Judge: Vegas soccer stadium financing petition has enough signatures for ballot

Las Vegas voters should get a chance to weigh in on using public funds to help pay for a controversial downtown soccer stadium, a judge decided Friday.

It took Clark County District Judge Jerry Wiese two days to side with stadium subsidy opponents, who filed a lawsuit late last month to force a public referendum on millions in taxpayer dollars the city hopes to spend on a $200 million downtown soccer stadium.

Mayor Carolyn Goodman said she sees no need to appeal the ruling, adding that she’d “love to hear from the people” on the stadium financing plan.

City Attorney Brad Jerbic, who predicted the city would challenge such a decision, said he hadn’t formally discussed the matter with the mayor but remained open to putting a potentially costly appeal up for a City Council vote as soon as Feb. 18.

City officials announced in early January that 2,306 signatures would be required to put Las Vegas’ controversial stadium funding plan up for a vote. After an apparent error in the city clerk’s office was revealed, that number almost quadrupled a week later.

A Jan. 23 lawsuit filed by council members Bob Beers, Stavros Anthony and Lois Tarkanian sought to force City Hall to acknowledge the lower, earlier referenced threshold for putting the issue on the ballot.

County election officials announced late last month that Beers and other stadium subsidy foes had fallen roughly 1,300 signatures short of the second city-mandated signature requirement, though they still managed to collect around three times the number of signatures first thought needed to put a stadium question to voters.

Last week, acting City Clerk Luann Holmes certified Beers’ petition as insufficient, setting the stage for a court fight that started Wednesday.

That hearing saw stadium subsidy opponents point to a state law requiring ballot petitions to be signed by a number of registered voters equal to 15 percent of those who voted in the last city election, held in 2013.

Jerbic argued that the law was trumped by Article 19 of the Nevada Constitution, which requires petition backers to collect a number of signatures equal to 15 percent of those who voted in the preceding “general county or municipal election,” which had a much higher turnout in 2011.

He also looked to expose an apparent flaw in subsidy opponents’ legal reasoning, pointing out that the city, by law, cannot “add an ordinance” to the city charter to block public stadium funding, as requested under Beers’ ballot initiative. Petitioners can add an ordinance to that effect in city code but would need state legislative approval to revise the city charter.

Friday’s ruling found little sympathy for that argument. It referenced a 2009 Nevada Supreme Court ruling to point out that the state’s highest court “seems to have approved” of using state law to amend a city charter.

Wiese goes on to note that the case boils down to interpreting legislators’ intent in drafting the ballot initiative statute, intentions he said weren’t meant to limit voters’ access to the ballot.

“This court will not deprive the people of their rights to express their votes on the ballot,” Wiese concluded.

Stadium subsidy foe and Mayor Pro Tem Anthony liked the sound of that conclusion.

Anthony, who announced his bid for Goodman’s seat two weeks ago, suggested the city might not even have grounds to fight the decision.

“Based on what the judge wrote, I can’t imagine the city would appeal,” he said, “especially when a District Court judge says they have their eyes closed.”

Goodman, a staunch proponent of the stadium’s current financing plan, is one of four city leaders — together with council members Bob Coffin, Steve Ross and Ricki Barlow — who passed on a chance to draft their own ballot question last month.

Her sudden change of heart on putting the matter to voters could have something to do with Wiese’s plainly worded ruling against the city, though Goodman maintains that she never has shied away from getting the public’s take on the matter.

“I would want to go back and get an opinion from legal staff, but I really think it’s important to hear from the people,” Goodman told reporters Friday afternoon. “This is not about sales tax or property taxes, it’s about tourism and room taxes. … It’s about understanding what the public (stadium) funding is about.”

Councilman Beers, who has accused City Hall of deploying “egregious unfair play” in alleged efforts to stymie the stadium ballot initiative, said he wasn’t surprised by the ruling.

Beers on Wednesday predicted the city wouldn’t appeal the court’s ruling on the signature tally, should it favor subsidy opponents.

He figured the city would challenge the wording of the ballot petition itself, language he came up with and which Jerbic called into question Wednesday.

He took heart in knowing that Wiese’s ruling dispensed with at least some of the questions surrounding the ballot question.

Beers said he would oppose any further appeals on the matter, should such a move go up for a City Council vote.

A deal approved by the City Council on Dec. 17 requires the city to chip in $56.5 million toward construction of the much-ballyhooed 24,000-seat downtown stadium project.

City leaders narrowly approved the deal over loud objections from City Council conservatives Beers and Anthony.

Contact James DeHaven at jdehaven@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3839. Follow him on Twitter: @JamesDeHaven