What the Gibbons-Ozmen relationship tells us about Nevada politics

By Jon Ralston

Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2010 | 2 a.m.

The long, sweet, cozy story of the Gibbons and Ozmen families, where campaign cash and government contracts have been the currency of friendship, has so many “only in Nevada” answers.

So many questions, too:

Where could a governor take $30,000 from a company and its principals in proximity to the corporation getting an $11 million state contract, then vote to ratify the contract, claiming to be “unaware” of the donation, even though it was from longtime friends and accounted for 95 percent of his contributions at the time?

Only in Nevada.

The chronology here is fascinating — and I don’t just mean how far back the Gibbons-Ozmen ties go, which is when Gov. Jim Gibbons was a congressman and helped Fatih and Eren Ozmens’ Sierra Nevada Corp. secure contracts and then saw the Ozmens hire Dawn Gibbons as a consultant. Where else could a congressman advocate for a local company, which then reciprocates by hiring the congressman’s wife, and then the couples travel to Turkey?

Only in Nevada.

The recent chain of Gibbons-Ozmen events is quite telling.

When I first checked the Sierra Nevada Web site this week, the company had a news release dated Aug. 5 announcing the contract with the Nevada Army National Guard to build solar facilities. Gibbons’ contribution report lists the $30,000 donation — bundled through the couple and a company PAC — coming Aug. 6.

By Tuesday the news release was dated Sept. 24 (I printed the original with the Aug. 5 date, by the way), which would have come after Gibbons, as chairman of the Board of Examiners, voted to approve the contract. I am not sure news release dates matter that much because either way, the governor took a huge cash sum a short time before he voted on the contract.

His spokesman, Dan Burns, said the governor “was unaware of the contribution at the time.” Here’s what makes that so suspicious, though: Gibbons did not start raising money last year until July. When he took the $30,000 from the Ozmens, he only had two previous donations — totaling $2,525. Could Gibbons really have been so disconnected from his campaign that he did not know his friends essentially had provided the only money in his account? Maybe.

To be fair, Burns pointed out that the bid award was made by a committee and that the governor did not influence the process. Fine. But where else could a governor claim with a straight face that he did not know close friends had bid on an $11 million contract and given a large sum of money to his campaign near the vote?

Only in Nevada.

Even if the Aug. 5 date was a mistake on that company release, there is another on the site with the same date, the day before the $30,000 contribution, in which Sierra Nevada announced a joint venture with a national solar firm, with promises of work to begin soon on “future solar (photovoltaic) projects.” And, voilà, eight days later, Sierra Nevada was formally notified it had the best bid for the National Guard contract — a bid ratified less than a month later by the governor and the Board of Examiners. Where does this happen?

Only in Nevada.

To many cynical observers, especially in the Year of Hating Incumbents, this may seem like pay-to-play. Few, I’d guess, will believe the contribution at that time was coincidental. Coincidences don’t happen often in politics — and that is not only in Nevada.

It also appears to be perfectly legal. State ethics laws specifically exempt campaign contributions from disclosure requirements when voting — the rationale being the elected official has submitted a contribution report so that information is public. Where could that kind of rationale be used to exculpate such nondisclosure?

Only in Nevada.

The ethics laws themselves are right on point:

“A public officer or employee shall not seek or accept any gift, service, favor, employment, engagement, emolument or economic opportunity which would tend improperly to influence a reasonable person in his position to depart from the faithful and impartial discharge of his public duties.”

And: “A public officer or employee shall not use his position in government to secure or grant unwarranted privileges, preferences, exemptions or advantages for himself, any business entity in which he has a significant pecuniary interest, or any person to whom he has a commitment in a private capacity to the interests of that person.”

Where else would taking $30,000 from government supplicants up for a bid not qualify as impeding impartiality and where else would a commitment in private capacity not include a longtime friendship, complete with apparent quid pro quos and European travel?

I think you know.

Jon Ralston’s column appears Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. Ralston can be reached at 870-7997 or at [email protected].