Governor’s Veto Looms As Democrats Showcase Suffering Schools

By Andrew Doughman / Nevada News Bureau
SUN VALLEY, NEVADA – When Sara Weatherford teaches at Sun Valley Elementary, she says frequent power outages and rattling pipes interrupt her lessons.
The 52-year-old school is a hodgepodge of a half dozen buildings erected intermittently over the past five decades. Noise bleeds through the walls between classrooms, making it difficult to concentrate, she says.
It’s schools like Sun Valley Elementary that Assemblywoman Debbie Smith, D-Sparks, wants to fix. Smith has sponsored a bill that would allow school districts to dip into the piggy banks they keep for debt payments.
The extra money would help school districts like the Washoe County School District renovate old schools like Sun Valley Elementary.
If the state was flush with money, the plan might not be controversial. But big pots of money are scarce these days, and Gov. Brian Sandoval has another use for the same funds.
In what would be his first veto since assuming office in January, Sandoval plans to veto Smith’s bill, Assembly Bill 183. Sandoval has booked the same money into his budget for school operating costs.
Smith and the Democrats cannot override the governor’s veto since Republicans in the Legislature will not vote against the governor, who is also a Republican.
So Democrats today opted for the next best thing. They called a press conference.
Washoe County School District Superintendent Heath Morrison addresses the press at Sun Valley Elementary School, where he voiced support for Assemblywoman Debbie Smith's school renovation bill.
This morning, Washoe County School District Superintendent Heath Morrison, flanked by education advocates and a union representative, stood behind a lectern at Sun Valley Elementary and spoke in support of the bill as television cameras rolled and reporters scribbled notes.
“We’d like to welcome you to Sun Valley Elementary School, and we are here today to make sure we are raising our voices in support for Assembly Bill 183,” Morrison said. “It allows us … to have safe, inviting schools conducive for children to learn.”
Sandoval is expected to receive the bill today. His spokesperson, Mary-Sarah Kinner, said today that the press conference did not change the governor’s mind.
“Unfortunately the bill does create a $300 million hole in the budget with no plan to fund that,” Sandoval told the Nevada News Bureau last week, when the bill passed out of the Senate.
Mark Stanton, chief capital projects and facilities management officer for the Washoe County School District, said Smith’s bill would let the school district take about $35 million out of its debt reserve account.
This would let the school district issue more bonds, which would raise the money necessary to renovate schools.
The governor, however, wants to sweep the debt reserves into the district’s operating fund. If he signed Smith’s bill, he would risk punching a whole in his own budget.
“It’s a philosophical decision about whether we want to use the construction dollars for operating costs,” Smith said today in her office.
She said she has not negotiated any compromise with the governor over his intent to veto her bill.
Nonetheless, the Assembly Democrats waited the maximum time permitted until they had to submit the bill to the governor.
Smith said they waited to “let things settle” and give the governor some time to think about the bill.
Smith, however, expects Sandoval to receive the bill today, meaning the governor will have until the end of next Monday, April 4, to either sign or veto the bill.
“We’ve had conversations about that and I think there was an understanding that I had a different position on that bill,” Sandoval said this past week.
The bill would be Sandoval’s first veto since he took office at the beginning of this year.