The Committee on Taxation was called to order at 1:30 p.m., on Thursday, February 25, 1999. Chairman David Goldwater presided in Room 3142 of the Legislative Building, Carson City, Nevada. Exhibit A is the Agenda. Exhibit B is the Guest List. All Exhibits are available and on file at the Research Library of the Legislative Counsel Bureau.

COMMITTEE MEMBERS PRESENT:

Mr. David Goldwater, Chairman

Mr. Roy Neighbors, Vice Chairman

Mr. Bernie Anderson

Mr. Greg Brower

Mrs. Vivian Freeman

Ms. Dawn Gibbons

Mr. John Jay Lee

Mr. Mark Manendo

Mr. John Marvel

Mr. Harry Mortenson

Mr. Bob Price

Ms. Sandra Tiffany

Mr. Morse Arberry

GUEST LEGISLATORS PRESENT:

Mr. Jerry Claborn, Assembly District 19

STAFF MEMBERS PRESENT:

Mr. Kevin Christensen, Chairman, Nevada State Apprenticeship Chairman

Mr. Jack Jeffrey, Director, Southern Nevada Building Trades Council

The proposed legislation was for purposes of exempting from the state sales and use tax, and from the local school support tax and all other local sales taxes included within the definition of an educational organization a local or state apprenticeship committee created to advance programs of apprenticeship in Nevada. For purposes of receiving a tax exemption for the property of an apprenticeship program, including those programs for apprentice labor approved by the Federal Government pursuant to 29 U.S.C. 50. And providing that any property held in trust for an apprenticeship committee by a legal entity created by that committee is to be considered property of the committee and is exempt from property taxes.

Chairman Goldwater recognized Assemblyman Claborn and asked him as primary sponsor to proceed. It was agreed to take testimony on both bills concurrently (A.B. 207 and 211).

Mr. Claborn explained the purpose of the bill was designed to clarify the state apprenticeship programs and to exempt them from sales tax. He introduced Kevin Christensen, Chairman, Nevada State Apprenticeship Programs and Greg Smith, Director, State Apprenticeship Training Programs. Mr. Claborn turned the floor over to his witnesses.

Mr. Christensen gave a brief summary of the apprenticeship program indicating there had been, over a significant period of time, thousands of apprentices trained in Nevada in a variety of occupations. Those programs were not restricted to construction and service industries but included industries the legislators would not expect within an apprenticeship training program.

Mr. Christensen stated both bills were absolutely critical to the continuation of the apprenticeship programs within the State of Nevada. He referred to two of the programs with which he had worked over the past years; the Southern Nevada Operating Engineers Apprenticeship and Training Program and the Southern Nevada Carpenters and Millwrights Apprenticeship Training Program. The southern Nevada carpenters program was one of the largest apprenticeship training programs in the state and currently numbered in excess of 1,000 apprentices in training. They had a huge facility in southern Nevada constructed over the past 2 years. The southern Nevada operators program had well in excess of 100 apprentices and included a considerable amount of equipment investment in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. The issues on taxation of property were contained in A.B. 211. Issues of use and sales tax were included in A. B. 207 and both were critical to savings in those programs.

Expanding on the training programs, Mr. Christensen explained there were between 2,000 and 4,000 apprentices in the state at one time all of whom had a contract with the state. The state was a party to each contract; the indenture agreement the apprentice signed as well as the apprenticeship committee that sponsored the apprentice. The apprentices in Nevada came from a variety of industries; the hotel-casino industry, the dealers program, hairstylists, a variety of Indian reservation programs, and even a program at the prison. Additionally, there were government-sponsored programs for maintenance programs and the traditional trade programs such as the operating engineers, carpenters, cement masons, and so on.

Explaining those training programs came before the legislative body in the framework of the Nevada Revised Statutes (NRS) Chapter 610 Mr. Christensen pointed out they allowed Nevada to have an apprenticeship program, which as chairman of the apprenticeship program he governed. The statute came from federal legislation, which authorized apprenticeship training programs across the United States. Because Nevada had a state apprenticeship council the program was called the State Apprenticeship Council (SAC). If Nevada did not have that statute and SAC program the state would be a Bureau of Apprenticeship Training (BAT) state. The legislature had authorized the SAC program to act in their behalf pursuant to NRS 610. He concluded that was the position in which he appeared before the committee on the two bills.

Proceeding through his testimony Mr. Christensen reiterated those tax issues were absolutely critical for the continued functioning of the training entities. Most of the programs fell into one of three categories: an employer by himself sponsoring a program, a multi-employer program, or a joint program, which would be a joint labor and management sponsored program. Hundreds of programs were approved by the state, all of them within one of the three programs.

Apprenticeship funding was handled, according to Mr. Christensen, through the Taft-Hartley Benefit Trust, which was tax exempt under federal law and tax exempt under the Department of Labor regulations. Traditionally, the administrators of those programs had been able to apply to the county for a property tax exemption as well as to the state for sales and use tax exemption. As the state had looked for tax revenues over the years, sometimes those exemptions had been called into question and reexamined. Ordinarily, the question was whether the programs were of an educational benefit and did they fill that purpose under NRS 610 and the Federal Government statute. Mr. Christensen assured the committee the programs were indeed filling a purpose of training the people of Nevada to meet the 21^st century and the critical changes in technology. Traditionally, those sales and use tax and real property tax exemptions had been granted.

In the 1997 legislative session a determination was made to cancel those exemptions. The administrators of the programs, as Mr. Christensen had explained had returned to the 1999 session to get the real property tax exemption restored through the legislative process which was A.B. 211. He stated the apprenticeship programs had a little trouble applying the previous legislation inasmuch as the counties, who decided whether you were tax exempt or not for property taxes, were not familiar with the Taft-Hartley Trust. In fact the district attorney’s offices were uncertain what the trust was, and did not know whether they could give the exemption until it could be proven the programs were a legal entity recognized by the state of Nevada.

What had grown out of that dilemma, according to Mr. Christensen, had been three or four of the programs going ahead and forming corporations owned by the trust. The trusts owned all the assets. It was a problem that had been created in the previous bill draft. Originally the bill draft was submitted using the name of the trust; the legislative counsel changed the verbiage inserting the word "committee" rather than "corporation." He wanted to be assured the committee members understood the difference; the trust controlled all the assets, all the money, and made all the major decisions on the directions of an apprenticeship training program. A committee, usually the same trustees assuming a different role, decided what training was provided, the curriculum, the classes the apprentices would attend, how often they would meet for class and for how many hours. State statutes required the apprentices complete at least 144 hours but funding to create those needed facilities came from the trust.

The officials of the apprenticeship training programs were proposing in A.B. 211 a clarification under section 3 by including the word "trust" which would read as proposed, "property that is held on behalf or in trust for local and state apprenticeship committee by any other legal entity formed by the committee shall be deemed property owned by the local or state apprenticeship committee for the purposes of subsection 1." Subsection 1 said those properties would be exempt. Those changes would simply insert the concept of the trust and would clarify what the apprenticeship programs were seeking.

Mr. Christensen added there had been one additional concept needed and they had proposed a change by adding two words. They would propose including "and training" on page 2, subsection 3, line 2 after the word, "apprenticeship" and before "committee" add "and training." The reason he brought that up was the trusts provided training not just for apprentices but also for pre-apprentices and journeyman retraining. He gave several examples of why that change would be necessary. An additional change the apprenticeship administrators had requested was in the middle of section 3 after the words, "entity formed by the committee" but the committee never made those decisions. It was a technical distinction whereby the trust always made those decisions. The trust was the original body, the one with all the money and power. It could convey authority to the committee, but it was always the trust that had the authority to make the decisions. He asked they insert, "entity formed by the trust or the sponsor" which would be the employer or multi-employer.

Mr. Marvel interjected with a question on A.B. 211, addressed to Jack Jeffrey, representing the Southern Nevada Building Trades Council, relative to action taken by the Committee on Taxation in the 1997 session. The members of that committee attempted to clarify and provide a solution to the problem and he assumed it had been resolved. He asked what happened to the previous action. Mr. Jeffrey concurred with Mr. Marvel, stating he was of the opinion problem had been resolved in the 1997 session as well. He explained the bill passed in 1997 provided the exemption but after session when the various apprenticeship committees applied for the exemption, it was the county’s position that the legislation specified, "the land and property would be held by the committee." The deputy district attorney with the concurrence of the district attorney said the committee could not own property; the committee did not own property, the trust did. The only way the apprenticeship programs could work around that was to form non-profit organizations and not all of them chose to do that. He was aware of two or three that did form non-profit corporations and those corporations now held the property and the committee was a part of it. Those that formed a non-profit corporation were now exempt.

Interjecting at that time, Mr. Christensen stated he was aware of only three apprenticeship programs that had formed non-profit corporations owned by the trust and had received the exemption.

Mr. Marvel asked Mr. Christensen for an estimate on the amount of the assessed valuation and was advised most of the programs were not as large as those he previously used as examples; the operating engineers and carpenters. The two properties in southern Nevada were $3 and $4 million properties including their buildings. They were huge facilities designed to train large numbers of apprentices and they had received their exemptions. Mr. Marvel repeated his request on the amount of assessed valuation and was advised by Mr. Jeffrey he had done an unofficial survey and was not able to verify its accuracy, but he estimated the facilities would run in the neighborhood of $20 million. As Mr. Christensen had previously indicated that would involve only about three of the programs but would represent 60 to 70 percent of the total number of apprenticeship programs.

Mr. Jeffrey elaborated on the information regarding the apprenticeship programs by informing the committee the carpenters leased space to the painters, plasterers, cement masons, and so on. In response to a further question from Mr. Marvel, Mr. Jeffrey indicated there were similar facilities in Washoe County as well.

Chairman Goldwater requested that Mr. DiCianno from the Nevada Department of Taxation make himself available for questions from the committee. Dino DiCianno, Deputy Director, Department of Taxation, introduced himself and stated the Department of Taxation had received requests for fiscal notes on both bills under consideration. He made copies of the reports available (Exhibit C); however, the reports had not been seen by the Department of Administration nor the Legislative Counsel Bureau (LCB) Fiscal Division. Addressing Mr. Marvel’s question, he pointed out the previous bill was A.B. 476 of the 69^th session. His department had contacted the Department of Business and Industry and the office of the labor commissioner in an attempt to determine how many additional entities would be subject to the exemption for property tax purposes. He pointed out on the second page of the bill was a list of organizations the Department of Taxation had determined would be subject to the particular property tax exemption. The department tried to extrapolate the amount for fiscal year 1998-99 to 2001. His department requested the current amount of the assessed valuation associated with the properties owned by the committee for the various apprenticeship programs.

Mr. DiCianno went through the exhibits and concluded, with the suggested changes, he would not be certain the fiscal note would be corrected particularly based upon the word "sponsor." He felt his department would want clarification as to whom the sponsor would be; would it be Sierra Pacific who would have the facilities or someone else. The department of taxation would need that information as it would definitely change the fiscal note.

Chairman Goldwater inquired of Mr. Christensen as to when the Committee on Taxation talked about "trusts" would that include Taft-Hartley Trusts only and would it be necessary for us to reference the United States Code. Mr. Christensen replied it may not be a bad idea as Taft-Hartley Trusts grew out of Title 29, U.S. Code. The Chair instructed staff to include the U.S. Code reference to insure there would be no misunderstanding.

Continuing with his testimony, Mr. Christensen, explained with regard to the sales tax issue, it was a different approach. The language in both the state and federal statutes had always been couched in terms of educational institutions and eleemosynary types of entities. The apprenticeship administrators had traditionally argued that apprenticeship programs had a huge element of education inasmuch as they were required to have a specific number of classroom hours. The class curriculum was required to be approved by the state Department of Education and there were monies given to programs qualifying through the state Department of Education. The apprenticeship program administrators entered into agreements occasionally with the community colleges and became an extension of the state education system through what was called a "memorandum of understanding." In those instances, the state gave credit to the enrolled apprentices for training, they paid fees for enrollment to the state and the state paid fees for the instructor and facilities used. In essence, it was an extension of the state college educational system and the apprentices were counted as part of their enrollment as well. In the case of the sales and use taxes the programs had always been able to argue successfully that they were an educational or nonprofit eleemosynary entity.

Pursuing his testimony, Mr. Christensen explained in their search for additional tax revenue, use and sales taxes had come under close scrutiny and they had been trying to memorialize the exemption that had traditionally been granted with A.B. 207. He pointed out he did have one suggestion, basically the same as the one he suggested in A. B. 211. He called attention to the bill containing two subsections 5 in sections 1 and 2 that contained the same language. He proposed they include the words, "and training" after apprenticeship and also include a reference to a nonprofit trust similar to what they suggested in the property statute. That would clarify the difficulty they had in the other statute.

In conclusion Mr. Christensen urged favorable approval of both bills as amended and indicated they were absolutely essential for the continued survival of the industry and for the state of Nevada which would qualify the state to have a workforce that would be an advancement to the technologies to carry the state into the next century.

Jack Jeffrey cautioned the members, due to some information he had heard recently which was the fiscal note they would be using could be misleading. He felt the figures were misleading particularly when he read the expenditures for each program was $500 per year which would be a low figure. He had heard from some of the coordinators that when they were called and asked what the committee spent they had gotten into a semantics problem because the committee did not spend any money; the trust did. For that reason, he felt the figures the members had before them were probably low. On the other hand, a number of those programs had been exempt from sales tax on a case by case basis so he did not think they would be talking about much of a net fiscal impact because of previous exemptions.

Mr. Marvel, directing his question to Mr. DiCianno asked how accurate the figures on the fiscal note were. Mr. DiCianno explained when the taxation department was developing the fiscal note they called Jan Needham from the Legal Division of the Legislative Counsel Bureau, and asked her what it meant when they stated, "served as a state or local apprenticeship committee to advance programs of apprenticeship in this state." They learned when the language was drafted, it was crafted referring specifically to the committee; it did not mention the trust nor the specific program. In the fiscal note the legislators had referred only to the committee. If the bill was to include the trust or the apprenticeship program the Department of Taxation would need to amend the fiscal note and it would be difficult.

Mr. Marvel admitted he was on record as being cautious of granting sales tax exemptions as it seemed every time the legislature met more and more exemptions to the sales and use tax were granted which eroded the base for the sales and use tax. His philosophical reasoning was if the state was going to continue granting exemptions, the state should simply get out of the sales and use tax business. Mr. Marvel emphasized he would be very cautious about granting further exemptions.

Stating he concurred with Mr. Marvel at the beginning of the meeting, Mr. Mortensen indicated, after listening to the testimony he had changed his mind. He realized the state did not tax schools and, inasmuch as that was an educational situation and as important as schools were, he had changed his mind and would now be supporting the bill. He added the bills did not provide any new exemptions so the legislature would simply be cleaning up the language. If the officials within the apprenticeship programs continued setting up nonprofit organizations the exemptions would be there anyway. He felt the committee was not deciding on a tax exemption but cleaning up a problem.

Chairman Goldwater announced he did not intend to take action on the bill until the committee members were able to review a revised and complete fiscal note and asked Mr. DiCianno to work with Mr. Christensen on having an updated fiscal note made available.

Mr. Christensen pointed out each time the apprenticeship programs submitted a draft of the bill they had referenced the "trust" and each time it came back from legislative counsel the trust was supplanted by the word "committee." That was where the problems stemmed, but the original intent was there when the bill draft was requested. The Chair suggested the administrators of the apprenticeship program reference the specific trust of the United States Code that related to the Taft-Hartley Trust. The bill drafters would probably work with that language better.

Mr. Manendo asked how long the apprenticeship programs had been in existence and was advised by Mr. Christensen most of the programs had existed since the early sixties when the programs obtained a federal tax exemption. When innovative members of their respective bodies thought they may be able to get a property tax exemption they included that. Mr. Price interjected he had been involved with the apprenticeship program in Clark county since the 1950’s so he was aware they had been around that long.

Greg Smith, representing the Nevada State Apprenticeship Program spoke next stating he had several concerns about some of the language in A.B. 211. Specifically on line 8, under section 1 whereby it referenced the Federal Government. For those who did not know all of the programs in Nevada were state approved, apprenticeship programs were run by the State of Nevada and the state apprenticeship council would oversee those experts as part of their job. Some states had federal programs and did not have state programs, they were administered by the Federal Government. Nevada was a SAC state so he did not understand why that language would be in the bill. Speaking as a council member, he felt the language should be removed.

Mr. Smith addressed his concerns relative to A.B. 207, and pointed out nowhere in the bill did it refer to the "state apprenticeship approved programs." The verbiage on line 5 stated, "serve as state or local apprenticeship committee" it did not say "approved by the state apprenticeship council." Everything they oversaw would be approved by them so he felt it important that language be included in the bill as well. He volunteered to work with Mr. Christensen to provide appropriate language to meet his concerns.

Mr. Jeffrey interjected at that time he could explain how the language became included in the bill draft. When the bill was requested, Kim Morgan, legislative bill drafter, contacted him at the conclusion of the drafting process and explained when the bill drafter was working on the bill, they picked up on lawsuit that had been filed against the state labor commissioner. Mr. Jeffrey was not familiar with the substance of the case, but as a result the bill drafter felt the federal program must be included. Whatever the state did for the state program it must do the same for the federal program and he could not argue the point as he was not a member of the council. He suggested to Ms. Morgan to leave in the wording and the committee would find out later if it was necessary. The officials of the programs, at that time, did not feel the wording was necessary. In talking to Kevin Christensen, attorney to the trusts, they determined Nevada was a SAC state. Nevada did not have federal programs and the federal officials had delegated the authority to recognize those programs to the state.

There was no reason for the federal program to be mentioned in the bill and there could be a danger in leaving them in. As Mr. Jeffrey understood it may be possible to get federal approval for a program that you could not get through the state so it would expand the exemption further than what the committee was requesting.

Chairman Goldwater asked if there would be any objection to holding action on the bill for a work session and at that time deleting the section. There were no objections; however, Mr. Anderson stated he might have a bit of concern in removing that language.

Mr. Anderson felt if the committee were going to remove that language the members of the committee needed to be certain there would be enough specificity so the program administrators knew what they would be looking at. When an application came through and, as Mr. Jeffrey just said there may be some people that would fit into one category and some another, the program administrators would want to make certain all applications had those programs available to them. The legislature could not tailor it to one particular union group or apprenticeship program. If they were going to have it available it would need to be for all, not necessarily one specific group.

Mr. Zuend explained he had looked up the statute from the U.S. Code and found it was a law from the 1930’s directing the secretary of labor to draft standards for apprentice labor, but it did not talk about specific programs. He did not understand why the phrasing was in the draft but even though there were federal apprenticeship committees, that statute did not appear to be the one that created them.

Mr. DiCianno informed the members the taxation department was neutral on the fiscal notes and would take no position, but he suggested that once the language had been determined, the revised version should come through the LCB Fiscal Division.

Addressing the committee, Mr. Christensen pointed out the state apprenticeship council had approved programs sponsored by non-union entities, single employer entities, entities that were sponsored by utilities, and both employer programs and joint sponsored with union and management involved. He concurred with the previous comments and did not feel that section was necessary.

Ms. Tiffany asked Mr. Christensen if his programs had been licensed under post secondary regulations such as college classes, training institutes and so on and was advised in the negative. She then asked how they were able to get the exemptions. Mr. Christensen admitted he could not answer and asked if she had been referring to the instructors that worked within the training programs. Ms. Tiffany explained there was a state department of licensing for post secondary education and everyone she knew in education must work with that licensing provision. She repeated she was curious how the apprenticeship programs were able to get an exemption unless they had been licensed as an instructional program recognized by the state. Mr. Christensen was not certain an exemption had been granted but he knew the instructors were well-qualified in their fields. Ms. Tiffany pointed out the license would need to be for the school, not the instructors. Lengthy discussion followed between Ms. Tiffany and Mr. Christensen in an attempt to determine the answer to Ms. Tiffany’s question; however, the answer was not forthcoming.

Interjecting at that time was Mr. Anderson who stated he may be able to assist. He explained at the school in which he taught some of the classrooms were used in the evening by the community college. He used to administer the overall program at that site and one of the programs had been a roofing program handled through the Truckee Meadows Community College. Instructors had been hired through the college and met their requirements. He felt in reality they met the requirements about which Ms. Tiffany had inquired.

Ms. Tiffany, pursuing her line of questioning, pointed out the programs had been operating under the license of the community college, but they had not been operating under the license of any institution. If Truckee Meadows had been sponsoring the program and providing the teachers that had been licensed it would be very different. Ms. Tiffany reiterated the apprenticeship programs had been operating under the license of Truckee Meadows Community College but were not operating under the license of any institution. That would be very different. If Truckee Meadows was sponsoring the program and employing the teachers, it was their license. If the apprenticeship programs did not have a post secondary license under which they operated they were a special anomaly created by the state. There would be no license they were using at all.

Chairman Goldwater at that point asked Mr. Christensen to work with Mr. Zuend and discuss with him the specific language change so the committee may get a bill proposed with appropriate language so people would understand clearly what was meant. He asked Mr. DiCianno to come to the witness table. He then stated the taxes in the bill were taxes currently not being collected and asked if that was the case. He further asked if there had been a constitutional or advisory question on whether to grant educational entities a tax exemption.

Responding was Mr. Zuend who explained in 1996 the voters approved a change to the sales and use tax exemptions to more thoroughly define what a qualified entity would be. Prior to that time, exemptions were simply granted to charitable or educational organizations without any definition. As he understood Mr. Christensen, the apprenticeship programs had been able to apply to receive those exemptions in the past based on the old statutes. The new statutes had more definitions and more tests to qualify and he assumed the Department of Taxation was challenging that now.

Addressing that statement, Mr. DiCianno pointed out the characterization by Mr. Zuend was correct except for the last part. Once the law was changed the department of taxation sent out applications to all entities, not just the apprenticeship programs and committees. His department reviewed the applications and some of them were challenged. Chairman Goldwater asked if that would affect the fiscal note and was assured it would.

Wishing to testify next were Dan Gouker and Dan Rose both representing different factions of the apprenticeship committees. Speaking first was Mr. Gouker who gave a summary of how the apprenticeship programs were funded. He indicated they were funded in their entirety by the working membership of the local union. His particular program was funded based on a per hour contribution of 15 cents. The NRS 610 required them to go through a very lengthy approval process to become certified as an apprenticeship program in the state and required them to make certain they had the funds available to complete an apprenticeship program. The committee, by virtue of the trust agreement, was required to have enough funding to complete a 5 year program regardless of the workload and the ability of construction to maintain their programs. Financially the committees had the legal obligation to complete those programs. Continuing with his background testimony, Mr. Gouker explained the fiscal impact to the state was nothing to be taken lightly but he assured the committee for the smaller programs the fiscal impact of those programs was critical.

Mr. Gouker pointed out when discussing the licensing, the programs were certified by SAC by virtue of probably more regulations than any entity in the state. Particularly when you consider the federal requirements, the selection processes that were governed by the civil rights act of 1971, and the state licensing that was required by public schools or post secondary schools. The programs did not fall under that banner inasmuch as they were a labor organization. Some of the comments made earlier were that it appeared the exemption would be between union and non-union. That, however, was an issue of quality work for construction in Nevada, for apprenticeship and training programs in the state.

Mr. Gouker pointed out the new legislative building was an example of a problem of poor quality and was over budget and over schedule on the structure. Another problem in the construction was the leaking roof. In the real world, if you received quality training you received quality work. The program administrators believed the citizens of the state of Nevada had a right to demand and expect quality work and the only way they were going to get that from the building and trade unions or service industry was through proper training. The post secondary schools mentioned earlier did not offer the hands-on training they offered and that was the reason the training programs were unique. Their program had a minimum requirement of 144 hours of curriculum per year plus full-time employment. In most of the programs, over 5 years, apprentices had to complete over 8,000 hours of on-the-job training and over 190 hours per year curriculum. He emphasized it was critical for the training programs that those funds were kept going.

He submitted a letter dated January 13, 1999, received by Mr. Reid, Tax Administrator in Carson City signed by Keith Rhodes, the deputy superintendent of schools that said, "yes, in fact, apprenticeship programs because of the approval process, the review process by the apprenticeship council and more importantly the department of education were educational entities within the State of Nevada." They had a partnership with community colleges for college credits. When his apprentices graduated they had received 43 college credits from the community college all of which were paid by the programs. He strongly urged the committee to help provide any assistance they could as the training was critical.

Mr. Gouker added all of the programs were required to keep statistics on enrollment and the application process. Currently he had 345 apprentices enrolled in two separate programs and they were in the process of establishing a program for residential wiring in the housing market. The average age of participants in his program was 34 years so the apprenticeship training programs were not talking about kids right of high school or community college but were talking about 80 to 85 percent of the graduates that did not go to college and needed to be gainfully employed. His program at that time was 42 percent minority so they did cover a broad base of the community. He proceeded with various percentages of the participants of programs both in Nevada and within the country. Mr. Marvel asked what percentage of the participants actually completed the program and was advised it ran about 80 to 85 percent over all.

Dan Rose, Training Director of the Sheetmetal Workers of Nevada spoke next echoing what had been testified to by Mr. Gouker. He felt the programs were just as much an educational entity as any college in the state.

Mr. Mortensen complemented the speakers on their programs and assured them he was confident the cost of their programs to the taxpayer was considerably less expensive than the rest of our schools.

Mr. Danny Thompson, representing the AFL-CIO stated his organization supported the bill with the changes that had been discussed by the committee.

Testifying last was Mark Schofield, Clark County Assessor, stating the legislature had attempted to get the legislation passed in 1997 and it passed but due to a technicality in the reading by the district attorney it had created the current situation. What occurred was a vesting situation; the property was not properly vested therefore the apprenticeship programs could not avail themselves of the exemption. He concluded by explaining his office fully supported the legislation.

Chairman Goldwater asked if the bill designated the properties would vest in a trust, would that constitute the test of vesting. Mr. Schofield agreed it would constitute the district attorney’s test of vesting. What happened was when you applied for an exemption in Clark County his office automatically sent the application to the district attorney for the appropriate legal review. It was his understanding the language being proposed would mitigate the problem and had been worked through the district attorney’s office.

Chairman Goldwater, finding there was no further testimony to be offered, closed the hearings on A.B. 207 and A.B. 211 and reminded Mr. Christensen and Mr. Zuend it was anticipated they would work on a revision of the language and be prepared to discuss it at a work session.

He thanked Mr. Claborn for bringing the bill to the committee.

There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 2:40 p.m.

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED:

Nykki Kinsley,

Committee Secretary

APPROVED BY:

Assemblyman David Goldwater, Chairman

DATE: