Saturday, June 11, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

LITTLE NOTICED AMENDMENT: Cabby protest delivers

Guinn to veto bill banning kickbacks

Radko Nikolov pulls up Friday to the Spearmint Rhino Adult Cabaret. Nikolov and other cabbies were relieved after Gov. Kenny Guinn promised to veto a bill that would have outlawed businesses from paying drivers who steer customers their way. Photo by Ronda Churchill. At the Plaza on Friday in Las Vegas, cabby Herman Harper criticizes a bill banning kickbacks. Harper praised Gov. Kenny Guinn's promised veto saying, "We're not kidnapping anybody." Photo by K.M. Cannon.

Cabdrivers declared victory Friday in their fight to keep kickbacks legal, as Gov. Kenny Guinn vowed to veto a bill containing such a ban amid threats of sporadic wildcat driver strikes.

"I think it's fantastic," said Ruthie Jones, vice president of the Industrial Technical Professional Employees Union Local 4873, the valley's largest representative of cabbies. "We trust the governor to keep his word."

John Trent, a spokesman for the governor, said Guinn's veto of the bill, Assembly Bill 505, would happen Monday, when paperwork issues are resolved.

"The governor has said he has every intention to veto Assembly Bill 505," Trent said. "He (Guinn) saw the pain of taxicab drivers over the past couple of days. That's part of his rationale."

That pain has been expressed in the form of traffic-jamming taxi caravans down the Strip this week and fears among cab company managers that some drivers would refuse pickups at McCarran International Airport and various Strip hotels.

Cabbies believe kickbacks of $20 or so, given to drivers by some strip clubs, massage parlors and other businesses for dropping off passengers, are a courtesy no different than tipping.

"We're hard-income, wage-earning people. We need any help we can get. We're doing a service," Western Cab Co. driver Herman Harper, 53, said while parked Friday outside the Plaza. "We're not kidnapping people and making them go places. We're trying to make a living."

"This is a service-industry town," Harper said. "If Steve Wynn gives us sandwiches, it's because he appreciates our service."

But critics contend kickbacks tempt drivers to steer riders to the places offering the most cash and force businesses to offer bounties to keep customers from being routed elsewhere.

"What Governor Guinn did by vetoing that bill was to keep a system in place like the old mob days," said Jennifer Knight, spokeswoman for a group calling itself Citizens for Enforcement, which represents a "handful" of businesses opposed to the kickbacks. Knight would not name the businesses, citing fear of retribution.

"If you don't offer a cabby a kickback, they'll boycott your establishment and refuse to bring patrons, even if the riders specifically ask to go there," Knight said.

Craig Harris, a union steward, said he did not know whether some drivers would continue with protests on their own until the veto becomes official or until enough cabbies know of Guinn's plans.

"We've been kicked around so many times, who knows?" Harris said. "It's getting to where trust is not a factor anymore."

Before Guinn's decision was announced Friday morning, Harris said, "I believe that drivers will continue to inconvenience the transportation industry as much as they can until the governor vetoes it or does something else."

Bill Shranko, operations director for Yellow-Checker-Star transportation, the valley's largest cab company, said he was assigning supervisors to monitor his drivers at McCarran, a rumored Friday night boycott target.

"We support them (the drivers) in total. But boycotts are an absolute violation of our contract. Denying service to the public is no way to get anything," said Shranko, adding that drivers who do boycott the airport could be fired.

The union said it had not authorized any work actions, though rumors had drivers acting on their own.

"I've heard various things," Harris said. "I can't confirm or deny any allegations. It bounces around."

Already, drivers have been participating in nightly caravans down the Strip, honking horns and blocking traffic. Another rally, involving up to 50 cabs, went southbound down the Strip from the Stardust Hotel mid-morning Friday.

Assemblyman John Oceguera, D-Las Vegas, who added the measure as an amendment to Assembly Bill 505, has denounced kickbacks as an underhanded way to do business at the expense of unsuspecting passengers.

"I respect the governor's ability to exercise his right to veto a bill," said Oceguera, who is also the Assembly's assistant majority leader and transportation chairman. "I'm sure it'll come up again in the future. Not by me, of course."

Oceguera said he sympathized with the plight of cabbies trying to earn a living but not at the expense of gouging others with kickbacks.

"These guys are hard-working guys," Oceguera said. "There's a practice that's not legal already in Clark County, but they've become reliant on it for their income."

The illegal practice Oceguera referred to is called a "diversion," where drivers talk passengers out of going to one destination in favor of another. Cabbies have been accused of diverting riders to strip clubs offering bounties.

The amendment would have taken existing law a step further by making it illegal for cabbies to accept money from a club, even when a passenger asks for a referral to any club.

"It's an insult. It's blatantly discriminatory and insulting," Harris said, adding that the "Las Vegas handshake," some form of greasing palms to get business done, is an accepted resort corridor tradition.

And the amendment doesn't stop kickbacks for other service workers or even limousine or shuttle bus drivers.

"It only singles out taxi drivers in Clark County," Harris said. "They say that everybody else is God's given children. We're some kind of troll living under a bridge, eating garbage."

Trent and Harris both expressed deep concern about how the amendment was tacked onto the bill in the waning days of the 2005 Legislature without review by either the full Assembly or Senate.

"The governor has concerns about how this amendment was addressed. He's hopeful leadership will take a closer look at the process and how these amendments are tacked on at the end," Trent said. "There wasn't a whole lot of open discussion regarding the amendment."

In killing the amendment, Guinn will also have to veto the core bill. It would abolish the Transportation Services Authority, the agency that regulates limousines statewide and cabs outside of Clark County, and give its duties to the Public Utilities Commission.

"The governor is a little disappointed about this. I think he thinks the bill itself is a good bill," Trent said. "This one amendment, that kind of ruined the bill."

Rank-and-file drivers were happy to be able to pull back from the brink with their revenue intact.

"Hopefully, we go back to the status quo," said Bob Marshall, a Checker Cab driver. "The protests would have continued until something happened."