EDITORIAL: Conduct public business in public

Although education gained the overwhelming amount of attention in the 2015 Legislature, and rightly so, Nevada lawmakers also made gains in other areas, including a move toward privatizing some Medicaid services. A section of Senate Bill 514, signed into law by Gov. Brian Sandoval last June, enables the state to consider the possibility of providing long-term services and support to the blind, elderly and disabled through a managed care model.

Hooray for that. Government at all levels needs to look deeper at privatizing agencies and services, to dial down the cost of government and provide the public with more efficiency, greater accountability and choice. Still, in making a move like this, it's important to understand the impacts and listen to constituents who may be affected.

To that end, as reported by the Review-Journal's Yesenia Amaro, state officials sat down last week with Nevadans for the Common Good — a coalition of Las Vegas Valley institutions that in this case was advocating for vulnerable senior citizens — and members of AARP. Among the top priorities state officials noted was that the process would be transparent.

So of course, that meeting was held behind closed doors. Sometimes, the copy just writes itself. How often do elected officials and bureaucrats need to be reminded that when they are doing the public's business, provided for by the public's money, that business is public?

To the state's credit, it appears stakeholders came away from last week's meeting satisfied that implementation of this law would proceed with proper caution. "Our concern was that the decision was already made, and it was just all going to go very quickly without getting any input (from the public)," said Barbara Paulsen, a leader with Nevadans for the Common Good. "That doesn't seem to be the case." Furthermore, a public meeting on this issue was held in Las Vegas on Wednesday night. Better late than never.

Again, we laud the long-overdue step to privatize any segment of government. But in the future, on this and all other public business, the state needs to keep in mind who it's working for.