Counties object to paying NOMADS penalties

Friday, March 26, 1999 | 10:08 a.m.

Nevada will pay $411,000 this fiscal year and will be charged $3.2 million next year and $6.4 million the year after that if the so-called NOMADS system still isn't running.

Washoe District Attorney Dick Gammick told a budget subcommittee Thursday that counties are being fined administrative money that supports programs collecting child support money from deadbeat parents.

"Washoe, last year, collected $20 million, Clark $36 million for child support," he said. "We will not sacrifice what we're doing for those custodial parents."

But he said the state will hurt those collection programs and the mothers who rely on the money if lawmakers don't stop the state Welfare Division from making counties pay part of the fines.

Gammick said Washoe County will get hit $367,000 next year and Clark County about $2.1 million. Douglas County District Attorney Scott Doyle said his county will lose $44,000 and Carson District Attorney Noel Waters said the fine in the capital city will be about $41,000 a year.

The county officials got some support from Sen. Bill O'Donnell, R-Las Vegas, who said it is "unconscionable that the state would roll out a program that doesn't work and then put this on the counties."

But Myla Florence, welfare division director, told the subcommittee it's up to the Legislature to decide who will pay fines she described as unavoidable at this point since the system won't be ready in October.

She said one option the state can consider is separating child support from the rest of the NOMADS welfare computer system.

And she said the delay in getting federal certification isn't the state's fault, adding, "The state did not design this system. The vendor designed the system."

That vendor is IBM, which sent representatives to assure the subcommittee chairman, Sen. Ray Rawson, R-Las Vegas. that the problems with NOMADS are fixable - if the state is willing to pay for the fix.