Friday, Dec. 10, 2004 | 10:59 a.m.
The clamor for a statewide reform of ethics laws continued Thursday with Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins introducing his own slate of proposed improvements.
The Henderson Democrat said he has been mulling an ethics package since February, prompted by the indictments against former Clark County commissioners, the double-dipping scandals in the Legislature and, now, the impeachment and censure of state Controller Kathy Augustine.
"Some of the issues that have arisen in the last year, year and a half, gave rise to the need for a strong ethics package," said Perkins, who has been working with Attorney General Brian Sandoval.
Ethics reform is sometimes difficult to pass in the Legislature, where officials tend to worry about how the laws would affect them, but Perkins and several other legislators believe that now is the time to strike because the public is frustrated about Augustine's impeachment.
The proposal includes measures that would put tougher penalties in ethics laws, restrict the amount of time a local political candidate can collect money, strengthen the whistle-blower law, force elected officials to resign before running for another office and strengthen the open-meeting law.
"There's a sense that maybe things need to be made clearer," said Assembly Majority Leader Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas. "Maybe things that are pretty obvious to some of us need to be made clearer to others."
Several insiders have pointed out that Perkins' ideas aren't entirely new.
Perkins hopes to resurrect an idea most recently pushed by former Sen. Ann O'Connell, R-Las Vegas, that would require officials to quit their elected office if they are running for a different elected position.
The change would affect Sen. Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, who, like Perkins, has floated her name as a potential Democratic gubernatorial candidate in 2006.
Titus would be midway through her term in the state Senate if she runs for governor and does not plan to resign. She said the Legislature already has looked at the idea and decided it wasn't needed.
"This is just a thinly veiled effort for Richard to get at me and it's embarrassing," Titus said.
Perkins argues that the public would rather officials complete their duties before they "shop for something else."
Elected officials in mid-term also can intimidate donors to give money under the fear they would face reprisal, Perkins said.
"It creates the wrong appearance," he said. "It certainly isn't aimed at Dina or anyone else for that matter."
Perkins also is pushing a ban on local elected officials from collecting campaign contributions in years they are not running for reelection, an idea that also has failed in the Legislature before.
Too many local officials take campaign checks just days before or after they cast major votes, Perkins said.
The idea is difficult to implement because local officials work year-round while legislators, who aren't allowed to accept money immediately before or after a session, meet only every two years, Buckley said.
The Legislature could set a reasonable point where it would be time for local officials to start collecting checks, maybe five months before an election, Buckley said.
"If you confine their fund-raising activities to a period of time when they're actually campaigning, the public's not looking at them accepting contributions and making votes at the same time as often," Perkins said.
Perkins also supports a "three strikes you're out" policy on elected officials who are found guilty of ethical violations.
Officials such as Augustine, who admitted to ethics violations before the state Ethics Commission, should automatically be thrown from office, Perkins said.
He also wants to increase fines and criminal penalties for ethics violations.
Stacy Jennings, executive director of the state Commission on Ethics, said she hasn't spoken to commissioners about Perkins' ideas but thinks putting some teeth in ethics laws will help deter unethical behavior.
"What you allow, you encourage," she said.
Jennings said she was particularly happy with an idea from Perkins to strengthen the state's whistleblowers laws.
Some are concerned that state employees will be even more reluctant to complain about ethics violations after Augustine's former employees testified and were criticized during the investigation.
Jennings said she already heard from state employees worried about coming forward with charges against their superiors, and the ordeal Augustine's employees went through could have a "chilling effect."
"It's the feeling I get from talking to state employees from time to time in the course of my job that they don't feel there's any protection for them," she said.
Sen. Maggie Carlton, D-Las Vegas, also has introduced a bill to deal with employees who come forward with complaints.
Carlton believes the Augustine mess could have been avoided if the issue had been addressed when employees first complained that the state controller was asking them to do campaign work on state time.
The Augustine fallout should be a "wake-up call" to state employees, who deserve the same protection as other employees, she said.
"If we could have done something at the personnel department level, maybe this wouldn't have happened," Carlton said.
In an issue also raised by the Augustine matter, Perkins wants to better define guidelines on when an employee can do outside campaign and political work for their boss if they are an elected official.
Several legislators are upset with a ruling from the Legislative Counsel Bureau that employees can legally work on campaign reports on state time for their publicly elected bosses.
Lastly, Perkins wants to strengthen the open meeting law and impose stricter penalties for people who violate it. He cited recent problems of the Board of Regents making decisions in closed session.
Titus has introduced several of her own bills, including a measure to require public employees to take an unpaid leave of absence while serving in the Legislature.
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