hours or skiing 3 miles into work"--which got her into the national news after Washington's "snowpocalypse" of 2012 closed down the roads.

Yunker-Carlson is probably best known, however, for what she did before her work at the Legislature. After finishing college and spending a few years working as a fishing guide in Alaska and Chile, she wanted a home of her own. Armed with a basic building plan she found online and some experienced friends, she set out to build a "tiny house," on wheels, of course, so she'd be at home wherever she was. Five months and a few blisters later, she had a 165-square-foot home to show for it--"an upgrade from dorm rooms and shared houses," she says with a laugh.

Although her home was on wheels, she found the job at the Capitol and has stayed put.

She works alongside Cyrus Habib (D), the nation's first blind lieutenant governor, who presides over the Senate "mostly unscripted," she says. "He has presided fairly, giving equal time to both sides and managing debate turn by turn across the aisle."

Yunker-Carlson's seat at the rostrum puts her right where the action is during floor debate, and she loves hearing both sides of an issue. "Especially in the era of smartphones, Facebook, web history and cookies, our devices learn our browsing history and continually show us what... we like to view, so we're rarely exposed to different perspectives," she says. "Now, more than ever, we need to work hard to hear from those with varying viewpoints and work together to find consensus."

The cyclical nature of legislative work is a good fit for her more recent role as landlady: After two years in her tiny house, she married...