Regents fail to decide on how many members to make board

Jennifer Knight

Monday, March 5, 2001 | 11:32 a.m.

A decision to add, subtract or keep the same number of regents was tabled on Friday after five failed attempts at voting on the size of the state Board of Regents.

The board faces the pivotal task of deciding just how to redistribute its districts to reflect a the state's growing population. Like the Legislature, the regents are weighing whether to increase the size of the board to maintain similar representation for people in rural Nevada.

On Friday the choices were not limited to keeping the same size or growing. The 11-member board also considered shrinking to nine or 10, but some felt that a smaller board would be more difficult to represent the growing population. Potential expansion to 12 or 13 did not pass either because some members felt it would be even more difficult to come to a consensus with so many members. In the end, the board couldn't even manage to decide on staying the same.

"This is not something to treat lightly because you could have some severe problems," Chairwoman Thalia Dondero said.

Dondero said that if the board shrank, many of the rural areas would be represented by regents who also covered highly populated areas. Under one scenario with nine members, one of the rural northern districts would be joined to make one contiguous district that stretches all the way to Clark County.

"They should have a representative because rural areas have different issues than do people living in large cities," she said.

Regent Jill Derby argued for a larger board, saying that the committees that many of the regents sit on now are becoming unmanageable. With more members, the board could stretch the committee load more evenly.

"Basically, the southerners wanted nine, while the north wanted more," said Regent Tom Kirkpatrick, who argued for less.

"When one of my predecessors voted to increase the board to 11 members, he said it was the biggest mistake he'd ever made," Kirkpatrick said.

For now, Dondero said she would like the board to stay the same, but the regents will continue to wrestle with the issue in the coming months.

This is the second time the issue has come to the regents and failed to pass. They are slated to consider the issue again in April.