Former state Senate Majority Leader David “Chip” Brightbill, who represented parts of south-central Pennsylvania over his more than two-decade career in the Legislature, died Thursday at 83 years old.
Brightbill, of Lebanon County, was sworn in to the Senate in 1983. He held various leadership positions, like caucus secretary and whip, before being elected by Senate Republicans as their majority leader in 2000.
His former chief of staff, Erik Arneson, who works for the Senate Republican caucus, said Brightbill was easy to make laugh, but knew when to be serious.
“ He expected a lot from his staff,” Arneson said. “And that’s what he got.”
Though he worked for Brightbill for about a decade, Arneson said one of his favorite memories was from before he was on Brightbill’s staff. As a young reporter at the Lebanon Daily News, Arneson received a call from Brightbill criticizing an article he had written.
“ That was the first of many lessons on legislative procedure,” Arneson said.
Brightbill is survived by his wife, Lebanon County Common Pleas Court Judge Donna Long-Brightbill, and five sons.
He represented the 48th Senate District, which at first included Lebanon and parts of Berks and Lehigh counties. After a new map was adopted in 2002, the district was redrawn to cover Lebanon and parts of Berks, Chester, Dauphin and Lancaster counties.
As Senate GOP leader, Brightbill spent many late nights negotiating with other caucus leaders over legislative proposals. Former Speaker of the House John Perzel said he recalls debating several state budget deals with Brightbill and former Gov. Ed Rendell, a Democrat.
“In the business we were in, it was the art of compromise,” Perzel said, noting Brightbill was always willing to negotiate.
Brightbill filled the majority leader role until 2006, when he lost a primary challenge amid the widespread uproar among voters about the infamous 2005 pay raise lawmakers gave themselves and other state officials with a dead-of-night vote.
Brightbill then returned to practicing law at Stevens & Lee in Reading.
In a joint statement, Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward and Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman credited Brightbill for being a national leader in legislation to repurpose abandoned industrial sites and for “establishing electric supplier competition” statewide.
“Chip was a skilled, practical legislator who was especially passionate about helping his district,” Ward and Pittman said. “He will be remembered for his creative approach to solving problems, his ability to negotiate difficult, complex issues and his encyclopedic knowledge of the legislative process.”
Before the Senate, Brightbill served as district attorney for Lebanon County. He received his law degree from Duquesne University School of Law in Pittsburgh.
Arneson said Brightbill carried a “courtroom style” to debates over legislation on the Senate floor.
“ If he was in favor of something, he wanted to understand all the arguments in favor of it,” Arneson said. “But he also wanted to know what people who were opposed to it were gonna say so that he could immediately start dismantling their argument. He was a prosecutor.”