Jon Ralston on Gibbons’ summit and what won’t happen

Friday, Oct. 5, 2007 | 7:29 a.m.

Gov. Jim Gibbons was at the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce on Thursday to take "a first step" but not "to point fingers." He wanted to "bring people to the table" but not to "assess blame." He was there to do it "right upfront " and "head - on." And he was there to have a "frank discussion."

All of this revelatory information the governor confided to the media before he disappeared into a conference room, his Dictionary of Cliches cleverly concealed somewhere, his programming intact.

The summit to save Nevada homes had begun.

Gibbons was there, as he told an interviewer, because "bringing everybody together is the first step" - and by everybody, he meant the moneyed interests, some of whom represented companies that have been accused by homeowners, activists and the federal government of causing the foreclosure crisis. This was a place where friends, doyens and Countrywide were supposed to be the lenders who had Gibbons' ear.

The atmospherics on Howard Hughes Parkway were marvelous. In a state where the foreclosure rate is three times the national average, where families are struggling to hold onto homes and where neighborhoods face decimation, the governor lunched at Big Business Central with high-level chamber types, then had a photographer take pictures of him with the executives before a train of bankers and lenders strolled into the secret summit.

(Soon thereafter, Gail Burks of the nonprofit Nevada Fair Housing Center and an aide were asked to leave. How such do-gooders got past chamber security, much less into the lender conclave , is beyond me.)

Not to worry, though. Gibbons will consider other voices, too, even some who have not contributed to his campaign or had lobbyists to whisper in his ear. Today was only, as Gibbons told us over and over, a first step.

Indeed, he was taking more first steps Thursday than Ed Bernstein ever did.

When he emerged, he had his special dictionary out again:

"We didn't get into this overnight; we're not going to get out of it overnight," he told the media.

And what to do? There's "no reason to reinvent the wheel," the cliche monster disgorged.

And the coup de grace: "It's not a crisis today. It's not of crisis proportion today, but it could cause problems down the road."

Phew. For a minute there, I was worried.

But then when I heard the governor was going to form a task force and that this was not the summit to end all summits - he plans another one with more people and even nonprofit groups are invited - I felt better.

It also turns out that borrowers were not as educated as they should be and the state needs to help them. And, the governor informed the media, the lenders don't think that Nevada needs more regulation. (Here is the point in the old days when the reporters rush to the phones to tell their editors to stop the presses!)

Perhaps I am being too harsh on the governor, although his history indicates he is not so open-minded. And he does not help his credibility on this issue by having a former bank executive (Mendy Elliott) running the agency that oversees business and industry and who just hired a mortgage lending executive (Joe Waltuch) whose previous employer is bankrupt and under a legal cloud.

But there is a rhetorical function to the governor's office , and to some extent it is his job to publicly try to reassure a populace and to take on the issue. "The bottom line is we are," one Gibbonsite said. "We're forcing people to talk about an issue that many are in denial over."

Talk about it in private, where the lenders might have said anything from "borrowers are boobs" to "we're losing enough already and can't do much more." We don't know.

But we do know that experts have raised questions about how much the state can do, which is why I wondered whether a GOP governor would be willing to bring in the strong arm of government to force the men and women in suits to give the almost-foreclosed-on a break.

Gibbons insisted he was just a facilitator Thursday, there to "make them sit at the table." He still believed in "free market solutions," the governor insisted as he tried to influence the market through the power of his office.

So maybe bringing everybody together for a frank discussion to take this problem head - on and right upfront was a good first step. But in this crisis, it's the last step that matters.