Friday, April 17, 1998 | 10:37 a.m.
An ethics task force appointed by Clark County Manager Dale Askew at the urging of four commissioners who face ethics hearings in mid-May will recommend more money for the state Ethics Commission to do its job properly.
"What I see happening is I think we're going to find that the ethics law that exists in Nevada is a very good one," said Larry Spitler, chairman of the committee appointed to recommend guidelines to the County Commission.
The committee has met four times to date, and has one more meeting planned before it holds its first public hearing, tentatively scheduled for 7 p.m. May 12 in the county chambers.
Following that public hearing, the committee will meet again to put a report together for the County Commission to review, hopefully by the end of June, Spitler said.
That hearing is intended to solicit recommendations from the public on creating guidelines for elected officials to know when to disclose a relationship, declare a conflict of interest, or abstain from voting.
It occurs two days before a state Ethics Commission hearing scheduled to investigate allegations that four county commissioners improperly voted to grant airport concessions to friends or business associates.
The four commissioners are Yvonne Atkinson Gates, Lorraine Hunt, Myrna Williams and Lance Malone. Askew said the task force was not appointed to advise them on their current ethics complaints or deliberate on those complaints and take action.
"This task force is not being formed to punish," Askew said, "but to establish standards and understand the existing law, to better understand what is out there now."
The only elected member of the task force is Hunt, who volunteered to participate, Askew said.
"The fact she has one of these charges pending that has been dropped and now may be brought back means she has all the more experience to bring to bear on the discussion," Askew said.
After reviewing ethics laws in other states and cities, Spitler said, the committee concluded that Nevada has one of the best ethics codes on the books.
"The law itself is good," Spitler said. "What makes the Ethics Commission ineffective is the lack of funding to enforce its rulings."
What it also lacks is an education arm to inform newly elected officials of their responsibilities under the state ethics code, Spitler said.
"So often newly elected people or people elected a long time aren't given an education on ethics in Nevada," Spitler said, envisioning an ongoing program of seminars sponsored by the Ethics Commission to discuss past opinions and what they mean.
"The Ethics Commission should be funded at a level that provides that education arm," Spitler said.
It also should provide a quicker turn-around on requests from public officials or complaints by third parties, Spitler said.
"The long period of time it takes to reach a resolution really discourages people," Spitler said. "It's frustrating to the person who filed complaint, but also to the person the complaint was filed against."
Spitler acknowledged those recommendations weren't what the task force was specifically appointed to do, "but Dale didn't preclude us from looking at that."
Askew said he appointed the committee to provide guidelines to the County Commission for when board members should disclose, when to declare a conflict of interest and when to abstain.
Spitler said that mission began with a look at state ethics codes and hearing from former Ethics Chairman Thomas "Spike" Wilson and Louis Ling, the deputy attorney general assigned to the Ethics Commission.
"I didn't get the sense that this task force was anything but genuine," Ling said. "It is just my personal opinion that this task force intends to come out with very useful results."
Spitler had equally good things to say about the Ethics Commission.
"We think the Ethics Commission is just fine," he said.
But the committee will suggest that the County Commission use its lobbyists to ask the Legislature next session to fully fund the Ethics Commission.
In addition, the committee at its next meeting will piece together a working draft of a guideline, weaving state law with "what we took from other jurisdictions," Spitler said. "For example, what Phoenix says on disclosure, or what Connecticut says about conflicts of interest."
Initially, Spitler said, the committee thought it could come up with a set of specific examples for when to disclose or abstain.
"We found looking at that right off the bat that we could never get every instance of when someone would have to disclose, declare or abstain," Spitler said. "What we really have to do is have trust in public officials to have ethics."
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