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The Las Vegas Metro Chamber's municipal endorsements released today snubbed a GOP mayor needing all the help she can get, embraced a union stalwart over a businesswoman backed by conservatives and ignored a Henderson mayor facing token opposition.
The stunning and strange chamber endorsements include:
Ex-Democratic state Sen. John Lee over Republican Mayor Shari Buck of North Las Vegas.
Former Building and Construction Trades Council President Steve Ross, the Las Vegas councilman, over...
In a new mail piece that hit this week -- and I mean hit -- ex-state Sen. John Lee accused North Las Vegas Mayor Shari Buck of being ethically bankrupt.
"Shari Buck is looking out for herself, not your family," the piece, which I have attached here, says.
And in the annals of "let's choose the worst picture we can find of our opponent," this may be the winner.
Two developments in the ongoing case of the city of Henderson and its lawsuit against Chris Milam, the would-be arena developer:
1. Dennis Porter, the city's project manager for the Milam project, has been placed an administrative leave after Mayor Andy Hafen's deposition. In the depo, Hafen is confronted with a document that indicates Porter forwarded an email from City Attorney Josh Reid to his home GMail and then sent it on to Milam's attorney. The email apparently talked about Milam dealing...
With all this talk of a complicated margins tax and a labyrinthine process to get SJR 15 and a mining tax passed, I thought I'd simplify the tax battle in the capital at the quarter-way mark:
THE DIRTY HALF-DOZEN (ROBERSON & CO.): There's gold in them thar companies. Translation: The mining protections and the margins tax are dead; long live the mining taxes.
THE OTHER SENATE RS: No way, no how. Translation: No way, no how.
SENATE DEMOCRATS: Can we just discuss this a little more?...
Despite an implictly critical statement from the gaming industry lobbying arm, the Las Vegas Sands is backing the six GOP senators who want to take mining taxation out of the state Constitution and create a new levy on the industry.
"We told (Senate Minority Leader Michael Roberson) we support the idea," Sands lobbyist Robert Uithoven told me this morning. "Obviously no one is supportive of singling out a major industry. But we also know and understand that mining is never singled out because...
Republicans wanting to raise taxes on a previously untouchable industry. Republicans attacking Republicans. Republicans pretending they are not criticizing the governor, but actually…criticizing the governor.
Oh, joy.
If there’s one thing that the Senate GOP proposal to tax mining means, it is this: The 2013 session just got very interesting.
Interesting enough, as one wag wondered, to be like 2003, which devolved into two special sessions, a governor suing the Legislature and a high court...
Or words to that effect.
In an opinion i have obtained, the Legislative Cousnel Bureau rebuts a long-running mining lobbying corps' argument that passing SJR15 would lower the industry's tax burden. Not so, says the LCB.
And it only takes a majority vote to put it on the ballot.
Read all about it, posted here.
UPDATE2 -- GOVERNOR OPPOSES -- Here is his statement, via his spox:
In his balanced budget, the Governor's commitment to K-12 education has increased spending for our schools, including an additional $135 million general fund investment. What's more, because the economy is growing and local revenues are up, overall spending on K-12 education is up over $400 million from last biennium.
The Governor's budget included increased spending for education without increased taxes. The Governor...
This was inevitable, I suppose.
Embattled Assemblyman Steven Brooks has filed a brief, though his attorney Mitchell Posin, with the state Supreme Court, arguing he cannot be banned from doing his job. This was always a danger when lawmakers moved so swiftly to create a select committee, give ChairmanWilliam Horne absolute power and then immediately banish an elected official from the place where he is supposed to do his elected business.
Posin's argument distilled: Lawmakers imposed an "extra-...
Back in 1999, the undersecretary of energy swatted away concerns about geologic disposal at Yucca Mountain.
''There is certainly science left to do and being done,'' Dr. Ernest Moniz told The New York Times in a piece headlined: "New questions plague nuclear waste storage plan."
But, Moniz added, ''One way or another we've got to advance toward geological disposal. We're pushing it hard. The science case is building up nicely. If we have to delay in the end we'll delay. But I see no reason not...