Tuesday, June 3, 2003 | 11:01 a.m.
Election results
Election results will be available live at:
With just one of about every 10 registered Clark County voters expected to vote in the general election, people standing outside the Howard Wasden Elementary School polling site this morning said more people ought to follow their lead.
"As a Metro Police officer every day we hear one complaint after the next about how things need to be changed -- well, this is where people can make a difference," said Laurie Bisch, who voted prior to the start of her shift at 10 a.m. today.
About 10 people stood in line as the polls opened at 7 a.m. at the school at at 2831 Palomino Lane in the heart of Las Vegas Ward 1, site of one of the valley's most hotly contested races between embattled City Councilman Michael McDonald and political newcomer Janet Moncrief.
Clark County Registrar of Voters Larry Lomax, who is predicting a 10 percent overall turnout following a 4.5 percent turnout of 576,216 active registered voters for the early voting period that ended Friday, said all 250 polling sites opened without problems this morning. The polls will close at 7 p.m. today.
Voters in Las Vegas, Mesquite and unincorporated Clark County are voting on a $50.6 million Las Vegas-Clark County Library bond issue that would build three new libraries in Las Vegas and one in Mesquite. The bond money also would be used to renovate 12 existing facilities and provide about $9 million a year in operating costs. If approved, the bond debt would add an average annual $8.82 tax on a $100,000 home, officials said. The bond debt would take an estimated 29 years to pay off.
Opponents of the measure question the timing, saying that with so many people still out of work from the fallout of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, it may not be wise to ask people to increase their taxes.
Also at stake during this election are mayoral and council seats in Boulder City and Mesquite as well as two municipal judge seats in Las Vegas.
"It is a shame there will be a low turnout because a lot more people should vote," said Jules Schwartzman, who for 13 years has been the first person in line at Wasden to vote in primaries and general elections.
"I didn't like the negative campaigning in the city council race. Maybe that turned some people off."
Lomax is predicting an overall turnout of 25 to 30 percent for the Ward 1 race, following a disappointing 10.4 percent turnout during early voting. Lomax, however, is predicting greater than 50 percent turnouts for Mesquite and Boulder City.
"Many of the sites have about two machines, but in Boulder City there are 10 machines at each site," he said, noting that about 800 machines have been installed for this election compared to 2,400 for last November's general election.
Amintha Norman, precinct leader at Wasden noted that the two machines at that site should be enough to accommodate voters, while seven were required last November.
In the April primary Moncrief, 43, a critical care nurse, collected 48 percent of the Ward 1 vote while McDonald, 38, a consultant for Alpha Omega Strategies who was first elected to office in 1995 and reelected in 1999, received 44 percent.
"In the primary, some of our staunchest supporters didn't vote, so we worked hard to make sure that didn't happen today," McDonald said as he greeted voters several hundred feet outside the Wasden polling site.
McDonald has in recent weeks been walking the district and sending out fliers critical of Moncrief. McDonald, who has lived in the ward all his life, says Moncrief, a local resident of 13 years, moved into the ward recently just to run against him.
McDonald is battling to overcome ethics problems that began after his 1999 re-election, McDonald faced several ethics complaints and a recall attempt. The complaints alleged McDonald urged council colleagues to buy the financially troubled Las Vegas Sportspark owned by McDonald's employer Larry Scheffler.
McDonald abstained on the vote but nevertheless was found to have broken ethics laws by the now-defunct city Ethics Review Board and the state Ethics Commission. No sanctions were imposed.
In May, McDonald was listed, along with several other politicians, in an FBI search warrant in a corruption probe. Agents were looking for payments to politicians from the Galardi family, owners of Cheetahs and Jaguars strip clubs. McDonald acknowledged that since he has been in office he has been paid by Mike Galardi to be a consultant on zoning and land planning issues.
Moncrief, who works at University Medical Center and also is the director of the Trinidad Surgery Center, has since February been knocking on doors seeking support. She also is accused of sending out negative fliers to sway voters.
She says that while McDonald has helped some neighborhoods -- those of the wealthy and otherwise affluent, she said -- he has neglected poorer constituents in Ward 1. Moncrief's center caters to uninsured patients, many of them non-English-speaking Hispanics.
But her experience in politics is limited and she admits to not having a lot of knowledge about zoning matters and other issues. She says, however, she is a quick learner.
McDonald has said throughout the campaign that she has failed to properly report all the money being spent on her campaign. Last week, Moncrief had to amend her campaign finance reports to note that she had left out an $15,000 loan to herself in March.
The City Council race is not the only one on the ballot in Las Vegas, however. Voters will also decide two municipal judge races: former district attorney candidate Abbi Silver is running against Bill Henderson and incumbent Toy Gregory is running against Denise McCurry.
In the municipal judge Department 6 race, Henderson, 44, has a private general practice with a focus on family cases. He also has worked as an alternate hearing master in Family. Silver, 38, is a chief deputy District Attorney for the Special Victim's Unit that includes domestic violence and sexual assault cases.
Silver, who lost a fall bid for district attorney, and Henderson, who last year failed to win a Family Court post, beat five other candidates in April to advance to the runoff. Silver got about 39 percent of the vote and Henderson about 15 percent.
In municipal judge Department 1, Gregory, 69, was appointed in 1983 and has run unopposed every election except for this one. McCurry, 33, practices criminal defense, civil litigation and family law at her firm, Denise McCurry and Associates. She is an alternate municipal judge for Las Vegas.
Gregory got nearly 41 percent of the vote in the primary election. McCurry got about 36 percent in the three-person race.
In other races across the valley, Boulder City Mayor Bob Ferraro faces a strong challenge from former Boulder City Councilman Bill Smith, who in the primary got 39 percent of the vote to Ferraro's 36 percent; and Theron Jensen and Bill Nicholes vie to become Mesquite mayor after both candidates eliminated incumbent Mayor Chuck Horne in the primary.
In Boulder City, the financial condition of the community that has long supported controlled growth has come to the forefront of the race.
Ferraro, 67, mayor for past four years and a councilman since 1976, has maintained that the city is in fine shape with several million dollars in reserve. Smith, 77, who was on the council from 1997 to 2001, has told voters that Boulder City government faces a financial doomsday with the reserves running dry in the 2009-10 fiscal year unless spending is curbed.
One major point of contention is the new Boulder Creek Golf Club that was built with $19 million in city funds and has cost about $480,000 more to operate than it brought in during its first four months of operation.
Smith wants to lease it out to lessen the city's burden. Ferraro says eventually the course will be a popular attraction for locals and tourists and will make money for the city.
Also in Boulder City, council candidates Karla Burton, Roger Tobler and Kevin Polk are competing with incumbent Bryan Nix for two open at-large seats.
In addition to the mayor's race in Mesquite, eight candidates are vying for four City Council posts. The top two vote-getters get two four-year terms, the third and fourth place finishers get two-year terms.
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