Bill out to change often-heard question: ‘What election?’

Tuesday, May 15, 2007 | 7:31 a.m.

Ask people outside of Las Vegas' Ward 5 whom they are going to vote for in next month's general election and you will probably get one of two responses.

"Who's running?" or, more likely, "There's an election next month?"

That's because the only citywide race on June 5 pits deputy public defender Lynn Avants against former prosecutor Martin Hastings in a race for the Department 6 Municipal judge's seat.

With judicial races generally not acting like a magnet for voters, election officials anticipate an especially low turnout.

"If we get 10 percent, I will be very surprised," said Larry Lomax, Clark County's registrar of voters. That means that only about 20,000 of Las Vegas' 214,276 registered voters will bother to cast ballots.

For the low-profile judicial race and another contest confined to Ward 5, where voters will pick a new City Council member, Las Vegas will spend an estimated $350,000 to mount a citywide election. Based on the projected turnout, that could work out to about $17.50 per vote.

From one perspective, the cost of setting up 345 polling places and hiring workers to staff them, regardless of the number of races or expected voters, is simply the price of democracy.

But the election's price tag, combined with the anticipated low turnout, has reopened an occasional debate over whether municipal races should continue to have the election calendar to themselves in odd-numbered years, as they do now, or be consolidated in even years with state and national contests.

The so-called off-year races could become a thing of the past if state legislators approve Senate Bill 149, which would require municipal primary and general elections to occur on the same date as state elections.

The bill has been approved in the Senate, but has been delayed in the Assembly to allow input from municipal government representatives.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman is among those who oppose the change.

"I personally like the city to have its own election cycle," Goodman said. "If they have them at the same time, everybody will be vying for the same (campaign) money."

One often-heard argument for retaining the current system is that by virtue of being the only political game in town in odd-numbered years, campaigns for local office draw attention, from the media and public alike, that they likely would not receive if they were in competition with state and national elections.

If local elections were to be contested at the same time as presidential, congressional and major statewide campaigns, the argument goes, city and county candidates would get lost in the shuffle, resulting in even less civic engagement in local government.

Those who favor consolidation, however, note that although local candidates might have to work harder to distinguish themselves - and what, they ask, is wrong with that? - even-year elections would result in many more voters casting ballots in municipal races.

In addition, because the county already would be obligated to conduct an election for state or federal races, municipalities' costs would drop substantially with a consolidated election.

If the state legislation passes, the county would bill cities for costs directly attributable to their elections. The major cost a city would incur would be adding pages to the sample ballot, about $18,000 per page, Lomax said. The cost of adding city candidates' names to the actual ballot would be negligible, he said.

In the case of next month's election, that means Las Vegas would have saved nearly all of the $350,000 had the election occurred in an even-numbered year.

The reason June's ballot has a paucity of Las Vegas races is that most of the contests were decided in the April primary, when Goodman, Councilwoman Lois Tarkanian and Councilman Gary Reese received more than 50 percent of the vote to be elected outright.

The sole council race remaining to be decided is in Ward 5, where Ricki Barlow, the liaison to former Councilman Lawrence Weekly, faces lawyer Stacie Truesdell for the seat vacated when Weekly was appointed to the Clark County Commission.

One theory holds that those who turn out for a low-volume election tend to be better-informed voters.

But political consultant Gary Gray, who represents Hastings in the judicial race, says that's not necessarily true.

"Some people feel it's their civic duty to vote in every election - that doesn't necessarily mean they are well-informed," Gray said.

Conversely, just because people choose not to vote doesn't mean they aren't politically aware, Gray said.

"It's not that people aren't smart - it appears they just aren't interested," he said.

North Las Vegas voters also will go to the polls next month for a small-scale general election.

Last November North Las Vegas voters changed the way City Council members are elected from citywide elections to ward-only races. And with only the Ward 2 seat at stake, the city will have to open only nine of its 37 polling places.

"It's saving money because it's a smaller election," North Las Vegas City Clerk Karen Storms said. Henderson, meanwhile, will save about $200,000 by being able to skip next month's election, Henderson City Clerk Monica Simmons said. All its citywide elections were wrapped up in the primary.

That leaves Las Vegas officials pondering whether spending $350,000 to fill two offices is a necessary expense, or an avoidable one.

Sun reporter Mike Trask contributed to this story.