Coffin to make budget case to colleagues

CARSON CITY — In a showdown between two veteran state legislators, Sen. Bob Coffin, D-Las Vegas, intends to appear personally at a meeting of a legislative panel to urge it to stop “unconstitutional” budget cuts by Gov. Jim Gibbons.

But Sen. Randolph Townsend, R-Reno, chairman of the bipartisan Legislative Commission, said he is not going to put the issue requested by Coffin on the agenda and won’t order attorneys for the Legislature to file suit against the governor.

Coffin, though, hopes his allies on the commission will ensure the issue is heard.

Asked whether he will appear personally before the commission, he said: “I may and I will.”

Townsend, Coffin said, doesn’t rule the bipartisan commission with an iron fist as he does his Senate Commerce Committee.

The Legislative Commission has six Republicans and six Democrats, including Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley, Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus and Assembly Majority Leader John Oceguera, all of Las Vegas.

So Coffin hopes to find a friendly ear among them.

Gibbons ordered state agencies to slice $283.6 million from their biennial budgets and intends to take $200 million out of the $273 million “rainy day fund” to finance state operations through June 30, 2009.

Townsend has said Gibbons followed the law passed by the Legislature in ordering the budget reductions because of a downturn in tax collections.

Under state law, if Nevada’s reserve fund drops below $80 million, the governor must gain approval for any budget cuts from the Legislative Interim Finance Committee, which handles money matters between sessions of the Legislature. Even after Gibbons’ 4.5 percent reduction in state spending, $130 million will remain in Nevada’s reserve fund, above the level at which legislative approval is necessary.

Townsend initially questioned Coffin’s plan to challenge Gibbons legally over the budget cuts, but said Coffin at least would have the chance to make his case before the committee. Later, Townsend stiffened his position, saying he sees no need for his committee to even consider the idea.

If Coffin wants to change the existing procedure, Townsend said, he should take the matter before the 2009 Legislature.

“I do not believe it is appropriate for the Legislative Commission to be challenging the statutory scheme that the Legislature adopted,” Townsend said in a Jan. 22 letter to Coffin. “The remedy is to change the statutes, not to sue the governor.”

Coffin, in a Jan. 21 letter to Townsend, said Gibbons made the budget cuts “without official notice to the Legislature despite statutory requirements to keep the Legislature informed and involved.”

“I believe that the Legislative Commission needs to serve notice on the governor that it will seek appropriate legal remedies if the governor follows through with his announced determination to unilaterally reduce state budgets in violation of Nevada law,” Coffin added.

While the two argue, the Legislative Interim Finance Committee gets its first official look at the budget cuts today. Democrats have been particularly critical of some reductions to social programs.

Coffin is a member of the Finance Committee, so he will get his say in advance of next week’s meeting of the Legislative Commission.

He called Gibbons’ reductions an “unconstitutional line-item veto of our budget.”

“The Nevada Constitution does not give the governor that authority,” he said.

Cy Ryan may be reached [phone] or at [e-mail].