Gibbons: Shortfall will give government a new look

By Kyle B. Hansen

Thursday, March 18, 2010 | 4:47 p.m.

Gov. Jim Gibbons told the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce on Thursday that state government will have a new look because of a projected $3.5 billion shortfall next year.

Gibbons spoke at a roundtable with business owners at the chamber’s offices, saying it’s important for businesses and government to work together and learn from one another to survive the recession.

“Government should operate the same as businesses, so government learning from business is important,” Gibbons said.

If re-elected, Gibbons said he would propose a balanced budget with no new taxes. But balancing the budget with no tax hike would require major changes, he said.

“What that will mean is the government we see today is going to look vastly different than the government that will be proposed for tomorrow,” he said. “There will be a number of agencies that will be combined to reduce administrative costs. There will be some agencies that are actually proposed for elimination.”

Gibbons will face former federal judge Brian Sandoval and former North Las Vegas Mayor Mike Montandon in the primary. The winner likely will face Clark County Commissioner Rory Reid in the general election.

Gibbons said it looks like economic circumstances are not going to improve before the Legislature meets to consider the budget for the next biennium, and the budget measures passed in the special session this year were “a Band-Aid on a significant problem,” he said.

Gibbons took credit for fixing the budget in the special session, noting how he said he dealt with legislative leaders.

“I had to go sit in there and literally sit them at a table and tell them what we can and cannot do,” he said. “It wasn’t easy; no one likes the end result. We got through it and I think we ended up with the best result for Nevadans with that session.”

He also took the opportunity to attack the Legislature’s attitude toward business during the session.

“I was a little bit shocked, chagrined at the treatment of your representatives,” Gibbons said to the chamber. “Sometimes the individuals in the Legislature do not know, do not understand, the struggles that most small businesses, and most businesses in general, are having around the state.”

The governor said the state is losing opportunities to attract businesses to move to Nevada because state law does not allow tax incentives. Businesses also hesitate moving here because of the uncertainty of how the Legislature will deal with the budget shortfall, the governor said.

“The greatest fear that they have in coming to Nevada is not our education system, it’s not the fact that housing is expensive in Nevada,” Gibbons said. “Their greatest fear is the lack of predictability of the tax structure in Nevada. They don’t know what’s coming.”

A down economy didn’t stop Matt Crosson from moving to Nevada. Crosson was named Tuesday as the new president and chief executive of the chamber.

“Nevada has problems, but so does everybody else,” he told the governor.

Crosson, who takes over April 26, is moving to Las Vegas from New York, where he was president of the Long Island Association, the largest business association in New York.

“Las Vegas is perfectly situated to take advantage of the kind of trends that will help the economy grow in the future,” Crosson said after the roundtable.