Does Nevada have a diversified tax structure?
Now a revenue-neutral tax-reform package, like what NPRI has proposed, would be a good idea
Read moreNSHE now trying to tell the truth; some worried honesty will hurt them politically
There's an amazing article today in the Las Vegas Sun on the Nevada System of Higher Education. Written by David McGrath Schwartz, it details the efforts of some in NSHE to tell the truth.
Higher education is trying a new approach to proposed budget cuts: honesty.Of course, if you've been reading Write on Nevada, you know about both Chancellor Dan Klaich's admission of past hyperbole from individuals in NSHE as well as how some officials in higher education - including Klaich - have continued to overstate those cuts.
After three years of reacting to proposed budget cuts with vague prophecies of doom - thousands of layoffs, eliminating athletic teams and the closure of popular schools - the higher education system is trying to provide detailed and more realistic scenarios for what would happen under Gov. Brian Sandoval's budget.
Officials who are committed to telling the truth should be acknowledged and praised - and it's a sad commentary that something as basic as truth telling must now be recognized, because it's been so rare.
Klaich's stark confession of past hyperbole was a great starting point. It's not Klaich's fault that former chancellor Jim Rogers frequently exaggerated. Klaich's admission of past mistakes is the first step toward an honest debate.
Regent Ron Knecht should also be noted for creating a spreadsheet that contains the last 12 years of NSHE operating budgets. This kind of accurate and easily accessible information lets anyone fact-check statements made by higher-education officials.
And why do some in the higher-education establishment oppose honesty? Because being honest would make it harder to scare people into action.
But in their effort to be forthright, some higher education officials worry they are hurting themselves politically by making cuts appear less dire. ...It's easier to mobilize supporters if you lie to and scare them. That's why I've repeatedly urged citizens in Nevada not to be manipulated and to fact-check what they hear and read.
Whether it's higher education, Nevada K-12 schools or health and human services, campaigning against budget cuts is an exercise in mobilizing supporters to clamor for services and pressure policymakers.
Unfortunately, NSHE's newfound commitment to honesty (although some, like Knecht, have been honest throughout) is not shared by all special-interest groups.
The budget reductions for UNLV, UNR and CSN are on the table. Let the debate, now with accurate information and alternative suggestions, begin.
Sunshine Week: A review of AB 239
Assembly Bill 239, a bill revising Nevada's open-meeting laws to require public bodies to po
st agenda-item support documents, meeting minutes or audio recordings, and meeting videos on their websites, could increase public oversight of state and local public bodies by making supporting documents accessible 24 hours a day. However, despite these efforts to make public-meeting information more accessible, it appears the onus could still rest on the public and not the public body to initiate publication of the information.Currently, the law requires a public body, such as a city council or school board, to provide individuals with a copy of any agenda-supporting documents provided to public-body members - but only if that individual requests those documents.
Under AB 239, a public body would be required to also post these supporting documents online at "the date and time the public body first provides the supporting material to a person who requests the supporting material." This language could reasonably be interpreted to mean that if no person makes a request for the documents, the public body has no obligation to post the materials online.
At first glance, it would seem that AB 239's alternative requirement to post supporting documents online at "the date and time the public body first makes the supporting material available to the public," would fix that potential loophole.
However, as often times happens to NPRI - at least with the Clark County school board - public-body members receive supporting documents which are not included in the package of materials initially offered to the public. This practice, which leaves the false impression that members of the public have all the documents that elected officials receive, would raise the question of whether the public body, under AB 239, would be obligated to post online the information given to the elected officials, but not the public.
If lawmakers wanted to eliminate any wiggle room in AB 239, they should model the law after NRS 241.020 (4) which requires all public bodies that maintain a website to post notice of their meetings online. If AB 239 required that all public bodies that maintain a website post all their supporting documentation online, these loopholes would be eliminated.
Sunshine Week: A review of AB 159
Editor's note: In honor of Sunshine Week, a national effort to promote a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information, the Nevada Policy Research Institute is going to be examining bills in the Nevada Legislature that would impact the state's open-meeting law, public-record requests or other transparency issues. Sunshine Week is a national effort to promote a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information.
Under AB 159, oral requests for public records would be given the same timelines, notifications and access as written requests. While current law seems to provide for this, some government entities only recognize written requests for records. For example, just last month, the Clark County school board publicly denied two verbal public-records requests made at a public meeting, including one made by NPRI, stating the request "must" be made in writing. Despite the school board's subsequent change of position, the board's public record still indicates a mandate for written requests.
In another significant clarification, AB 159 would require the person who has legal custody of a public record to prepare a copy of the public record, if requested. This clarification prevents government bureaucrats from denying someone a copy of a record because the requestor has no way to make his or her own copy. This clarification could also save staff time and resources, because it would allow a person to inspect a larger file of public records onsite, identify the few records of interest and have the staff copy just those records. This would eliminate the need for staff to shuffle through the larger file to locate the few records the requester actually wants copied.
Public oversight and government accountability would also be improved under AB 159, which would: require copies of public books and records to be made available immediately upon request, in certain circumstances; limit the fee that may be charged for a copy of a public record in the custody of a law library operated by a governmental entity to 10 cents per page; require that copies of minutes and audio recordings of public meetings be made available to the public upon request and at no charge; reduce the fee a county clerk charges for copying records, proceedings or papers; and eliminate the fee a county clerk charges for searching records or files in the office of the county clerk.
Obama Administration slips on transparency promise
According to the AP, last year people requested information 544,360 times under the United States Freedom of Information Act, but the government responded to only one out of every three requests.
Additionally federal transparency details included:
- The SEC averaged 553 days to respond to requests and the CIA took more than 3 months
- The State Department received three times as many requests in 2010 than in 2009 and had over 20,500 overdue cases in its backlog
- Ironically, the Obama Administration censored 194 pages of e-mails requested by the AP regarding the Administration's Open Government Initiaitive
Transparency promotes accountability and provides information for citizens about what their government is doingWhile it's not a "Read my lips" contradiction ala President George H.W. Bush, it is unfortunate the Obama Administration hasn't kept his campaign promise of promoting greater transparency.
The truth about pre-K (hint: it doesn't work)
At last night's education committee hearing, both Clark County Superintendent Dwight Jones and Washoe County Superintendent Heath Morrison indicated they are proponents of spending government money to provide pre-K services. Several liberal lawmakers have also previously indicated they are big fans of pre-K.
Each claims that funding pre-K increases student achievement.
Except it doesn't. Consider Georgia, which has had universal, state-subsidized pre-K since 1992.
Or consider Oklahoma, which has had universal, state-subsidized pre-K since 1998.
Now compare this to the reforms Florida instituted in 1998, and the ensuing results.
There's no contest. Why would anyone choose pre-K over the proven reforms of Florida? Bueller... Bueller...
Now, advocates of pre-K will cite small-, small-scale studies to justify this enormous expense, but those studies have significant limitations, which the Heritage Foundation's Lindsey Burke details here. She also explains here how government-funded pre-school could crowd out private alternatives.
In fact, the research in these papers is so important, I'm going to link to them again:
- Does Universal Preschool Improve Learning? Lessons from Georgia and Oklahoma
- More Government Preschool: An Expensive and Unnecessary Middle-Class Subsidy
State-subsidized pre-K is an enormously expensive program that produces little to no lasting increase in student achievement.
UNR President Glick misleads on the size of university's past budget reductions
In an open letter to University of Nevada, Reno staff on proposed reductions, UNR President Milt Glick wrote:
Since 2009, the University's annual general fund appropriation has been cut $44 million, or 20 percent.That statement is false, as you can see easily by looking at the last 12 years of operating budgets for the Nevada System of Higher Education.
There are two ways you could define UNR's annual general fund subsidy - as either the total amount of subsidy UNR gets from the state, or the amount of money going to UNR proper, excluding auxiliary programs like athletics and the Medical School. Either approach reveals Glick's claim to be false.
Consider the total subsidy UNR has received in the past three years.
Fiscal Year 2009: $199.6 millionGoing from $199.6 million to $175.6 million per year is a $24 million, or 13.7 percent, reduction.
Fiscal Year 2010: $182.5 million (includes stimulus money used in place of a general fund subsidy)
Fiscal Year 2011: $175.6 million
Consider the total subsidy UNR (excluding auxiliary programs) has received in the past three years.
Fiscal Year 2009: $130.6 millionGoing from $130.6 million to $117.9 million per year is a $12.7 million, or 10.8 percent, reduction.
Fiscal Year 2010: $121 million (includes stimulus money used in place of a general fund subsidy)
Fiscal Year 2011: $117.9 million
I assume that Glick would justify his statements by saying he's referring to "cuts" from the amount UNR wanted, which is a) ridiculous (for example, your pay didn't get cut just because your boss didn't give you the raise you wanted) and b) not what he wrote.
Statements like Glick's are the reason why NSHE Chancellor Dan Klaich recently said:
I think we have been guilty of hyperbole in the past, where we get the first dollar of a cut and we would like you to believe that the sky is falling in. And here we are a few years later and, lo and behold, the sky is right where it started out. It has not fallen in.Video of Klaich's comment after the jump.
This is just another example of why Nevadans - citizens and policymakers - need to fact-check the statements coming from many of those in higher education. Many higher-education officials are doing their best to earn a new kind of BS degree.
Semi-related and worth reading: Glenn Cook's recent editorial, "Bluster surrounds debate over salaries, benefits."
State politicians work nationwide to pull the rug out from voters
Steve Malanga has a great article in City Journal decrying the "taxonomy of fiscal gimmicks, evasions, and ploys" that state lawmakers have used nationwide in order to avoid a legitimate reconciliation of state budgets.
Malanga points out that state lawmakers who are sweeping capital improvement funds, borrowing against future revenue streams, papering over debt, and engaging in other fiscal chicanery are, consequentialy, defrauding the voters who have given a clear mandate to reduce state spending. In many states, lawmakers are pursuing these dubious strategies in order to explicitly circumvent spending constraints put in place directly by voters - short-circuiting the clear intent of the electorate.
As Malanga puts it:
Facing scary revenue drops that left their budgets dangerously unbalanced after years of runaway spending, states have employed an unprecedented number of fiscal gimmicks over the last two years to try to make up the difference. They have swiped revenues dedicated to maintaining roads or enhancing emergency medical systems; sold future lottery proceeds for cash today; grabbed unclaimed money in personal bank accounts; and redefined taxes as fees to get around constitutional limits on tax hikes. And they've justified these moves by claiming that voters are in no mood for the spending cuts or explicit tax hikes necessary to shrink deficits legitimately-even though the tricks often circumvent budget restrictions that the voters themselves enacted.
It's clear that most of these strategies are currently being used, or likely will be used, by policymakers Carson City. Yet, policymakers in the Silver State need to remember the reason they were put into office and stop using gimmicks to prop up unsustainable spending. It should have been clear at the outset that the 30-plus percent increase in real, per-capita General Fund spending that lawmakers embarked on between 2003 and 2009 was unsustainable. Now, voters have given lawmakers a clear mandate to reverse that increase.
This is not the time to play games - particularly when a detailed roadmap for reducing spending is readily available.
Audio: Klaich admits NSHE's past hyperbole
For the past couple of weeks, I've been citing this quote by Chancellor Dan Klaich whenever someone would overstate the impact of Gov. Brian Sandoval's proposed reductions to the Nevada System of Higher Education.
I think we have been guilty of hyperbole in the past, where we get the first dollar of a cut and we would like you to believe that the sky is falling in. And here we are a few years later and, lo and behold, the sky is right where it started out. It has not fallen in.And now, for your listening pleasure, I have audio of his statement.
Unfortunately, those involved with the higher education system continue to make hyperbolic remarks. The latest:
Sen. John Lee, D-North Las Vegas, said hopelessness over long-term unemployment and pent-up anger about a funding imbalance that favors universities over community colleges has unemployed construction workers and others who are seeking retraining at their wits' end. ...Umm ... yeah. Can't you see the similarities between fighting an oppressive regime and fighting to get more of the state funding pie? Chancellor Klaich did tactfully decline to agree with Lee's call to arms, though.
"We will have to do as they did in Egypt, fight for those rights," Lee told the group, who didn't respond other than to thank him for his testimony.
What's worse is that in the same article, the reporter, Benjamin Spillman, misreports the size of the NSHE operating budget, which makes the proposed funding reduction look larger than it actually is.
Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval's budget proposal would cut the system's operating budget from the current level of $556 million to $395 million by 2013.False. The NSHE's current operating budget is $1.744 billion. Don't believe me? Check out the budget for yourself (second tab). What the $556 million figure refers to is the subsidy NSHE receives from the state, which is less than 32 percent of its operating budget.
In total, the reduction in state support proposed by Sandoval is less than 10 percent of NSHE's operating budget - and that's before you factor in tuition increases.
Crisis? Only if you're using hyperbole.
Reid skirts stupid law
The big news circulating on the blogosphere today involves Rory Reid's apparent evasion of campaign finance laws during his recent gubernatioral bid. For those who have not seen it, Jon Ralston first broke the story here.
Reid and his staffers set up an Economic Leadership PAC and encouraged donors to contribute to the PAC, saying it would be "an effort to assist his campaign." The campaign then set up 91 shell PACs and shuffled money from the Economic Leadership PAC, in $10,000 increments, through the collage of shell PACs and then into Reid's campaign account. This effectively allowed Reid to skirt campaign finance laws that limit contributions from a single source to $10,000.
It's clear that Reid's scheme at least violates the spirit, if not the letter of the law. Reid claims the scheme was vetted with Secretary of State Ross Miller beforehand although Miller, according to Ralston, "could not confirm that the Reid campaign cleared the machinations with his office."
However, while it is incumbent upon public officeholders and candidates (both roles filled by Reid) to uphold the law, I would be remiss not to point out the questionable constitutionality surrounding campaign finance laws that limit an individual's freedom to contribute. Contributing to the campaign of a political candidate is a fundamental and essential component of individuals' right to free speech, where those individuals are subject to democratic government. (I won't get into a discussion here of Locke's definition of natural rights and whether a democracy or a republic is the best means of safeguarding those rights. For those who are interested, see Hoppe's Democracy: The God that Failed.) As such, the majority of campaign finance laws are, in fact, a curtailment of individuals' First Amendment right to free speech.
It's possible that Reid's campaign broke the law, but it's also questionable whether the law itself is in conflict with constitutional provisions and/or the natural rights of individuals more generally. To put it succinctly: Reid may have broken the law, but the law may have broken the law first. If nothing else, this may give Reid standing to challenge the constitutionality of the tangled mess of campaign finance laws.
