Tao challenges Maxfield to release tax records

Tuesday, Oct. 19, 2004 | 9:42 a.m.

Clark County Commission candidate Jerry Tao fired off another salvo in what is an increasingly bitter campaign.

Tao on Monday released his income tax records for 2002 and 2003 and challenged his competitor, incumbent Commission Chairman Chip Maxfield, to do the same. Tao said "questions of conflict of interest have dogged" Maxfield during his four-year term.

"We already know that Maxfield accepts money from businesses that he is supposed to vote on, as evidenced by the fact that he has been forced to abstain nearly 200 times," Tao said.

Maxfield, a Republican who has a substantial advantage in the number of Republicans to Democrats in District C, has said he abstains when it is ethically necessary to do so. Until August, when he sold his interest, he was the co-owner of Southwest Engineering, a civil engineering firm.

"I have fully complied with the law and have submitted all required documents and will continue to do the same," Maxfield said Monday.

"I would like to point out that he (Tao) is under investigation for the reporting in his campaign contributions," he said.

Tao said staff members improperly recorded a mortgage he took out on his property as a $150,000 contribution from his father, well over the legal limit of $10,000 for such contributions. Maxfield has asked the Nevada Ethics Commission to look into the financing issue.

Tao has recently made a number of accusations against Maxfield related to a civil lawsuit filed by a business owner who was denied a zoning request to establish a business in a residential part of the valley.

Maxfield and his lawyer, Don Campbell, have said the accusations are without merit and that the lawsuit is an effort to affect the Nov. 2 election.

Campbell said Monday that Maxfield "intends to hold those responsible for this lawsuit to the full measure of personal and monetary sanctions available under the law."