Rebate vote

What a difference it can make when the public's business is conducted in the light of day.

Back in 2005, the eight-member Nevada Tax Commission granted Southern California Edison a sales tax rebate for using out-of-state coal at its now-closed Laughlin power plant.

A little consideration for a "good corporate neighbor" -- business as usual.

But the commission voided that approval last year after the Nevada Supreme Court ruled the panel had violated the state's open meeting law by reaching its initial decision behind closed doors.

This week -- and this time in the light of public scrutiny -- the commission voted again. And this time the vote was 6-2 -- to tell Southern California Edison to take a hike.

The California utility was seeking $50.8 million, a figure arrived at by applying Clark County's sales tax rate to the company's total monthly coal purchases between March 1998 and March 2005, according to Department of Taxation Director Dino DiCianno. In toto, though, California Edison sought $70.2 million -- adding $19.4 million in accrued interest.

Edison's consulting tax adviser Anthony Smith said the company "will most likely be filing an appeal" in District Court.

There, much will depend on whether the coal slurry the outfit imported from Arizona is held to have been coal -- a mineral -- or, instead, a product manufactured out of coal.

Commission Chairman Thomas Sheets stuck by his original vote to deny the refund. "I don't see any reason to change my decision from last time. ... The water mixed with coal was not simply a transportation medium."

Clark County Deputy District Attorney Paul Johnson concurred that 1 billion gallons of water per year in the slurry was used in the plant's cooling towers. "They're using it. It's something other than raw coal. It's half coal. It's half water," he said.

But Commissioners Hank Vogler and John E. Marvel dissented, siding with the company's interpretation that coal slurry, even though it's half water, is a tax-exempt mineral.

Chief Deputy Attorney General Gina Session reiterated her position that Nevada doesn't have a coal production industry. Therefore, any coal being sold in Nevada has to be produced outside the state and is properly taxed.

The courts will decide. Then, presumably, the Legislature will review the statute, either clarifying it or -- roll of the dice, here -- rendering it subject to even more "interpretation."

What remains interesting, though, is how much harder it seems to be to grant special tax breaks when there are members of the public present to write down what everyone has to say -- and how they vote.