Henderson: A place to call for election reform
Hardly a month has gone by — and in some cases, not more than a week or two — in which Henderson city government hasn’t taken a slap at its residents. Here’s a sampling:
— The city enacted a policy that called for punishing city employees who spoke with the media, with discipline up to and including termination. Upon media exposure and subsequent blowback, the city walked back the policy.
— In May, it was reported that the city employs six of Mayor Andy Hafen's relatives in full-time jobs, with annual salaries ranging from $63,000 to more than $100,000. But to hear the mayor tell it, he had nothing to do with their hiring. A week later, the City Council Hafen leads was found to be a sea of unanimity, with all but 18 of more than 3,000 votes getting full approval. That’s 99 percent of the time, a ludicrous lack of dissenting opinion.
— June saw an effort to significantly raise the city's recreation fees, purportedly to bring them in line with other cities. More likely, it was an effort to help fund the best-paid local government workforce in the state on the backs of residents who are still reeling from the Great Recession. Ultimately, the City Council approved the fees, to be phased in over three years.
— Finally, in late July, we learned that a city of Henderson employee spent most of a day fixing a waterline leak at the home of Mayor Hafen's daughter, Amanda Hafen. She wasn't billed for almost $870 in labor and parts until two weeks later, after Review-Journal reporter Eric Hartley began asking about the repair.
In fact, all these stories were brought to you by Hartley, without whom Henderson residents might not have any idea of all the goings-on around City Hall. (Full disclosure: I live in Henderson.)
This year’s municipal elections could have changed that dynamic, but the city again showed it wasn’t all that interested in hearing its citizens’ voices. Throughout candidate filing and into primary season, there was no mention of primary voting on the city of Henderson website home page — for arguably the most important civic event on the 2015 calendar.
Not surprisingly, all three City Council incumbents won re-election in the April primary, avoiding a June runoff altogether. A meager 11.8 percent of the city's registered voters turned out — including just 3.5 percent on primary Election Day, April 7.
Since 2007, on municipal election days, Henderson has utilized voting centers around the city, rather than precinct voting. The centers allow voters to go to the most convenient location. However, that’s proved confusing for some voters accustomed to the precinct voting of state and federal elections. And the voting center model certainly doesn’t seem to bolster turnout. So maybe that’s a change worth reconsidering.
But the change that really needs to happen — in Henderson and every other Clark County municipality — is election consolidation: moving off-year elections to November of even-numbered years. Last November, 41.5 percent of Clark County voters turned out, and while that’s still a weak number, it was enough to flip the state Senate and Assembly to Republicans in a landslide election for the GOP. If Henderson’s election had been held last November, when voters were far more engaged, does anybody think incumbents would have swept to re-election?
Therein lies the problem: off-year elections are little more than incumbent protection programs. And when incumbents are bulletproof, the culture of government becomes insular and unaccountable. (See above.)
Under state law, the city of Henderson can move its election to November of even-numbered years. But it won’t, because that would put incumbents at risk.
That means it’s up to the voting, taxpaying citizens of Henderson. If they’re fed up, they should start a petition for a ballot question to move the election. Henderson’s hospitable city slogan reads, “A place to call home.” How about making it a place more hospitable to the electorate?
Patrick Everson (peverson@reviewjournal.com) is an editorial writer for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Follow him on Twitter: @PatrickCEverson.
