NLV council candidate faced tax liens, records show

North Las Vegas City Council candidate Matthew Anderson is running on the platform that a city in financial distress needs a businessman to help it bounce back. But the chiropractor has had his own financial hurdles, records show.

Over the past 12 years, Anderson has had six tax liens filed against him, totaling nearly $400,000.

He said the liens are in the past and he’s stronger for his unpleasant experience with the Internal Revenue Service, which he said wasn’t a result of him skipping out on taxes but a disagreement about what he owed.

“I’m proud we survived through it,” Anderson said. “Being able to survive is really paramount to being a success — and I have that.”

Anderson said all of the liens are resolved, save for one, which he said was a mail mix-up. He said his business sent its tax forms multiple times, including via certified mail, but the IRS claimed the forms hadn’t arrived and slapped the business with a lien. Anderson said the agency told him recently he can expect the issue to be over in a matter of weeks.

Two of the past liens, totaling $358,558 and from 2003, concerned confusion regarding whether he was designated a contractor or an employee, he said.

The other liens, filed in 2010, concerned a dispute that the IRS thought his practice was more lucrative than it was. Anderson said his accountants felt they were in the right — and that his earnings in years after reflected his estimates — but the IRS was going off rates chiropractors were making before the economy plummeted. Even so, it didn’t make sense to keep fighting the IRS, he said.

“They’re a huge government organization and I’m a small guy,” Anderson said. “Businesses go through this kind of thing, and we are not a multimillion corporation or anything. We’re just a small office. My tax people are some of the best, and you can still have trouble with the Internal Revenue Service regardless if you’re doing things right or not.”

Anderson is running for the open Ward 4 seat in Nevada’s fourth most populous city, North Las Vegas, which has a projected 7-year deficit of $78 million. His opponent, Richard Cherchio, has held the seat before. Cherchio was appointed in 2009, but lost the election in 2011 by a single vote to Wade Wagner, who decided not to run for re-election.

Cherchio has had more than $5,000 in liens on a property in Las Vegas. Cherchio said he and his wife bought the place with the idea that they might want to live somewhere smaller in a few years, but then the economy tanked. Cherchio said they ended up doing a short sale to dodge foreclosure.

According to campaign finance reports Cherchio has raised $112,157 and spent $52,071 on this year’s campaign. Anderson has raised $8,311 and spent $3,517.

Early voting for the April 7 primary is ongoing and ends April 3. If one of the candidates gets 50 percent or more of the votes in the primary, he will win outright. The general election is June 2.

Contact Bethany Barnes at bbarnes@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3861. Find her on Twitter: @betsbarnes.