Las Vegas files petition in city hall dispute

By Cy Ryan

Monday, May 11, 2009 | 7:31 p.m.

CARSON CITY – The Las Vegas City Council says efforts to get a public vote in the upcoming municipal election on building a new city hall in downtown Las Vegas “are ill conceived and poorly implemented.”

The council has told the Nevada Supreme Court that opponents of the city hall are making only “half-hearted efforts” in their legal battle and “may be seeking a graceful way out of the position their flawed initiatives have placed them.”

Attorney Daniel Polsenberg filed the legal brief for the council to support the decision of District Judge David Barker that the initiative petitions signed by 14,000 residents are defective and the city hall issue should not be allowed on the June 2 election ballot.

And the city got support from two groups called the Downtown Las Vegas Alliance and Livework LLC that filed a brief that said the opponents, including the Culinary Union “continues their efforts to hold Las Vegas hostage to its demands through its attempt to force defective measures onto the ballot, in the hopes of stifling future development.”

The Supreme Court has decided to speed up consideration of the issue, and the briefs from the Las Vegas Taxpayer Accountability Committee and the Las Vegas Redevelopment Reform Committee are due next Monday.

These two committees, with the backing of the Culinary Union, believe the city hall will cost $267 million to build while backers say the cost is $150 million in a lease-purchase plan.

Tami D. Cowden, who signed the brief representing the downtown alliance and Livework, says the opponents “have relied more on the perceived emotional appeal of their self-declared status as champions of taxpayers, than on accepted legal principals.”

The city council approved the plans and opponents are suggesting the voters have a chance to reverse the decision at the election next month. Those opposed say the Supreme Court also could order a special election.

There is only one council race on the city election and it would cost an additional $450,000 to expand the election ballot.

Judge Barker ruled the initiative petition was invalid on grounds it contained more than one subject and the language was misleading.

Polsenberg said the initiative contains one subject about the lease-purchase agreement and then a second about plans and the project contract. The initiative, Polsenberg said, “violates the single-subject rule requirement” in Nevada law.

He also said there are six other reasons why the Supreme Court should reject the appeal to order the issue on the municipal election.