EDITORIAL: More Cops redux

Clark County Commissioner Tom Collins is fond of folksy farm analogies. As it turns out, one such saying perfectly describes his latest sales tax increase proposal: It’s lipstick on a pig — with a tiara and a tutu to boot.

Less than a week after he single-handedly blocked a new funding source for Southern Nevada police departments, Mr. Collins put forward largely the same plan that won just three commission votes — two short of the five needed for passage. Instead of boosting the county’s 8.1 percent sales tax rate by 0.15 points all at once, Mr. Collins suggests phasing it in … over just eight months.

Somehow, having retailers reprogram their registers two or three times by summer sounds counterproductive to us.

But so does scheduling yet another vote on a plan that’s DOA. As reported by the Review-Journal’s Ben Botkin, Mr. Collins intends to introduce the tax plan Tuesday for a possible November vote. A sales tax increase for county police departments has been kicked from Las Vegas to Carson City and back all year, and the only version that has a chance of winning five commission votes is a compromise plan from Commissioner Susan Brager that boosts the rate by 0.075 percentage points.

Assuming, of course, Mr. Collins gets on board. He provided the deciding vote against the plan last week because he thought it provided too little money.

Police departments do not have a funding crisis. Unfortunately, a lot of valley households do (see above editorial). Enough on this issue already. This pig won’t fly.