State opens fiscal year with pay raises, new programs

Wednesday, July 1, 1998 | 11:40 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- Expanded programs for newborns and the mentally ill, along with a pay raise for 15,000 state workers, begin today as the state starts a new fiscal year.

More than $4.8 billion in state and federal funds will be pumped into state agencies to carry them through until June 30. That's 6 percent more than last fiscal year.

The state should have a comfortable reserve of more than $80 million this year despite lagging tax revenues. State Budget Director Perry Comeaux said Monday that although sales and gaming taxes did not produce as much revenue as expected, there were savings by some agencies to offset some lost revenue.

Eight new birth centers will open in Southern Nevada today as part of Gov. Bob Miller's Family to Family program. The centers will help parents of children up to 1 year old, according of Project Director Barbara Ludwig.

The state Division of Mental Hygiene and Mental Retardation will begin new programs and expand others. Among projects on tap is the 16-bed Bruce Adams Community Residential Treatment Center for the mentally ill in Las Vegas.

This is "an old-fashioned half-way house," Dr. Carlos Brandenburg, division administrator, said. "There are a lot of people in the (mental) hospital who are unable to adjust to community life right away. In the hospital it was highly structured. But now they find they can't live without some kind of structure."

The facility would fill the gap between a mental hospital and full-scale community living. The division will seek bids from private industry to build the center, and the state will provide treatment. Brandenburg expects the project to begin in September.

Educare, a similar treatment facility in Reno, should be ready by August.

The Program Assertive Community, an intensive treatment program for the mentally ill who live in their own apartments or in group homes, will be expanded, Brandenburg said. About 35 people are treated in Las Vegas, and about 10 would be added each month.

A rural-clinic office will open in Pahrump by fall. There will be a psychiatrist and a psychologist to help those with mental problems, and medications can be prescribed.

State workers will receive a 3 percent cost-of-living boost today, but the employees' unions say that does not make up for the years in which workers did not receive pay hikes. The State of Nevada Employees Association is seeking a 6.4 percent pay raise starting in July 1999.

In January, the state's elected officials will get a pay raise. The governor's annual salary of $90,000 will rise to $117,000; the lieutenant governor from $20,000 to $50,000; secretary of state, treasurer and controller from $62,500 to $80,000; and the attorney general from $85,000 to $110,000.

The state's financial picture continues to look good despite the tax revenue slump. Comeaux said the 1999-2001 biennium is likely "to have little revenue to work with to fund our growth, much less anything new."

There were savings in the past year because the number of welfare and Medicaid cases was lower than expected and agencies that could hire new employees in October didn't get the new workers on board until later.