The Session has finally started...

It has been said that the Legislative session really started on Monday, which was the deadline for all the committees to introduce their bills. We finally know the lay of the land and the (somewhat) totality of what we have to deal with. While there is always the potential for leadership to introduce “emergency” bills, there is no way to quantify what those will be yet.

The next deadline is April 10th, when most bills must be through their first committee of introduction. This means that the next few weeks will be a flurry of activity.

I received a document the other day that has about 15 bills listed on it that could negatively impact the business community, 12 or so of those bills are workers comp related. There are some big deals in there and I will get more information out to Chamber members as I learn about them.

I took action on two bills today. The first was AB 313 in the Assembly Commerce and Labor Committee. As I had to testify in another hearing, I signed in as opposed but did not go to the table. As you can see from the link above, this bill would limit the amount of late fees that a landlord could charge a tenant if he/she is late with their rent payment. While this bill only affects a certain segment of our membership, the Chamber believes that this is an unnecessary intrusion into the private sector and that every business should be free to set their own payment policies and procedures.

I stepped up to the table in the Senate Government Affairs Committee to oppose SB 264. This bill would allow all local governments (counties, cities, school districts, library boards, etc) to impose, increase, decrease, or repeal certain taxes without having to come to the State Legislature for authority to do so.

Nevada does not have a home rule system whereby localities are free to set their own taxing and spending policies. All taxes imposed by a local government have to have been authorized at some point by the legislature. Of course, several local government representatives testified in support of this concept.

While the Chamber believes that there should be discussions about giving local governments more autonomy over their affairs, rules, and regulations, I testified that tax rates and policies should probably have the extra check and balance that the legislature provides. I quoted our Agenda for Economic Vitality in Nevada, which states our support for the “concept of reasonable tax and fee caps to prevent government from unnecessary expansion.”

I also pointed out that there could be unintended consequences if this bill were to become law. We all know that Clark County is the economic engine of this state. Could there be a scenario whereby that county raised taxes or fees so much that businesses have no incentive to remain or locate there? Would that reduction in tax base then ripple through our state budget and, therefore, our local budget? These are things that must be considered.

Tomorrow at 1:30 will find me in Senate Taxation testifying in strong support of SB 201, the RTC-5 bill. Come down to Carson and support us!