Task force sets county on flexible ethics course

Adrienne Packer

Monday, March 29, 1999 | 11:26 a.m.

When Clark County adopted an ethics policy addressing its own weaknesses, county officials were applauded for being proactive rather than waiting for the state Legislature to draft a new law.

The county policy was passed early in what is expected to be a year known for ethics legislation.

Currently, a handful of proposals are being swirled into two bills making their way through the Assembly and the Senate. State lawmakers are optimistic about passing substantial ethics reform before they adjourn.

The county accepted credit for moving forward with its own policy, but it didn't take long for an incident to cause critics to question whether the policy needs strengthening or whether elected officials should simply be more accountable for their behavior.

And that was to be expected, according to Larry Spitler, a former assemblyman who led the citizens task force that wrote the new county policy.

"One of the strongest recommendations we made when we delivered this report is that it needs to be readdressed and looked at as issues come up," Spitler said.

Spitler's comments came after Clark County commissioners Erin Kenny and Bruce Woodbury took phone calls from Lt. Gov. Lorraine Hunt, who touted one of two finalists for a multimillion-dollar McCarran International Airport contract.

An element of the county's policy prohibits former board members from lobbying commissioners for one year after leaving their positions. It was an attempt to prevent people with "juice" from influencing a decision.

Hunt had been a county commissioner until winning the lieutenant governor's race in November. Hunt was not paid by the contract applicant, but her action pushed the boundaries of the code.

Spitler said unpaid advocates were not addressed by the task force but because Hunt's actions have been perceived as unfair, they might be in the future.

"One of the things we tried to accomplish with the cooling off period is to prevent people from unduly using their influence," Spitler said. "If you're advocating one company over another, that's lobbying. Some people lobby for free, some do it for money."

Lobbyists, acquaintances and business relationships were addressed by the county policy and in at least one proposed state measure in an attempt to take the game of politicking out of elected officials' decision-making processes.

But ethics experts have said there also has to be some measure of common sense. And as Kenny said during one ethics discussion: "I don't think you can legislate morality. There are certain things in this world we accept as blatantly right or blatantly wrong."

Whether new legislation will help elected officials determine the difference between right and wrong has yet to be seen.

So far, the county's new policy has been smudged by Hunt's calls to the commissioners, which ironically came as Gov. Kenny Guinn's staff was drafting his bill to reform ethics on a statewide level.

Guinn's bill was introduced the same day that Forsythe, Francis and Ernaut Associates -- the group that Hunt promoted because it ran her successful campaign -- appeared before the County Commission for the airport contract. Ernaut is Pete Ernaut, Guinn's chief of staff.

The governor's bill recommends that the Ethics Commission hire a full-time legal adviser and an executive director with an investigative or law-enforcement background. It suggests imposing stiffer fines for politicians who violate the ethics code. Spitler's group concentrated on cutting politics out of policy-makers' decisions by studying ethics laws in other states to determine how other governments handle certain situations.

County Manager Dale Askew assembled the group to look at contract-awarding procedures because the state law isn't specific enough.

He felt compelled to design the policy after two board members were admonished by the Nevada Ethics Commission for choosing airport-concession applicants who were acquaintances, then voting for them without disclosing their relationship.

"The reason we created the task force was to see whether state law was working for us in the minds of the people we asked to look at this, private people," Askew said.

"I don't think we can escape the fact the controversy involving the D Gates was the driving force. It caused us to take a step back and take a look."

Clark County adopted an ordinance March 2 that addresses the contract-awarding procedures that troubled its elected board members.

Askew said the most significant element of the ordinance eliminates "ex-parte" communication.

Under the new law, project proponents who contact county commissioners between the time "requests for proposals" are issued and when the item is posted on the board's agenda will be disqualified.

Woodbury was criticized last year after he offered advice to longtime friend and D Gate concession applicant Gary Naseef during the request-for-proposal process. When it came time to vote, Woodbury abstained, but critics said the damage had been done. Naseef was allowed to open a coffee kiosk.

"Other than the ex-parte communication, it was an endorsement of the existing (state) law," Askew said of the commission's unanimous approval of the ordinance. "It's something that works and that we should indeed follow."

Since the adoption of the ethics ordinance, the commission no longer has the option to choose acquaintances named on a list of applicants. The law clearly describes how airport contracts may be awarded.

One option allows the airport's master concessionaires and aviation staff to write a request for proposal, evaluate applicants and submit a recommendation to county commissioners.

The second method gives airport staff the authority to determine what type of business is needed and, perhaps with the help of an independent selection committee, sift through proposals and submit the best applicant to the board.

The third option allows airport officials, with permission from county commissioners, to directly negotiate and choose a business owner.

When the contracts of the airport's two master concessionaires -- W.H. Smith and Host Marriott -- expire, the policy might change again.

Commissioner Mary Kincaid believes the master concessionaire concept is too political and should no longer be used after the two companies' contracts expire in 2008. She said she has fielded calls from businesses who say W.H. Smith and Host Marriott reserve the most ideal space for their own stores.

"It's like the fox watching the henhouse," Kincaid said.

While the county has scrambled to create a policy to prevent further missteps, the valley's other local governments distanced themselves from the commission's airport controversy.

Henderson officials are quick to point out that they adopted the city's own ethics-related ordinance three years ago, long before the state Ethics Commission came down on county board members.

Henderson's 1996 ordinance provided campaign contribution disclosure policies that at the time were not addressed in the state statute. The City Council passed the resolution and committed itself to making more detailed disclosures than state law required but left the option open to other elected officials in Henderson.

During the 1997 Legislature, the state adopted the policies drafted by Henderson, and the city killed its ordinance.

The state statute requires candidates who receive more than $10,000 in any given year to file a disclosure form. It prohibits donating money to a candidate using the name of another person or organization and it says contributions in excess of $100 must be reported.

North Las Vegas, Henderson and Boulder City have not developed ethics ordinances that regulate an elected official's behavior, nor do they see the need.

"We have no ethics laws of our own," said North Las Vegas City Clerk Eileen Sevigny. "We follow the Nevada Revised Statute."

That statute is expected to change by the time state legislators break in May.

While several ethics proposals have been written by various lawmakers, Guinn's is the only bill to be introduced.

Aside from providing the Ethics Commission with more attorney-minded people, Guinn's proposal clears up the law in regard to personal relationships.

He recommended that public officials disclose their relationship with applicants, but only abstain if the applicant involves relatives or if they have a substantial personal or business relationship.

The governor also suggested increasing maximum fines imposed by the Ethics Commission from $5,000 to as much as $25,000. He recommended that ethics violations be treated as felonies.

Legislators have more pressure on them to create an understandable law that covers a broad range of scenarios because two years will pass before the issue can be revisited. The county, as Spitler said, will add to its policy as needed.

Coming Tuesday: Nevada's lawmakers molding legislation from several versions of ethics proposals.

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