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Sunday, July 26, 1998
COLUMN: Jon Ralston
Danger for Jones, panel
The state Ethics Commission's decision to preside over a public airing of a controversy enmeshing Las Vegas Mayor Jan Jones and the rest of the City Council reverberates with ominous overtones.
The Aug. 14 hearing not only has the potential to destroy Jones' gubernatorial aspirations, but it also could cripple the credibility of the ethics panel. In Jones' case, the panel could, albeit inadvertently, decide the contest for the state's most important office. But by going further and addressing when campaign contributions should be disclosed, the panel is tangling itself in a quagmire from whence there is no escape. Let's explore both issues, which are distinct.
The ethics panel probably had enough evidence last week to move forward to a public investigation of Jones' opposition to siting a restaurant on West Sahara. Several Las Vegas luminaries involved with nearby BankWest had lobbied intensely to block the eatery. Whether she should have disclosed a financial relationship her husband had with some of the prime antagonists to the restaurant seems a legitimate area of inquiry. And the propriety of a much-discussed phone call she had with one of those opposing the eatery -- Boyd Gaming's venerable Bill Boyd -- in which she discussed contributions to her gubernatorial race along with the zoning issue also is legitimate fodder for the panel to explore.
Jones may find it difficult to get around the disclosure issue for two reasons. First, she listed on her state ethics disclosure form a company in which her husband is involved that took a $4.3 million loan from a trust that includes Boyd and Perry Whitt -- both of whom also are involved with BankWest and both of whom opposed the restaurant, Nick's Fishmarket.
But, second, she cannot use ignorance as a defense. As one neutral observer with intimate knowledge of ethics laws put it: "She can't put blinders on. She can't use an artificial prophylactic. She has an obligation to know."
Jones will be aided by the fact that the zoning was highly questionable, although it is not helpful that staff recommended approval. An adverse finding would be devastating to her aspirations. But the mere fact that a hearing and guaranteed media spectacle will occur two weeks before the primary, just as she is trying to develop momentum in her uphill campaign against GOP anointee Kenny Guinn, could badly hobble her. For Steve Miller, who lost to Jones in the 1991 mayoral contest and has pursued her with a Javert-like zeal ever since, to be the agent of her political demise would be too sweet for him and too bitter a pill for Her Honor to swallow.
On the other, more global issue, the commission's decision to look into whether Jones and the other council members should have disclosed contributions from Boyd Gaming is a disaster waiting to happen. The ethics statutes make no mention of campaign contributions. For the ethics tribunal to start deciding what the proper threshold is for the proverbial "reasonable person" to disclose seems unwieldy at best and ludicrous at worst.
The panel would then be setting thresholds for when quid pro quos come into effect, thoroughly tainting a contribution process already viewed with cynicism by the public. To set in stone some percentage of contributions as triggering disclosure would paralyze government and makes little sense, which is why the panel previously has shied away from campaign contributions as part of its purview.
The panel would be setting itself up for its legion of critics to pounce. I'm not talking about mewling county commissioners wriggling on hooks they baited themselves. I refer to those who support the ethics panel's mandate, but fret that it could grow too great if it bites off too much.
No matter what the panel does to Jones, if it tries to set standards for campaign contribution disclosure, it will have undercut all the good it has done in helping to expose corruption at the Clark County Government Center.
Jon Ralston publishes The Ralston Report, a political newsletter. His column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. He may be reached via e-mail at Jon_Ralston@lvrj.com.
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