Feds double rent on airport property

Wednesday, Dec. 10, 2003 | 9:32 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- The federal government has forced the state to double the rent it pays for space for its motor vehicle pool operation at McCarran International Airport.

Pam Wilcox, director of the state Lands Division, told the state Board of Examiners on Tuesday the state will now have to pay $98,000 a year. She said the Federal Aviation Administration has told McCarran officials that the state was paying below market place.

The increased rates will be charged retroactive to February, she said, and McCarran has extended the lease to the end of 2005.

Wilcox told the examiners the money was in the budget, and that the state would look around for other property for the motor pool. She said her division is looking for about two acres south of the airport.

The examiners board agreed to an amended contract plus the higher rate.

McCarran wants to expand into the present motor pool location. At one time the state was trying to locate its operations at UNLV, but that fell through.

Gov. Kenny Guinn, the board chairman, also criticized the medical school at the University of Nevada for a delay in a claim for $778,000 for services.

The state Division of Mental Health and Developmental Disabilities asked the medical school for psychiatric help for state clients. The medical school submitted the bill more than a year later.

University officials told the examiners board there was a change in staff in both places and there were problems with the contract. They said the state has since hired the psychiatrists.

Guinn wondered how the medical school could go for a year without getting reimbursed $778,000 from the state. School officials said other funds were used to pay the psychiatrists.

The governor said there is only so much money in the state's stale claims account. "It makes us look like we don't know what we're doing," he said.

"You can't let something like this go on for more than a year," he told university officials. But the claim was honored.