MINUTES OF THE meeting

of the

ASSEMBLY Committee on Government Affairs

 

Seventy-Second Session

April 18, 2003

 

 

The Committee on Government Affairswas called to order at 8:16 a.m., on Friday, April 18, 2003.  Chairman Mark Manendo presided in Room 3143 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. Mark Manendo, Chairman

Mr. Wendell P. Williams, Vice Chairman

Mr. Kelvin Atkinson

Mr. Tom Collins

Mr. Pete Goicoechea

Mr. Tom Grady

Mr. Joe Hardy

Mr. Ron Knecht

Mrs. Ellen Koivisto

Mr. Bob McCleary

Ms. Peggy Pierce

Ms. Valerie Weber

 

COMMITTEE MEMBERS ABSENT:

 

Mr. Christensen, Excused

 

GUEST LEGISLATORS PRESENT:

 

Senator Bernice Mathews, Washoe County Senatorial District No. 1

 

STAFF MEMBERS PRESENT:

 

Susan Scholley, Committee Policy Analyst

Eileen O'Grady, Committee Counsel

Nancy Haywood, Committee Secretary

 

OTHERS PRESENT:

 

Michael Osborn, Executive Director, Nevada Classified School Employees Association

Henry “Mike” Campbell, State President, Nevada Classified Employees Association, Paraprofessional and School-Related Personnel

James “Jim” Avance, Lobbyist, International Carwash Association

 

Chairman Manendo welcomed all Committee members and guests to the Committee on Government Affairs and called the meeting to order at 8:16 a.m.  The roll was called, and he directed the secretary to mark members present upon their arrival.  The Chair reviewed the agenda and welcomed Senator Mathews, representing Senate District 1 and sponsor of Senate Bill (S.B.) 28, who would introduce the bill to the Committee.

 

Senate Bill 28 (1st Reprint):  Provides that certain money set aside for group insurance for officers and employees of school districts must not be used for other purposes. (BDR 23-195)

 

Senator Mathews began by declaring that S.B. 28 was a good bill and very simple.  It would hurt no one and would not cost the state any money, she declared.

 

The purpose of S.B. 28 was to limit the use of the money that provided group insurance to officers and employees of school districts.  Further, it was to ensure that the money set aside was used for no other purpose.  Currently, a school district was to provide group life, accident, and health insurance for officers and employees.  Senate Bill 28 would require money paid by the officers and employees of that district for insurance coverage and the money set aside by the district to provide coverage to be held for that purpose only. 

 

The bill required the money to be used only for the purpose of administering and maintaining the group insurance provided to the officers and employees, and it prohibited the money from being loaned to the school district or to any other governmental entity.  Senate Bill 28 also provided that the money not be used to purchase any obligations of the school district or any other governmental entity. 

 

If adopted, S.B. 28 would become effective upon passage and approval.  Senator Mathews then invited Mike Campbell and Michael Osborn to come to the witness table as proponents of the bill.

 

Michael Osborn, Executive Director, Nevada Classified School Employees Association, spoke briefly on behalf of S.B. 28.  He stated his belief that it was an extremely important bill that would protect the monies of the employees in the school districts paid into the insurance fund and the matching monies placed in the fund by the districts themselves.  The rising cost of insurance required protection of the monies to pay for the increasing costs.  It was clearly necessary to assure all employees that money placed in the fund for that purpose would remain in that fund until needed to cover insurance costs.

 

Chairman Manendo asked if the monies in such a fund had ever been used for any other purpose.

 

Mr. Osborn stated that there was one incident some years ago.  According to what had been told to him, Mr. Osborn reported that there was a grievance brought against a district in the early 1990s.  Believing that the grievance settlement would go against the district, a large amount of the insurance monies in the specific insurance fund was withdrawn to settle and pay off the dispute rather than waiting for the arbitration decision.  That would be the very reason for drafting the proposed legislation.  That kind of thing would not happen if S.B. 28 were in place.

 

Henry “Mike” Campbell, President of the Nevada Classified School Employees Association, was speaking to urge support for Senate Bill 28, he said.  Currently, there were three districts in the state that were self-funded as to their insurance program.  Those districts included Clark, Lyon, and Washoe Counties.  There were also ongoing talks with other rural counties and the teachers’ associations to develop a self-funded insurance pool with the other rural counties.  With that in mind, it was very important to have legislation in place that would protect said monies. 

 

Assemblyman Knecht stated that he had some experience as an economist and an expert witness with funded versus unfunded reserves.  He noted that he had personally testified in favor of funded reserves in a nuclear power context.  The essence of the bill was that there were rules and regulations that governed an insurance company to make sure that they had the money if and when the time came to pay a claim.  That was what a self-funded plan should do also.  Senate Bill 28 would prevent self-dealing and would impose reasonable requirements for prudence.

 

Senator Mathews thanked the Committee for hearing the bill and for their support.

 

Hearing no further testimony, Chairman Manendo closed the hearing on S.B. 28 and informed Senator Mathews that the Assembly leadership had asked that all Assembly committees hold bills until after Tuesday, April 22, 2003.  The Committee would take action on this and other bills on or after April 23.

 

Assemblyman McCleary asked to introduce a special guest, David Adams, who was Mr. McCleary’s general election manager and was here to see Assemblyman McCleary in action.

 

Chairman Manendo invited James Avance, Consultant and Lobbyist, to speak to the Committee on Assembly Bill (A.B.) 484, heard by the Committee on April 11.

 

Mr. Avance had testified and offered an amendment to the bill on April 11 in error, he stated.  He had indicated that the health district of each county should be the ones to indicate standards for runoff of water.  Neither of the health districts in southern Nevada currently did that nor was there a desire to do that.  He stated he was in a quandary as to what to ask the Committee to do. 

 

Jim Avance believed that the Committee could pass the bill to the Floor, because it was possible to fix it on the Senate side.  He thought the Committee would not choose that alternative.  Another possibility would be to remove the amendment placed on the bill and to allow it to again read that each jurisdiction would create its own regulation as to water runoff.  That would reference counties over 400,000 population and cities over 60,000 population.  Either way, if there were further complications with the bill, Mr. Avance assured the Committee that he would be able to clean up the bill in the other House.

 

Chairman Manendo restated alternatives that he believed were possible.  The Committee would be able to amend to reverse the amendment, or the Committee could move not to adopt the amendment with an explanation as to why that was necessary.  Either of the options would take the bill back to the form of the original bill. 

 

Assemblywoman Weber stated her belief that she had voted against the bill when it went out of Committee.  Another possibility, she thought, was to make Section 1, subsection 1, line 4, regarding the Board of County Commission as well as the cities, enabling rather than mandatory.  Replacing “shall” with “may” would have that effect for counties.  Also, in Section 5, page 4, line 35, replacing “shall” with “may” would have the same effect on cities.

 

Although the Chair was unsure whether those changes would affect what each entity had jurisdiction over, he complimented Ms. Weber for creatively approaching the resolution of difficulties.

 

Jim Avance stated that the Clark County representative, Dan Musgrove, indicated to him that he had misspoken.  The counties affected by the bill would be ones with a population over 100,000, not 400,000.

 

Assemblyman Hardy spoke of his concerns.  One was that, no matter what the Committee decided to do, there was a possible misunderstanding of what the bill would accomplish.  Committee members might have assumed that the bill put into place a means to monitor the pollutants in wastewater. 

 

Mr. Hardy affirmed his belief that the technology to monitor the pollutants would be extremely expensive, if, indeed, it existed at all.  If the technology did exist, he believed that monitoring pollutants would require a huge infrastructure that would be unlikely to be affordable by a single entity.  The health districts did not have such technology in Clark County, the jurisdictions were more interested in licensing, and the efforts to monitor what was done would appear to be impossible currently. 

 

Assemblyman Hardy stated again that he did not believe there was technology in place or that entities were close to having it.  He stated his admiration for the simple word change suggested by Assemblywoman Weber, because it would give a direction but not a mandate.  That would allow for the exploration of how to accomplish the monitoring of pollutants if that were to be the clear intent.

 

Chairman Manendo believed that local governments were in a position to do the monitoring, and that would be one reason why the bill was brought forward. 

 

Assemblywoman Koivisto stated her belief that, to be in compliance with the Clean Water Act, local governments had to have that technology in place.  The bill would require taking the next step.

 

Assemblyman Hardy referred to the technology in existence as “downstream” technology.  One would put a probe in the water downstream to be able to say that something had happened upstream.  The upstream occurrence would still remain a mystery, he conjectured.

 

Jim Avance stated that he anticipated that all of the subjects brought forward would be aired in the second House extensively.  He foresaw that charts and other exhibits would be present at that time. 

 

Chairman Manendo again reviewed the options of the Committee.  The Committee would be able to adopt an amendment to rescind the amendment made on April 11, or the Committee could choose not to adopt the amendment and just have a debate on the Floor on the bill itself in its current form.

 

Assemblyman Hardy stated that he believed the Assembly was in as good a position as any to debate the bill.  He wondered if it would be fair to other colleagues to put it forward for the Senate to deal with.  Mr. Hardy stated that it was not a clean bill, and he did not feel comfortable with it.

 

Assemblyman Knecht seconded Mr. Hardy’s thoughts.  With three workdays between the current date and the deadline for passage out of the first house on April 22, it seemed much too frantic to try to tackle a bill on the Floor of the Assembly such as A.B. 484.

 

Assemblyman Grady asked if it would help the Chair if the Committee took a vote to withdraw the amendment at that time.  The Chair would be able to say that the Committee reconsidered the appropriateness of the amendment and chose to withdraw it.

 

Chairman Manendo stated that the Committee would not be able to take action on the bill.  Any vote would simply be a straw vote.

 

Assemblywoman Pierce suggested sending the bill to the Floor without the amendment and allowing the whole Assembly to talk about it.  The Chair wished to clarify her intent that the bill be discussed in its original form or version.  She concurred.

 

Assemblyman Collins stated that, when the bill made it to the Floor of the Assembly, any member of the Government Affairs Committee would be able to ask that the amendment be withdrawn or not approved.  That would give Committee members an opportunity to talk with colleagues about supporting the withdrawal of the amendment or the motion to withdraw the amendment as an option.  That would allow the bill to go to General File as it was and to vote for it on the Floor.

 

Chairman Manendo added Mr. Collins’ suggestion to the options available.  He stated that he needed to check with the Committee’s Legal Analyst to make certain how to best deal with the situation.  He expressed appreciation to the Committee and to Mr. Avance for the discussion of A.B. 484.

 

As there was no further business to come before the Committee, Chairman Manendo adjourned the hearing at 8:42 a.m.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED:

 

 

 

                                                           

Nancy Haywood

Committee Secretary

 

 

APPROVED BY:

 

 

 

                                                                                         

Assemblyman Mark Manendo, Chairman

 

 

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