Taxicab Authority gets new exec

By Richard N. Velotta

Thursday, Feb. 14, 2008 | 4:48 p.m.

Gordon Walker, a vice president for a government contractor on the Nevada Test Site, has been appointed administrator of the Nevada Taxicab Authority.

The appointment was announced Tuesday by Department of Business and Industry Director Mendy Elliott. He replaces Tom Czehowski, who was appointed on an interim basis in May and resigned last week to return to the Department of Industrial Relations-Occupational Safety and Health Section where he was chief administrative officer.

Walker will join the Taxicab Authority on Feb. 25.

Walker has served as vice president of Ruchman & Associates Inc., a government contractor for the National Nuclear Security Administration.

When the Taxicab Authority interviewed him for the administrator's position in August, he was the five-member board's third choice for the job. The top two candidates were rejected by Elliott in January.

In Walker's interview, he said he had been at his position for 13 years, spent time as a Nevada Department of Taxation hearings officer and, needing additional financial support for his family early in his career, drove a taxi in Las Vegas for three companies in six months. He quit, he said, because the work was too hard and he wasn't very good at it but it gave him a different perspective of the industry that prompted him to apply for the administrator's job.

The Department of Business and Industry announcement said Walker's 25-year work history included seven years as deputy executive director for the Nevada Department of Taxation, where he enforced laws, conducted investigations, resolved complaints and issues and worked cooperatively with a board of directors.

The authority oversees the 16 taxicab companies operating in Clark County and regulates taxi fares in addition to when and where taxis may operate.