Gates recall headed for failure again

Jeff Schweers

Thursday, June 11, 1998 | 11:39 a.m.

A petition submitted by a group trying to oust Clark County Commission Chairwoman Yvonne Atkinson Gates for alleged ethical improprieties has failed a second time to generate enough valid signatures for a special election.

Secretary of State Dean Heller announced the results today in Las Vegas, saying that the full verification he ordered accomplished his goal to scientifically prove that the random sample process outlined in state law works the way it's intended.

"The public can feel confident that when they are involved in a recall petition process that it's fair, accurate and valid," Heller said. "The theory is the random sampling mirrors the universe as a whole. Scientifically we proved this is the truth."

When told of the outcome, Gates sounded relieved. "I'm just glad the verification process validated the random sample."

However, she said she was "disgusted that we continue to cost the taxpayers money to prove something we knew was going to turn out this way."

The full signature check cost Clark County an additional $29,600 in staff overtime, on top of the $3,750 it cost to run the random sample. Chief Deputy Secretary of State Donald Reis estimated the cost for his staff to come to Las Vegas was about $25,000 for the week-long verification process.

Heller's office and the Clark County Elections Department spent a week examining all 7,480 signatures filed by Citizens for Honest and Responsible Government. Only 3,639 signatures were validated -- 741 fewer than the 4,380 required to trigger a special election.

The ratio of valid signatures to the total was 48.26 percent, slightly lower than the 48.51 percent ratio that turned up valid in the random sample of 503 signatures conducted in May by the county elections department. In that sampling, only 244 signatures came up valid -- short of the 293 needed to trigger a special election.

Heller had called for the full verification after Citizens for Honest and Responsible Government challenged his failure of the petition, saying the random sample was unconstitutional. It was the first time under a 1993 election law creating an appeal procedure that Heller has had a ruling challenged.

Aviva Gordon, an attorney for Gates, had challenged Heller's authority to call for a full signature check after already failing the petition. Washoe County District Judge Michael Fondi was expected to cancel the June 12 hearing.

"This strengthens my position that the secretary has the authority to interpret, execute and enforce election laws," Heller said.

County and state election officials started out with 7,480 signatures, then removed 58 signatures of people who had requested their names be withdrawn from the petition. Of the remaining 7,422 signatures that were verified, only 3,582 checked out as valid.

The rest were discounted because they were not registered, lived outside the district or didn't match the signature card on file with the elections department.

The Gates recall group began its petition drive after the state Ethics Commission in January reprimanded Gates for using her position to seek lease space from casino executives for a fledgling frozen daiquiri franchise. Gates divested herself of the business before the ruling.

Charles Bennion, a lawyer paid $125 an hour to monitor the verification process for the group, said they would have to discuss whether to start the recall process over again -- noting his disappointment in the company hired to circulate petitions, National Voter Outreach.

"A major problem we encountered is that we registered many people when we went and got signatures, and we failed to turn those registrations in on the same day," Bennion said.

By turning the voter registration forms a day or two after those people signed the petition, their signatures became invalid, Bennion said.

"That's really where we failed," he said. "That's frustrating because we really have the support. Enough people out there want this special election to go forward."

Bennion said NVO was selected because of their expertise. The same company had collected signatures for the Republican Party's "paycheck protection" initiative, which was struck from the ballot by Clark County Chief District Judge Myron Leavitt as unconstitutional.

"The whole process of petition gathering is new to the group," Bennion said. "It's a rather technical area, and if you screw up, it can be very damaging to the effort. Obviously, because look what happened."