ASSEMBLY DISTRICT 17

With tough budget negotiations and painful cuts sure to dominate next year's legislative session, three-term Assemblyman Kelvin Atkinson said this is no time for voters in District 17 to bring in a rookie.

"You need someone who knows how to negotiate, how to maneuver through the Legislature," the Democratic incumbent said.

Atkinson is being challenged by two political newcomers who were inspired to run, at least in part, by the grass-roots campaign of Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul.

Republican David Isbell volunteered with the Paul campaign in Nevada last year, an experience that left him frustrated with his own party and the state's political leadership in general.

He said he got into the race to help steer the Republican Party back toward its hallmark conservative values, chief among them "excluding government from our lives as much as possible."

Specifically, he favors dissolving the Clark County School District and replacing it with smaller, "competing" school districts to drive up performance.

The other challenger, Las Vegas native Ryan Fitzgibbons, is a member of the Independent American Party, though he said he "took a year off to vote for Ron Paul."

He wants even less government than Isbell, basically only those things specifically spelled out in the Constitution.

He said budget problems, both at the state and federal level, could easily be solved by eliminating welfare and other social programs better left to churches and charities.

"The government has taken over personal responsibility a ton," he said.

Fitzgibbons has a bachelor's degree in English from Brigham Young University in Utah. He believes English should be the official language of Nevada and the nation as a whole, but he is fluent in Portuguese thanks to a two-year Mormon mission he served in Brazil.

Isbell is a California native with a bachelor's degree in marketing he earned over the Internet from the University of Colorado. He moved to Southern Nevada to work for a local television station five years ago, shortly after completing a two-year Mormon mission in Estonia.

He has never voted in a Nevada election before, but he did cast ballots in California when he lived there, he said.

The Chicago-born Atkinson has lived in Southern Nevada since 1991. He holds a bachelor's degree from UNLV and works as a management analyst for the Clark County coroner's office.

He said there is "no easy answer" to the state's budget woes, but efforts to bring in uncollected tax revenue and re-examine state-granted tax breaks seems like a step in the right direction.

He also thinks the state should consider adopting a four-day work week, something that he said seems to have worked well for the city of North Las Vegas.

Incumbency isn't the only factor that favors Atkinson. According to county voter records, District 17 is home to more than twice as many Democrats than Republicans and 14 times more Democrats than Independent Americans.

And at the end of the last reporting period Aug. 5, Atkinson had raised almost $94,000, while Isbell reported $2,275 in donations and Fitzgibbons reported none.

That's no accident, either. Fitzgibbons said he believes strongly that "money should not buy elections," so he isn't taking any even though he knows it makes his chances of winning "pretty minimal."

Isbell, meanwhile, said he is running his campaign "on a shoestring" but has still managed to send out mailers, print up flyers, and meet a host of voters in person, either by knocking on doors or appearing before clubs and civic organizations.

As for Atkinson's contention that trying times call for seasoned representation, Isbell said, "What has experience gotten us so far? Ask yourself that question."

Contact reporter Henry Brean at hbrean@ reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0350.