Legislative news briefs

CARSON CITY -- A bill that protects Nevada tenants from a scam involving landlords and their attorneys was approved Tuesday by a Senate panel.

The Judiciary Committee approved Assembly Bill 462 after its author, Assemblywoman Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas, said tenants on the verge of eviction are being charged bogus legal fees before landlords will accept a rent payment.

Under Nevada law, tenants have five days to pay rent after being served with an eviction. If the tenant doesn't respond to that notice, a final notice can be served on the sixth day and the renter can be locked out on the seventh day.

The problem is that landlords are refusing to accept the rent within the five-day period unless the tenant pays a $75 legal fee to the landlord's attorney, Buckley said.

Under the bill if landlords accept the late rent payment, they could not evict the tenant. But Buckley said the landlord can still serve the tenant with a 30-day no-cause eviction notice.

Panel rejects expanded Medicaid for disabled

CARSON CITY -- A budget subcommittee has voted against expanding Nevada's Medicaid program to help severely disabled Nevadans, angering a spokesman for the disabled.

But the subcommittee chairman, Sen. Ray Rawson, said he's not giving up and may try for the expansion even though the Medicaid budget has been closed.

Paul Gowins of the Disability Forum said he was caught off guard by the subcommittee's decision Tuesday to add $1.4 million to help up to 60 disabled people with a lower level of services.

Gowins said the forum's goal was to use the new money in combination with expanded services. The idea was to help keep a lower number of severely disabled people in their homes or homelike

settings and out of costly institutions.

Annual sessions measure moves ahead in Nevada

CARSON CITY -- A plan to let Nevada voters decide in 2000 whether they want annual legislative sessions has cleared a key state Senate committee.

Meanwhile a move to extend legislators' terms was unanimously rejected by another committee.

Members of the Senate Government Affairs Committee voted 4-3 Tuesday to send Assembly Joint Resolution 5 to the Senate floor for a final legis lative test. Already passed by the Assembly, its next destination after a Senate vote would be the 2000 ballot.

Under the plan, lawmakers would meet for a regular session of 120 days in 2001 and will meet for 45 days the following year to make adjustments in the budget.

The Senate Legislative Affairs and Operations Committee, however, rejected Senate Joint Resolution 17, which would have extended the terms of senators to six years and assemblymen to four yea rs.

Senators now serve four years and Assembly members have two-year terms.

The Nevada Constitution prohibits them from serving more than 12 years in any one house.

Henderson college study gets $500,000

CARSON CITY -- The bill to study the feasibility of a state college in Henderson was approved by the Assembly Ways and Means Committee Tuesday and sent to the floor.

The committee reduced from $1 million to $500,000 the amount of money to be allocated to the board of regents of the University and Community College System of Nevada for the study.

Assembly Majority Leader Richard Perkins, who sponsored Assembly Bill 220, said Henderson has agreed to donate 200 acres or more a campus, and many local businesses are willing to contribute to the project.

Perkins, D-Henderson, estimated the proposed school could have an enrollment of 14,000. It would be cheaper to operate than UNLV, since the professors would spend more time teaching and less doing research than professors at the university. And they would be paid less.

He raised the possibility that Congress may locate a national teachers academy at the Henderson site. He said U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., was working on this project.

The regents will bring the results of the study to the 2001 Legislature.

Plan to overhaul employee health plan clears panel

CARSON CITY -- Gov. Kenny Guinn's bill overhauling the structure of the financially troubled state employees group health insurance plan cleared the Assembly Government Affairs Committee Tuesday.

The committee adopted some amendments but left intact most of Senate Bill 544, which goes to the Assembly Ways and Means Committee.

The program was near collapse when the Legislature first approved an emergency appropriation of $10 million in March. It is getting ready to pass another $16 million to keep the system operating until June 30, the end of this fiscal year.

SB544 would enlarge the governing board from five to nine members and for the first time include two outside representatives who must have experience in investments and insurance.

The bill would allow employee groups to leave the system to seek their insurance elsewhere starting in January 2001, Assemblyman Doug Bache, D-Las Vegas, said. The compromise allows 18 months for improvement of the program, which has 47,000 people enrolled.

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