Editorial: Pushing for fairness

Saturday, June 2, 2007 | 7:12 a.m.

This week Gov. Jim Gibbons vetoed legislation that would have doubled the $50,000 cap on damages that can be awarded to people who win civil lawsuits against government entities.

But Sen. Terry Care, the Las Vegas Democrat who sponsored Senate Bill 66, anticipated that the governor would veto the measure, which would have increased the damage cap for the first time since 1979. So Care hedged his bets and slipped the language to increase the cap into another bill - Assembly Bill 483, a measure to expand Nevada's homestead law that Gibbons championed in his State of the State address.

That legislation was passed unanimously and was headed for the governor's desk, leaving Gibbons with a dilemma - veto a pet project of his in order to veto the damage cap yet again or approve his homestead exemption and institute a higher cap that he said would cause undue hardship for rural local governments.

But the Assembly helped out Gibbons on Friday when it voted to retrieve the homestead bill, paving the way for Gibbons to work out a compromise with Care to not only phase in a damage cap increase, possibly starting at $75,000, but also obtain Gibbons' desired homestead expansion that raises the exemption from $350,000 to $450,000.

Local governments did play the financial hardship card in opposing the damage cap originally sought by Care. But, as Care noted when he introduced his bill in February, the proposed $100,000 cap was less than $130,000, which is what the cap would have been if it had been adjusted for inflation all along since the last time it was raised in 1979.

Raising the cap from $50,000 to $100,000 wouldn't have caused local governments to collapse. And government should be held accountable for its actions, which can result in damages that far exceed $50,000.

For example, a speeding Nevada Highway Patrol cruiser slammed into a car on Interstate 15 last year, killing four people inside. Placing a $50,000 cap on such a tragedy is ridiculous, no matter who is paying.

People who have been harmed by the actions of a government agency or its employees are entitled to compensation that more accurately reflects modern reality. The compromise proposal spearheaded by Care, and making its way through the Legislature, is at least a step in that direction.