Republicans holding off on endorsing room tax deal

LAS VEGAS-A deal between the Nevada State Education Association and Station Casino, Harrah's and Wynn may have been reached in an attempt to kill a ballot initiative that would have raised the  gaming tax, but the state's political leaders haven't thrown their full support behind it yet. The Democratic leadership in the Assembly doesn't "anticipate any problems," but Republicans say they are waiting to see the details of the agreement before deciding whether to support any compromise to raise the room tax.

The deal, reached Monday right before a deadline to turn in petition signatures, reportedly kept a Teachers Union-supported 3 percent gaming tax increase initiative off the November ballot in return for gaming support of an up to 3 percent room tax increase instead, capped at 13 percent.

Although the compromise was reached with the help of the governor's office and Republican legislators, the governor's office and Republican leadership are holding off on supporting it until final details are released.

"I've heard the concept, but without it being written down-there's a lot of ways to write that," said Gov. Jim Gibbons' press secretary, Ben Kieckhefer, Wednesday.  "We haven't seen anything from them, a policy review of it.  Obviously the governor is concerned about it as a concept.  We haven't seen anything to take an official position on at this point."

Teachers Union president Lynne Warne said details will hopefully be coming in the next week.

"We have details still to finish working out and put the plan on paper," said Warne.  "We're going to be moving forward with the ballot advisory question which we need to get to the different county commissioners to consider then have put on the ballot, as well as the statutory initiative.  We will be proceeding forward quickly, forthrightly to see this accomplished."

The next step for teachers is to get their advisory question past the seventeen county commissions and onto the November ballot.  If the advisory question passes, legislators will have to pass the tax increase by a two-thirds supermajority in both houses and the governor would have to sign it.  Failing that, the teachers and the casino executives associated with the deal will also be collecting signatures for a statutory initiative to raise the room tax that will be placed before voters later in 2009.

Revenue from the increase would go into the general fund for the first two years, but then would be directed toward teacher salaries and student achievement afterward.

"I'm not sure which direction our caucus is leaning right now," said Republican Assembly Minority Leader Heidi Gansert.  "There's a strong concern about raising any taxes, I know that, and also earmarking revenue streams.  My understanding is that is specifically directed toward teachers' salaries, so I question whether that's a good idea to earmark that.  I have some concerns about what I've read, but I haven't seen the details of the plan."

Even if Gansert does come out strongly against the plan, she will have a tough time preventing its passage through her house of the legislature.  If Assembly Democrats unanimously support it, they would need to pick up only one Republican vote to reach their two-thirds supermajority, assuming the assembly retains its current makeup after the November election.

Assembly Majority Leader John Oceguera said Wednesday he doesn't expect members of his caucus would be opposed to the deal.

"The tax certainly wouldn't affect any of my constituents or any other of the legislators' constituents so it's a start," said Oceguera.  "I don't anticipate any problems."

Asked if he believed the deal would receive Republican support, Oceguera asked "if they don't like this, what's their solution?"

"We're cut to the bone now and we're going to have to cut some more," said Oceguera.  "If they have a better idea, bring it. We're open to suggestions, but to just criticize and vote against anything without bringing your own solutions, I think, is very irresponsible."

Passage in the senate will be harder, and if only eight senators vote against the deal, it will not pass. 

Warne believes the deal will be able to pass the senate, however.

"We have been working with Sen. Raggio as well as other representatives from the senate and we are confident they will stand up and do the right thing for Nevada's kids and schools," said Warne.