Reid says he won’t support education funding waiver

By Jean Reid Norman

Published Thursday, April 9, 2009 | 1:44 p.m.

Updated Thursday, April 9, 2009 | 5:50 p.m.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said today he will not support Nevada’s request for an education funding waiver in the state’s bid for economic stimulus money.

The state has requested a waiver from the requirement that it fund public education at 2006 levels to qualify for the stimulus money. He pointed out that the state has grown dramatically since then and said the Legislature must find a way to provide the funding over the next two years.

The economic stimulus package could bring $396 million to Nevada over the next two years. But the requirement that the state fund education at 2006 levels has been a stumbling block. The governor’s budget meets the requirement at the elementary and secondary levels, but $268 million would have to be restored to higher education to qualify.

Reid’s comments came after leaders of the Nevada Legislature talked to the Secretary of Education’s office about the stimulus money and waiver process via a conference call Reid set up.

“I believe in the public school system. I have grandchildren in it, and I want to take care of them,” said Reid, who spoke Thursday at the grand opening of the John C. Kish Boys & Girls Club in Henderson. He was there to be inducted into the Boys & Girls Club of America Hall of Fame.

When asked if he had any advice for the governor or Legislature, he said, “No, they’re going to have to work that out on their own. I have enough to do in Washington. All we ask is they take care of kids at the 2006 level.”

Reid spokesman Tom Brede issued a clarification hours after news of the senator’s comments became public.

“Ultimately whether to grant Nevada a waiver is a decision for the Secretary of Education to make based on a clearly defined process,” Brede said. “The state will either qualify or it won’t.”

A spokesman for Gov. Jim Gibbons said Reid was in effect suggesting that the state raise taxes during a recession.

“New taxes will kill jobs at a time when we are trying to stimulate the economy,” spokesman Daniel Burns said. He called Reid’s position “partisan politics at work.”

Burns said the state has letters of support for its waiver from Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., and Rep. Dean Heller, R-Nev., and has sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Education declaring its intention to file for a waiver. He said the forms and guidelines for waivers have not been written yet.