By Mark Waite

There weren’t any major local bills this state legislative session.

The only county-sponsored bill was Assembly Bill 49, which simplified the process of designating minor county roads. Still, the county can count other successes and failures this session.

After three sessions in the Legislature, Nevada District 36 Assemblyman Ed Goedhart, R-Amargosa Valley, was able to pass a bill requiring water rights protests filed by government agencies to be signed off by the administrator. Goedhart said that will end some of the “robo protests” filed by agencies like the National Park Service on water right holders in Amargosa Valley, including his employer, the Ponderosa Dairy.

“This is going to put more accountability on people at the top who are pushing the buttons. There are going to be more ramifications for their actions,” Goedhart said.

State Engineer Jason King is deciding at what level the protests must be signed, he said.

Goedhart also passed Assembly Joint Resolution No. 5, which asked the federal government to enter into negotiations with Nye County on mitigation for the environmental damage at the Nevada Test Site, now known as the Nevada National Security Site NNSS . He said it will now be up to federal legislators like U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev, to follow up on it.

“The resolutions they don’t have the weight of law. What they’re for is to let them know that 64 members unanimously — every single member whether they were Democrat or Republican — every single person in the state assembly voted for this resolution urging Congress to come to the table and repair the damage they’ve done to Nevada,” Goedhart said. “Sometimes you have to build public awareness that sometimes can be turned into political power.”

On a statewide scale, Goedhart was one of six assemblymen out of the 42, who voted against the budget package.

“You’re hearing about how the budget has been demolished and decimated but basically the biennium before, we’re about 2.75 percent less on spending. So I guess if you’re government and you have 97.5 cents to spend out of every dollar you can’t complain about the 2 1/2 cents you don’t have. But at the end of the day there’s a lot of people living on less than a 2 1/2 percent reduction in their household,” Goedhart said.

“There were a lot of tough decisions but I think at the end of the day there was enough money to take care of properly sized government. There’s never going to be enough money for everybody’s wish list because the go go days of the real estate boom are done. We now have to live within our means,” he said.

Goedhart voted against extending the sunset of a collection of taxes after two years. That was a step taken after the Supreme Court said Gov. Brian Sandoval couldn’t raid the $62 million Clean Water Coalition. It raised fears the court would rule at a later date the state couldn’t grab a number of funds.

“When we passed them last biennium we promised the taxpayers we would only extend those taxes for two years,” Goedhart said. “Once again the government proved to the people there is no such thing as a temporary tax increase.”

The taxes could have been allowed to expire and the state could have gone on a 5 percent diet instead of 2 1/2 percent, Goedhart said. He said legislators who voted for extending the sunset violated the no new taxes code.

State Sen. Mike McGinness, R-Fallon, who represents this area, had a bigger role in his last session before he faces term limits, as the Senate minority leader. When the Supreme Court decision came down May 26, the Legislature went into high gear to pass a budget quickly in the last 11 days of the session.

The Republican caucus had held firm behind Gov. Sandoval’s plan for a $6.2 billion general fund budget. The extension of the sunsetted tax allowed Sandoval most of the $657 million he had counted on from other sources for the next biennium before the court decision.

“The Supreme Court really threw us a curveball. We had to regroup,” McGinness said.

An attorney for the governor said unless the money was for a statewide purpose, the Legislature couldn’t sweep the fund, McGinness said. He voted for the spending bills, which passed the Senate 15-6.

“Rather than take the chance on another court case three or four months down the line that will have us back in special session, we better address the deficit, $656 million. In order to get there, there were significant cuts already. We would have had to make some much more serious cuts to get there,” he said.

It was disappointing to break a no new taxes pledge, but McGinness said they did the responsible thing. When the legislature had $500 million more he said they put it in education which is 53 percent of the state budget.

McGinness recalled the grueling deliberations that last week of the legislative session. He recalled coming home to Fallon, 60 miles east of Carson City, at 3:15 a.m. one morning, two days later he didn’t get home until 4:15 a.m. Then he had to be at the state capitol for 8 a.m. hearings. Legislators worked straight through the last two weekends, including Memorial Day.

Goedhart criticized the last minute “ram and jam” through the Legislature. His bill requiring the posting of bills on the Internet for 48 hours before they can be voted on didn’t even get a hearing.

Another Goedhart bill, allowing the taking of federal land by eminent domain for renewable energy, was granted a committee hearing but wasn’t passed. Judiciary Committee Chairman William Horne, D-Las Vegas, thought it would be unconstitutional, some legislators wanted to wait and see what happened with a similar law in Utah.

Goedhart said there were only 22 bills passed by the 16 members of the Republican caucus.

McGinness recalled the last minute frenzy in the legislature.

“There were a lot of games being played. In fact in the Senate there was a large energy issue that got passed through very late. You have a 20-page bill that’s brand new the last couple hours of the session it’s hard to go through it line-by-line,” McGinness said.

One provision in that bill kept confidential the amount paid by utility companies for power purchase agreements with renewable energy producers.

Counties lobbied McGinness on getting a bigger share of revenue from geothermal leases.

But otherwise, McGinness was satisfied with the progress this session. There were critics who said the Legislature failed to tackle long-term revenue concerns, like a broader tax base. There were suggestions for a business margin tax or expanding the sales tax to include services.

“When the economy is good I think our revenue plan works fine. You can say it’s been cobbled together but every state has a different taxing scheme. When the state was booming in the early 2000s, there was no complaint about the revenues. It was almost like we couldn’t send it fast enough. New hotels were going up in Las Vegas and new shopping centers. I think when those people who are dependent on the public budget are getting hurt that’s when they want to change the taxing formula so they’re not hurt so badly,” McGinness said.

The senator said this Legislature took action on changing the Public Employment Retirement System, so people hired after Jan. 1 don’t get their health benefits covered when they retire.

Goedhart was disappointed the state didn’t make any changes to collective bargaining, which he said costs Nevada taxpayers $500 million per year.

“There were only a couple minor reforms to education that didn’t mean a hill of beans,” Goedhart said.

The reforms on public employee benefits won’t kick in for 15 years, he said.

“I don’t believe there was near enough reform to government to justify the need for higher taxes. We still have to do a better job spending the existing revenues before I ask the taxpayers for more money out of their shrinking wallets,” Goedhart said.

State funding on education per student will actually go up, Goedhart said, from $5,192 per year per student to $5,263 in the 2011-2012 school year and $5,374 in 2012-2013 though he said the school districts can afford fewer teachers.

Higher education was initially facing a 27 percent cut, but legislators restored half of that. Goedhart said students can pay 13 percent more for college tuition that is outlined in the budget.

“Eighty percent of what a college education costs are being paid by taxpayers. So is it unreasonable for them to chip in 20 or 25 percent? I don’t think so,” Goedhart said.

While every legislative session seems like the worst one, McGinness said, “this one had some particular quirks and turns.”

“The public has to give us credit we finished on time for the third time since we had the 120-day session rule. The way things were going on the 100th day I wouldn’t have bet a nickel on getting there.”

The only issue left dangling was redistricting. But McGinness noted, “the Democrats filed suit against the redistricting before the census numbers were even released. So that kind of tells you where the process is going.”