Published by Nevada’s Legislative Counsel Bureau (LCB) on their website
Introduction. NCPE received these questions in June, and circulated ideas about our response to our Legislative Proposals Committee. To read what we sent forward to the LCB, Click each question to skip forward to our responses.
Q 1. What improvements would you like to see in the legislative process in general?
The process is not sufficiently open to the citizens to take part. And the legislators do not have time to read BDR’s prior to hearings and when amended. On the one hand there is the 120-day limitation, but on the other hand the process and staffing and time to allow for discussion are all inadequate. The result is that some legislation is well-considered and representative of the people, but other legislation is not.
Q.2. Bill Requests:
--
Q 3. Bill Introductions:
BDR’s should have a deadline, except for emergency measures, so that they are drafted and in the hands of the legislators within, say, 30 days after the start of the session, but preferably or some categories of BDR’s should be filed before the session starts. Back to TOP
Q 4. Committee Hearings:
Provision must be made for the citizens to be heard at hearings. Since 78% of Nevadans live in Clark County, arrangements must be made to use enough video-conferencing sites to allow us to take part in any hearing. When 4 or 8 hearings are running simultaneously, then 4 or 8 sites in Las Vegas must be set aside, scheduled, announced in advance in time to make plans to get there, and have space for us to sit, wait, and then make our presentation. The State has a number of such sties – for example, besides the Sawyer Bldg., the Contractors’ Board is wired, and so are some spaces at UNLV, and a number of others. Several senators have said that there are , in fact, enough wired sites to make this happen.
In addition, then the Committee secretaries must be given correct information about the day and time of a hearing and the video-conferencing site in Clark County, so that Nevadans who call and ask how and where and when to take part in a hearing can obtain correct information in time to use it.
This seems to require Rules in the Assembly and Senate as to the time allowed between when a bill arrives at a committee and when it must be heard.
Nevadans who come to Carson or to the video-conferencing site should be allowed to present their thoughts. There should be prior warning to the Committee chair, perhaps 24 hrs. in advance, as to the names of those who wish to be heard, so that the Chair is not expected to make time for spontaneous testimony unless indeed there is time for that. If the time for testimony by Nevadans is limited, that fact should be relayed to those on the list to testify, in advance, and the same rule should apply to all – whether 3 minutes or 5 minutes or whatever. This is in addition to the current practice of allowing remarks to be handed over or faxed over and somehow included in the record. Though this practice can be justified as allowing legislators to read arguments which might not stick in one’s memory, so that memory could be refreshed, it also is used to silence Nevadans who are not heard and whose ideas will not be read.
If true hearings are instituted and this creates scheduling problems, the solution is not – as in 2005 – to forbid Nevadans from being heard, but, instead to provide more time. If true hearings cannot be scheduled in 120 days in a practical way, then go to 130 days, or whatever.
Amendments: Some are prepared well in advance but have not been seen by other Committee members or the affected public. There should be copies made available on site, in these cases, but the 78% of Nevadans NOT in the Carson City area need some way these advance amendments could be posted on the website.
Some amendments are crafted during the hearing, in which case deliberation is possible.
Q 6: Budget Reviews:
Same issues as with Hearings: 78% of Nevadans are in Clark County. These Budget Reviews should be open to the public by way of video-conferencing in southern Nevada.
Q 7: Completing sessions on-time:
There must be rules preventing what happened in 2005, when some bills were not even seen for the first time until late March, and hearings in early April were cut short to permit other hearings to take place. Then of course any bill not passed in one chamber by early May was declared dead, so that the real time available for true hearings was not even one month. Some of this may be avoided by reasonable scheduling of hearings. But some of it will require rules to prevent “bottle-necks”.
And, in the final analysis, the 120-day limit must itself be evaluated after adjournment: if all practical steps had been taken to permit true hearings and to permit legislators to read bills before voting, etc., and the 120 days were not enough to do the work Nevada needs done, then change it to 130 days or some other number. Otherwise not.
