Las Vegas may choose Bryan Scott as next city attorney

The Las Vegas City Council will appoint outgoing City Attorney Brad Jerbic’s replacement from within City Hall, choosing on Wednesday to forgo casting a wider net for candidates as Jerbic steps down July 1.

Jerbic told the Las Vegas Review-Journal he believed there would be only one applicant: Bryan Scott, the senior assistant city attorney who oversees the civil division.

“I completely support Bryan. He’s been a wonderful, wonderful assistant to me,” Jerbic said. “Hopefully (it will be) a very smooth and seamless transition because he already knows everything.”

“I can’t think of a better replacement,” he added.

The council unanimously directed acting Human Resources Director Vince Zamora to immediately post the job opening internally and provide city lawmakers with the list of applicants to interview.

The posting will be up for five days. In a sign of how quickly the council wants to choose Jerbic’s successor, it also directed Zamora to place the appointment on the agenda for its next meeting June 3.

The council can choose to make the appointment either effective immediately, so that the new city attorney will briefly share the role with Jerbic, or effective on the day of Jerbic’s retirement, according to Zamora.

Councilman Cedric Crear wondered aloud if the council would have to interview all job-seekers.

“I just want to be clear, because if there is a candidate that stands out, and the council decides that they would like to move forward with that candidate, I wouldn’t want it to be obligated to go through a perfunctory process,” he said.

The council could have decided to invite candidates outside the city to also apply or to have spent up to $50,000 on a recruitment firm to conduct a regional or national search, Zamora said.

The city attorney is one of three positions, including the city manager and city auditor, under the direct supervision of the City Council, which has the authority to hire and fire those executives.

Jerbic has served as the city’s top prosecutor since 1992. He was the first city attorney to be handpicked by the council. Prior to legislative changes, that role was either elected or appointed by the city manager.

He said he will join the private sector and practice in municipal law upon his departure.

Contact Shea Johnson at sjohnson@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0272. Follow @Shea_LVRJ on Twitter.