Effort to kill Las Vegas planning commission term limits draws heated opposition

By Dave Toplikar

Wednesday, Aug. 3, 2011 | 1:24 p.m.

Don't eliminate term limits — that was the clear message given today by at least two Las Vegas City Council members as they considered an ordinance to remove them for people appointed to the city's planning commission.

After hearing strong opposition from the public and from two members, the council decided to wait until its Aug. 17 meeting to vote on the issue.

The ordinance, proposed by Councilman Ricki Y. Barlow, would remove the planning commission term limits now in effect, which limit a planning commissioner to two-four year terms.

Barlow said he wanted to eliminate term limits because most of the city's 20 other appointed advisory boards and commissions have no term limits.

Councilman Steve Ross said he understood the intent of the bill, "but I am vehemently not going to support this ordinance."

Ross said he agreed with negative comments that several members of the public made at the outset of the meeting.

"None of us up here were elected forever," Ross said. "We have all been elected for a certain amount of time. Should we be re-elected, that's great, but for a certain amount of time."

He said the ordinance would be significant in that it "creates a career planning commissioner. And that's not the intent of who we are."

Ross said the council needs to encourage other people to get involved.

He said he understood that planning commissioners accumulate a great deal of knowledge during their time on the commission.

"But there's not a chance in heck I'm going to support this ordinance," he said.

He said there were "hundreds, probably thousands" of people who would be interested in serving in the city's planning process.

"It's a great place to learn. It's a great place to grow," he said. "I'd like to see every single one of them have a term limit to allow for a good rotation of people coming in and out who want to serve."

Barlow said that it would be unlikely that anyone would become a "career" planning commissioner.

"The chance of that happening is very slim and none," Barlow said.

That's because each city council member gets to make an appointment and it's unlikely that new council members would continue to pick the same planning commissioner, Barlow said.

Councilman Bob Coffin said he supported the change because he had considered appointing Steve Evans again to the planning commission, but found out that Evans had served 10 years and was term-limited.

"Frankly, he didn't want to serve any longer," Coffin said.

But Coffin said during his efforts to get Evans back, he realized it was important not to eliminate people from public advisory boards who had developed expertise in the subject.

"I'm doing this for a principle and not for politics," Coffin said. "You see, I think the planning commission is outside politics. I think it is a real good buffer for the council. Otherwise, you'll have yourselves being pestered constantly by people with their own interests in mind — strictly their purely selfish interests — in opposing or supporting something."

Coffin said he thinks government works better if someone is on the commission who understands all the extensive planning codes.

"I think you can't develop skill unless you have time in a position," he said.

Coffin said he supported Barlow's ordinance "because I feel the skills required to be an effective planning commissioner have to be acquired.There's no school for this ... There isn't a clamor of people to be on the planning commission. So when you find people who are good at it and want to do it, I think you should be able to keep them."

If the council approved the ordinance, a planning commissioner could still be removed for several reasons, including lack of efficiency or malfeasance.

"If they get abusive, you will hear about it. And they can be removed," he said. "We don't have to wait until an election happens to remove them."

Wolfson, who pointed out that any appointment made by a city council member is subject to the ratification by the entire council, said he wanted to wait to vote on the issue to consider terms of other advisory boards and commissions, too.

Mayor Carolyn Goodman said there are a wealth of people in our community who have the knowledge and expertise to serve on many of those boards and commissions.

"My biggest concern is to make sure that those people who want to serve in our government in some manner have the opportunity to do it," Goodman said.

Goodman said she was concerned about the various boards and commissions having different terms, with some having eight-year terms and some having two-year terms.

Mayor Pro Tem Stavros Anthony said he was "definitely for term limits" for any city board or commission.

"Anybody in a public policy position, I don't think they should be around for more than a couple of terms," Anthony said. "The whole tradition of Nevada is that we have term limits from the governor down to the Legislature to city councils and county commissions."