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CARSON CITY -- Gov. Jim Gibbons met with legislative leaders Thursday to talk about the growing deficit facing the state but they didn't come up with any solutions.
"Everything is on the table, including a special session" of the Legislature, Gibbons, who in the past opposed a special session, said after the closed-door meeting.
But Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio, R-Reno, said he opposed a special session, adding: "Nobody is going out and raising taxes."
With its declining tax revenue, the state will be an additional $60 million in the hole in the fiscal year that starts July 1. Gibbons said the deficit may be close to $1 billion in the following two fiscal years.
One suggested solution -- to withhold the 4 percent cost-of-living raise for school teachers, university employees and state workers -- got little support.
Senate Minority Leader Steven Horsford, D-Las Vegas, said he opposed suspending the salary increase. And Raggio said nixing the raises would "put salt in the wounds" of government workers who, like others, are facing $5-a-gallon gasoline and other inflation.
Gibbons said a special legislative session would have to be called to stop the pay raise or to order a four-day work week for state employees, another possibility.
Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, suggested state officials work with the Nevada congressional delegation to pull back new federal regulations on Medicaid. That could mean an immediate $34 million in federal funds to the state, more than half of the next fiscal year's $60 million shortfall.
A proposal by Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki to use tobacco money that now finances Millennium Scholarships was roundly criticized. Under that plan, the state would issue bonds to raise an immediate $600 million and use the tobacco funds, derived from the settlement of a nationwide lawsuit stemming from the health dangers of smoking, to pay off the bonds.
Gibbons said that proposal "could be costly to the state," adding that he was concerned about using "one-shot" money to meet a continuing problem.
Leslie, calling the Krolicki plan shortsighted, said it would never be approved by the Democratic-controlled Assembly.
And state Treasurer Kate Marshall said Krolicki has refused to share with her the figures she to judge if the proposal is workable. Attorney General Catherine Cortez-Mastos also raised legal questions about the plan.
State agencies already have cut 4.5 percent from their budgets. Officials have said another 1 percent reduction might be needed next fiscal year.
Horsford said he opposes any across-the-board cuts, which hit the public schools and human service agencies the hardest.
"The economy is not a partisan issue," Raggio said. "Everybody has to tighten their belt. Everything is on the table."
He said rather than calling a special session the Legislative Interim Finance Committee could work with the governor on the issue. The committee, composed of members of the Assembly Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee, meets between sessions to handle budget matters.
Among others who participated in the meeting via phone were Assembly Majority Leader Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas, Assembly Minority Leader Heidi Gansert, R-Reno, Assemblyman Morse Arberry, D-Las Vegas, and Assembly Majority Leader John Oceguera, D-Las Vegas. Krolicki phoned in from Hong Kong, where he was attending a tourism meeting.
Gibbons said a special legislative session would have to be called to stop the pay raise or to order a four-day work week for state employees, another possibility.
What is the difference? A four-day workweek is a "pay-cut."
Let's call this meeting what it is - political grandstanding. The Governor knows the legislature does not want a special session with the entire Assembly and half the Senate up for re-election. They don't want to give up campaigning and they sure as hell don't want to go on the record with unpopular spending cuts or even less popular tax increases five months before the general election.
While I would love to see true political leadership here, I'm not holding my breath. But I do enjoy the infighting on the ill-conceived Krolicki band-aid plan. One last question - with the state having so many budgetary issues, why is the Lt. Governor in Hong Kong? Aren't there better ways to spend our tax dollars?
Buckley is the Speaker, not the majority leader.
ANY meeting that this assclown governor calls to address any issue in Nevada is a joke. No one wants to even look at the lying idiot. Nevada goes down the tube at the LuvGuv fiddles with his thumbs on his cell phone.
Pretty sight isn't it?
Sounds like everyone could've just gotten a text from the Luv Guv that he doesn't have any ideas on how to solve the budget problems. Would've saved a lot of time, money, and would've been the most effective thing he'd ever done in his gaffe ridden administration.
It is time for this man to go! Can we Nevadans aford to keep an incompetent, pompous, self-engradizing men in power while the state goes to ruins?
Just asking, look at what has happened to our county's economy under the watch of a similar character now in the White House. We are actually letting them ruin and run our lifes to the ground while we passively watch. Once again it is time for this man to go!
Buckley...no leadership.
She should be demanding to have a special session to raise taxes.
Maybe term limits can't come too soon. The lack of leadership, not only from the governor, but especially from the legislators who have been around longer than he has, is really, really sad. This is why the public goes for term limits......we can't seem to get the losers voted out of office. I read Buckley is considering running for governor, geeeez, more lack of leadership on the horizon.