LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — If you've ever wanted to make a suggestion for a new law, now just might be your chance.
The Southern Nevada Forum held its initial meeting on Monday, with the goal of coming up with a dozen new ideas to fix problems faced by residents of the Las Vegas Valley.
Steve Sebelius outlines some of the top issues and potential solutions:
The 13-year-old organization — created by the Vegas Chamber, the City of Las Vegas, Brookings Mountain West and former Assembly Speaker Marilyn Kirkpatrick in 2013 — brings together lawmakers and community leaders to brainstorm ideas.
The group has racked up some successes over the years, too. A website dashboard that shows student performance data, funds for medical school residencies, the authority to create inland ports and an extension of fuel tax revenue indexing were all ideas that came out of the forum, current Assembly Speaker Steve Yeager said Monday.
It works like this:
Four committees — covering education, transportation, economic development and health care — meet regularly for a few months, boiling down ideas to three concrete suggestions each.
Those suggestions are later turned into legislation in Carson City.
The panels are led by a bipartisan group of lawmakers who have the ability to introduce legislation, said Yeager, who himself won't be returning to Carson City, having decided not to seek a sixth and final term in office.
The meetings are open to anyone, although the schedule of times, dates and locations wasn't available Monday. You can express your interest in being on a committee by filling out a form at this link.
For the 2026 session of the forum, the committees and their leaders are:
- Economic Development and Governance: Democrats state Sen. Julie Pazina and Assemblyman Duy Nguyen, and Republicans state Sen. John Steinbeck and Assemblyman Brian Hibbetts
- Education: Democrats state Sen. Marilyn Dondero Loop and Assemblywoman Erica Mosca, and Republican Assemblywoman Melissa Hardy
- Health care: Democrats state Sen. Roberta Lange and Assemblywoman Tracy Brown May, and Republican Assemblyman Greg Hafen
- Transportation and Infrastructure: Democrats state Sen. Rochelle Nguyen and Assemblyman Max Carter, and Republican Assemblywoman Lisa Cole
On Monday, people at the transportation committee meeting tossed out ideas such as funding for transit projects, including light rail, fees for electric vehicles that use the roads but don't pay the state's gasoline tax, cracking down on unregistered cars and people who don't carry car insurance, and greater protections for pedestrians.
On the economic development committee, suggestions included extending the life of tax abatements to give new businesses time to grow, making more land available for commercial use, not just housing, putting non-profit funding into the regular budget, rather than just awarding grants at the end of the process and making it easier to get permits and licenses regardless of where in the valley you open your business.
Before the groups met, however, they heard from UNLV political science professor David Damore, the executive director of Brookings Mountain West, who warned them that Nevada faces some serious headwinds.
Damore said revenue doesn't keep up with the state's brisk growth, leaving Nevada behind the curve.
"We already have a revenue structure unable to keep pace with growth; we need to address some revenue issues here," he said. "And remember, the people coming here now, they're not coming to build our economy, they're coming to avoid paying taxes in their home state, while putting demands on our services and on our healthcare."
Damore traced some of the problem to a limitation on government growth devised at the end of the 1970s, which artificially constrains budget increases and leaves money on the table.
"We put this in place in 1979, using 1974 as a baseline — the idea being that the general fund would grow to keep pace at 1974 levels, adjusting for inflation and population growth," he said. "Well, guess what? We don't have a tax structure that can even generate that much revenue. For this biennium, we're about $900 million below that."
Damore said tax exemptions cost state coffers plenty of income, and the entire revenue system needs a serious look.
"$9 billion in tax exemptions that we have in this state. So, a state that goes through the couch cushions to fund mental health, well, maybe we want to revisit some of this stuff here," Damore said. "Obviously, no one wants to raise taxes; I get that. But we need to have a serious discussion about revenue."
If you have a question, concern or story idea about politics and government in Nevada, reach out to Steve Sebelius and "Ask Steve."
