Ralston awaits political theater of Gibbons’ Last Gasp

By Jon Ralston (contact)

Wednesday, Nov. 18, 2009 | 2 a.m.

Take this prediction to the bank: The next session of the Nevada Legislature will not commence as scheduled on Feb. 7, 2011, but sometime next year, perhaps as early as January.

The only questions are just what will be on the agenda, how much can be worked out beforehand and what decibel level the legislative whining will reach. What is not in question is that there will be a spectacular lack of policy purity on display as a governor who doesn’t like federal money for education will be arguing for federal money for education and Democratic legislative leaders will be meekly standing by and allowing cuts they abhor to be enacted while mouthing fiscal conservative shibboleths they hardly believe. It will be almost as grotesque as a full-length legislative session.

Even if the state’s languishing economy doesn’t compel Gov. Jim Gibbons to call the Gang of 63 to wintry Carson City, the erasure of a law that renders the state ineligible to compete for tens of millions in federal education dollars should tip the scales.

Gibbons signaled Tuesday to capital reporters that the 2003 law barring the state from using student data to evaluate teachers would be on the special session agenda — if there is one. What the governor did not say is that his folks believe a session is likely, sources confirm, and will probably be slated for mid- to late January. The latest depressing fiscal numbers are due at the end of November and rather than interfere with the holidays, Gibbons would set the date after the New Year.

Lawmakers will beg the governor not to force them back to the capital, arguing there are plenty of gimmicks at his disposal, cravenly bowing at the altar of the executive power they so disdain. Anything would be preferable to giving up their fundraising for a month or actually having to cast a vote that some of their constituents don’t like.

Gibbons will call the session for policy and political reasons he will find irresistible — call it the Gibbons Last Gasp Session. With his approval ratings in the teens and many of his “friends” probably maxed out to GOP savior-in-waiting Brian Sandoval, Gibbons has nothing to lose.

So why would he pass up a chance to look like a leader, shout “no new taxes” one more time, blame captive lawmakers for the escalating jobless rate and, as a bonus, pound the teachers union for pushing the law that exempts their members from responsibility if students aren’t performing? Did I mention the lure of a special session would be irresistible for the governor?

My guess is lawmakers will respond by doing what they do best in the face of pressure on the cusp of a difficult election year: Assume the prostrate position. They will maunder about how they are slicing into bone and how there must be a long-term solution — wait, is that a Vision Stakeholder Group I see before me? But they will not make much of a fuss.

The issue of that education law paralyzing Nevada’s ability to grab as much as $175 million in “Race to the Top” grants could be entertaining, though. Gibbons was adamant Tuesday that he wanted to change the law to make the state eligible, apparently oblivious to the fact that he spent his entire congressional career — and some of his gubernatorial tenure — railing about the federal tethers. But no matter.

Legislative history indicates the provision was put into the bill designed to force states to comport with the No Child Left Behind Act. But teachers union lobbyists urged during the regular session that the “sole purpose of data collection should be diagnostic for student achievement,” according to the minutes of a May hearing.

When lawmakers failed to pass the measure during the regular session, it was enacted in the first special session (yes, there were two). The language was scaled back but still prohibited student data from being used to evaluate teachers, which, of course, is counterintuitive — albeit, not to lawmakers. Just in case Gibbons and any of the GOP legislators want to yell too loudly at the January session, though, the measure passed unanimously, so this will be 20-20 hindsight on display.

Just one more example of the Law of Unintended Consequences after a session bereft of much deliberation but replete with rushed-through bills in one regular and two special sessions, including the then-largest tax increase in history, a true abomination produced by the legislative Cuisinart.

Yes, the inevitable session will be Gibbons’ last gasp. But lawmakers will be gasping for their political breath while the public can only, once again, gasp in horror.