Columnist Jon Ralston: There’s a new sheriff in town these days

Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2000 | 10:05 a.m.

Jon Ralston, who publishes the Ralston Report, writes a column for the Sun on Sundays and Wednesdays. Ralston can be reached at 870-7997 or through e-mail at ralston@vegas.com.

It hasn't been a good year for Southern Nevada cops, or actually ex-cops, in elective office.

Las Vegas City Councilman Michael McDonald's skating on thin Las Vegas Sportspark ice and seeing it disintegrate beneath him was matched by Clark County Commissioner Lance Malone's strange metamorphosis from gaffemeister to martyr to corpse.

But one local law enforcement type has provided hope in the first year of the new millennium that cops can shine in the elected world: Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins oversaw a caucus that lost only one of 28 seats, this after many forecasts of doom. And his moves in the interregnum between Election Day and Session '01 could presage a new stage in Perkins' rapid political evolution.

Perkins was an unknown second-term assemblyman in 1995 when then-Speaker Joe Dini tapped him to be the Democratic floor leader in an unprecedented 21-21 lower house. Only three sessions later, Dini has handed him the gavel, albeit somewhat reluctantly, and the Henderson police captain has become the first Southern Nevada speaker since Jack Vergiels in 1983.

His deft handling of the transfer of power from Dini to himself, which was dicey up until the last moment, showed the toughness and grace of a statesman. This was a sword not just with two edges, but multiple blades that could have inflicted damage to Perkins and the party.

First, Dini was the man who gave Perkins a chance to get into leadership. And the legendary Mr. Speaker did not want it to look as if the gavel was being wrested from him. So Perkins had to both assuage Dini's psyche while also ensuring that he held firm to a commitment to turn over the caucus reins this session. After months of flip-flops, punctuated by various caucus and outside emissaries trying to salve any hurt feelings, Dini agreed to step down.

But the master of the deal, the man who has given his home of Yerington more paved miles than any other rural burgh, cut a fat one: He will chair the influential Commerce Committee, will wear the ceremonial moniker of Speaker Emeritus and will be considered part of the leadership team. Bravo, Mr. Speaker -- Perkins, that is.

The second part of the deal was just as difficult for Perkins to negotiate. To give Dini the Commerce helm, he had to ask Barbara Buckley, the incoming majority leader, to relinquish the chairmanship. Now anyone who saw Buckley operate last session knows how much she loved that post and how she wielded it with tenacity and ferocity rarely seen in Carson City.

But after receiving assurances that Perkins would let her hold hostages at the session's end as any committee chair can, and persuading her that as majority leader she actually chaired all the committees (love the spin), Buckley relented. She also took the broader view: Bringing leadership South was more important than her Commerce perch. Huzzahs, huzzahs, Mr. Speaker.

Perkins also showed his toughness and savvy when he organized the lower house this week, most notably with how he handled Vivian Freeman and Chris Giunchigliani. Perkins bumped an incensed Freeman, who had been panned by legislators and lobbyists alike after the '99 session, from her chairmanship of Health and Human Services. But he elevated Giunchigliani to the critical position of vice chairman of Ways and Means.

Perkins, as much as anyone, knows that Giunchigliani is a human posterior pain-inducer. But as one insider pointed out, he also recognized that if she ratchets back her rhetoric, she is one of the smartest and hardest working legislators in the capital. "She deserves the shot and he gave it to her," said one legislative player. And now she can never say Perkins didn't give her the rope to climb the leadership ladder, or with which to hang herself. Kudos again, Mr. Speaker.

Once the session starts, Perkins still must prove that he can hold his own with Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio and Gov. Kenny Guinn and his team -- he will be helped in the latter endeavor by a caucus whose members, as one put it, will be framing letters the governor sent out for their opponents and hanging the missives on their office walls.

Now if they could just find a viable candidate for governor in 2002, Perkins and the Democrats would be in fine fettle. Now where's a good cop when you need him?