Drive to ban ‘double-dipping’ lawmakers gains momentum

Monday, Oct. 27, 2003 | 10:56 a.m.

The unfolding "double-dipping" scandal surrounding state lawmakers who collected pay from their local government jobs while serving in the Legislature is bolstering a drive to bar such officials from Nevada political office, foes and supporters agree.

Proponents of the ban expect to file the initiative paperwork on Friday.

Other states prohibit public employees from serving in state legislatures, but the critical difference is that those states have full-time, professional legislatures, Sen. Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, said.

She is one of 12 Democratic state lawmakers who have public-sector jobs. Only three Republicans would be affected by the proposed ban. That disparity has some opponents of the ban alleging that the real intention is to wipe out the Democrats.

The effort to let voters decide whether to ban public employees from the state Legislature was launched by a group called Nevadans for Sound Government, which has links to the ultraconservative Independent American Party and Nevada Republican Liberty Caucus.

George Harris is the leader of that caucus and the initiative campaign. Harris said the accusation that he is targeting Democrats is "nonsense."

"This is just about good government," he said. "This issue crosses party lines. Taxpayers are sick and tired of getting screwed."

Harris and other conservatives said they were galvanized by the record $836 million tax increase passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. Kenny Guinn in July. An effort to recall Guinn, a Republican, is sputtering, but Harris said he has overwhelming support for the initiative to bar public employees from political office.

Harris said the tax increase passed, in part, thanks to an inherent conflict of public employees. They are more likely to support higher taxes and government spending because it pays for their salaries and their government projects, Harris and advocates of the prohibition say.

Opponents of the proposed ban counter that the alleged conflict of interest is no different from one that exists for people in other professions. If Nevada wants to continue to have a part-time, citizen Legislature, it should be open to anyone voters want to elect, they say.

And now opponents of the ban are worried that what they see as good arguments against the restriction will be overwhelmed by the controversy surrounding the several employees of local governments who were collecting state and local public pay.

The initiative will receive a boost from the widespread coverage of the controversy, said Paul Brown, Southern Nevada director of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada, an advocacy group that works with labor, human rights and environmental groups.

"Right now it plays into their hands, absolutely," Brown said. "It has some of the appearance of an organized campaign.

"Anybody who thinks these things are coincidences is a political fool. The sequence is organized."

Coming on the heels of controversial Republican-led successes in California to throw out the elected Democratic Gov. Gray Davis, and controversial redistricting in Texas, the initiative effort is directed at public employees who tend to be Democrats, Brown said.

Assemblyman Bob Beers, R-Las Vegas, one of the supporters of the proposed ban, points out that if it passes it wouldn't necessarily mean that the 15 lawmakers affected would have to leave office. Beers said those lawmakers who wanted to continue to hold public office would just have to find other ways to make a living. He said his Republican Assembly colleague Ron Knecht, an employee of the Public Utility Commission, for example, could resign from that public job and become a consultant or he could keep his commission job and leave the Assembly.

Those who are skeptical or oppose the initiative note that conflicts are not restricted to government employees. The Legislature often puts people with experience or expertise in an area on committees to write legislation and vote on issues affecting their own industries, Brown said.

"I think that if you take a close look at everyone up there, official or not, there are conflicts of interests," he said. "The so-called purpose of a citizens' Legislature is to have experts in their areas. 'Nevada,' in this case, is a Spanish word for conflict-of-interest."

Ted Jelen, of the political science department at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, agreed.

"Think of the stuff that's going on legally," he said. "I'm a lot more shocked by it. It's Jelen's first law of politics: What's truly outrageous is what is legal."

He said the initiative has unfairly targeted government employees, many of whom may be experts in fields that need legislative oversight.

"I think it's absurd," Jelen said of the initiative. "If we are going to start doing that, we can start doing things like banning anyone with a business that is regulated.

"It would also eliminate a good source of expertise or take away what little expertise exists in the Legislature."

Jelen said he doesn't believe the scandal is a "vast, right-wing conspiracy," but he also notes that those targeted in the various investigations are Democrats.

The solution to concerns about the way any elected official is voting in Carson City -- or Washington, D.C. -- is not to pass new laws restricting the right to serve, he argued. The solution is for the people to elect new representatives.

"Vote them out," Jelen said. "If you don't like them, run against them. Don't vote for them.

"It amazes me that there are people in this state who think it makes perfect sense to bind the voters. If you don't like what is happening, the voters are perfectly free to use that."

Clark County Commissioner Rory Reid, a Democrat, said the initiative paints with a broad brush. Good politicians of both parties would have to choose between their careers of their desire to represent their constituents, he said.

"It would be hard to argue that Richard Perkins and Dina Titus are not good public servants," Reid said. Perkins is Assembly speaker and deputy police chief in Henderson; Titus is a UNLV political science professor and Senate minority leader. Both are Democrats.

"I think you need to be careful," said Reid, former chairman of the state Democratic Party. "We shouldn't try to create these categories where everyone in the category is negatively affected.

"We have citizen legislators and they are going to have other jobs."

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