THE COMMISSIONERS HAVE NEVER HEARD OF AND HAVE NEVER SEEN THE $19,000 STUDY ON TAX ROLL BACK/ABATEMENT OPTIONS FOR STOREY COUNTY COMMISSIONED BY LANCE GILMAN, THE PRIVATE PARTY.
THE PARK FUND HAS BECOME A TOPIC OF DISCUSSION AGAIN…AND SO IT GOES…….
By Nicole Barde
The agenda for this meeting is HERE and County Manager Pat Whitten’s summary of this meeting is HERE. To listen to audio of this or other Commission Meetings go HERE.
Commissioner Lance Gilman was not in attendance due to a meeting conflict.
This was a VERY short meeting….hence a short summary. There were few staff updates.
Public Works Director Mike Nevin gave a brief update on the road work being done by Farr West at TRI and announced that the public bathrooms at the north end of town would be open this weekend. The plan was to have them open year round beginning this year. This should make Mark Phillips happy since he had vociferously complained about their closure at a recent VCTC meeting. Commissioner Jack McGuffey asked about the status of the roofing project for the Highlands park gazebo and Mike said it was on track. Then Jack mentioned that there had been some discussion on the Highlands chat board about the use of Park Funds for maintenance or anything that was not new construction. Pat Whitten said that he’d have to look at the statute. Jack then added that it was a NEW roof and not a repair to an existing roof so it might qualify as “new construction”.
County Comptroller Hugh Gallagher concurred that since it was a new roof that it might qualify and that he’d look at NRS 377 to make sure. He reported that the budget committee met to review the tentative budget and how to bring it into line (it was a deficit budget) and that it looks like the ad valorum may be less than anticipated. The staff was given the direction to complete as many projects as they can in this budget cycle and then see how that impacts spending in their tentative budgets for next year.
County Manager Pat Whitten announced that the May 3rd meeting will be a very informative one since John Porter, the County’s chief lobbyist, will be giving an update on all of the federal and state issues that may affect Storey County and how they are being addressed. Pat also talked about the relocation of the Justice Court. Judge Herrington needs about 2500 sq. ft. to house the court and it needs to be safety and security compliant. They are looking at a few options such as an annex to the courthouse, and the bank building. The bank building however isn’t compliant so that looks like its out. Sounds like another county real-estate purchase might be happening.
Additionally, Pat said that the June 7th commission meeting might be canceled due to the ribbon cutting ceremony scheduled for USA Parkway. The Governor will be in attendance and so the county staff will be preparing for that event.
Lastly Pat said that he, Jack, V&T Rail Commission Board Chair Dwight Millard and Carson City Mayor Bob Crowel will be meeting on Wednesday April 20th to discuss the state of the Interlocal agreement between the County and the Rail Commission. I attended the Rail Commission meeting on Monday April 18th and will have a summary under a separate report…..but suffice to say it’s not a pretty picture for the Rail Commission.
Under Board Comments Jack mentioned that there will be a bit of activity at Miners Hall since they are cleaning it up for the F.O Eagles state convention.
Community Relations project manager Cheri Nevin reported that the County got the $30k grant to update Miners Park and received kudos from Pat Whitten for being able to get the County such good grants and to keep us compliant with the terms and conditions of those grants. The County benefits from these grants greatly and it’s due to Cheri’s knowledge and persistence!
The agenda item having to do with Union Pacific getting an indenture to amend the existing Mustang Ranch underpass right of way grant has to do with having a clean title on that right of way, part of the land is in Washoe and Storey hopes to transfer all the responsibility to Washoe as well. The way it reads now, the location of the right of way that is recorded isn’t where it actually is. This sounds like a housekeeping item.
Commissioner and Board Chair Marshall McBride was selected to represent the commissioners at the May 19th State Supreme Court settlement conference in the Malfitano case.
The Brothel Licensing Board convened to hear the appeal of a brothel worker whose work permit was denied due to a failure to disclose pertinent information.
The agenda listed three workers making an appeal. One of them had gotten an approval be the sheriff, one of them was a no show and so there was only one to be heard today. Bottom line the young woman had had 21 violations (illegal prostitution) in total, reported 9 but was “clean” for the last 5 years. She HAD received approval for her work card last year with no issues being raised. This year she added more/different information on her application and that was flagged thru a background check since some of those disclosures were not on her application. A bit of discussion went on then Jack asked her if she didn’t get the work card approval if she would go back out on the streets to do her work……she didn’t answer that question. Jack later said he could support the approval for public safety reasons. Marshall then said that since she had been clear of any violations or arrests for the last 5 years that he could support the approval on that basis and she was approved.
Pat Whitten made it clear to the Mustang Ranch representatives that it was not acceptable for the other young woman to be a no show and that her request for approval would likely be denied in the future.
Under Public Comment I asked the commission if the $19,000 study/report on the feasibility of a Storey County property tax abatement/rollback commissioned by Lance Gilman, and reported by Kris Thomson, was available for public review. They replied that they knew nothing of this report, had never seen the report and that since they had not commissioned it nor paid for it that it was a private document.
I asked how it is not a public document since Lance Gilman is a Commissioner, and he commissioned it to be done. The reply was that he had done so as a private citizen. I then asked “how do we know? How can you tell the difference?” ( By that I meant how can you tell which side of “the line” Lance is on when he does these types of things?)
No answer to that but they said that IF they do use that report as a basis for any action that it would then become public. I just don’t understand why Lance didn’t inform the county of the study being commissioned or share the results of the study. $19,000 is a lot of money…it must be quite thorough……..I wonder what it concluded…………
How odd…………
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