The state is coming for the loot

The walls that separate the treasuries of local governments from the state's depleted coffers are about to be blown up again.

But once Gov.-elect Brian Sandoval and lawmakers snatch the loot, the question is whether they'll build new barriers strong enough to later keep themselves out -- and whether counties and municipalities really want that kind of protection.

County commissioners and city council members across Nevada know that Sandoval and Co. are planning to swipe big bucks from their bank accounts to balance the 2011-13 state budget without raising taxes. The money grab is expected to be many times bigger than the diversion carried out by the 2009 Legislature, which took more than $100 million from Clark and Washoe counties.

This time, cities and school districts are expected pay tribute, too. The looming redirection of revenue could reach rural White Pine County, where residents are worried that millions of dollars set aside for a public swimming pool and recreation center might be used to prop up their schools and prison, instead.

The 2011 Legislature promises to be a session of brutal compromises, from spending cuts to redistricting to education and pension reform. Democrats have majorities in the Senate and Assembly, but are short of the two-thirds threshold needed to pass tax increases or override a Sandoval veto.

Another bargain might be in the works to let local politicians get their spending money back: home rule.

Currently, Nevada's local governments lack the autonomy to raise taxes or significantly change the structure of their oversight themselves. The various sales tax hikes that Clark County voters have OK'd over the years -- for more cops, roads and water infrastructure -- required the approval of the Legislature to become law.

This lack of home rule allows the Legislature to take as well as give. It's why local governments and agencies spend millions of your dollars dispatching small armies of lobbyists to Carson City every other year to protect their interests.

However, the absence of home rule also gives county and city leaders great political cover. Lacking the power to raise taxes means never having to campaign on the issue. It allowed outgoing Clark County Commissioner Rory Reid, during his unsuccessful run for governor this year, to claim he balanced the county's budget for eight years without raising taxes. Never mind that he couldn't raise taxes, even if he wanted to.

Plenty of state lawmakers are tired of having their political careers defined -- or ended -- by their decisions to raise taxes. And they're sick of seeing this valley's county and city elected officials avoid that heat, especially when they've signed off on the contracts that have created some of the highest-paid local government work forces in America, to the detriment of public services.

Sandoval has said he supports home rule. It's a nice hint that when the Republican releases his two-year budget next month, it won't be limited to the $5.3 billion in state general fund revenues the Economic Forum projects will be available to spend. The state's current spending plan is $1 billion larger, thanks to the temporary tax increases of 2009, which expire in June, and federal stimulus money.

So to keep his no-new-taxes promise, Sandoval probably will take a bunch of local money, transfer some state responsibilities to cities and counties as part of a restructuring, then give those cities and counties the power to raise their own taxes.

For some local government types, that would be the worst of both worlds.

"Most boards and councils don't want home rule," Clark County Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani said last week, fully expecting the state to take a bundle from the county. "They'd much rather blame the Legislature. They don't want to have to raise taxes themselves."

It wasn't entirely a coincidence Wednesday when, on the same day the Economic Forum released its sobering forecast, Clark County Manager Virginia Valentine announced her resignation effective Jan. 4. She'll become president of the Nevada Resort Association -- and leave the fiscal and political headaches of helming county government to someone else.

Her successor will have to see various collective bargaining disputes through to resolution while managing free-falling tax collections and the state's anticipated revenue raid. The next county manager might very well be the first to offer the elected bosses on the commission a choice beyond spending cuts: local tax hikes.

Giunchigliani, for one, wants that choice. "If we believe in the services we provide, we should make the case to the public for the taxes needed to preserve them," she said, adding that major local government consolidation would offset the need for some local tax increases.

All this boils down to a relatively simple question: Isn't there enough tax money in Nevada to cover the state's most important functions?

When you consider every dollar that flows into every empire -- cities, counties, schools, local police and fire departments, state courts, libraries, colleges and universities, operations and debt service, and on and on -- the answer is yes.

The Tax Foundation ranks Nevada 25th among the states -- smack in the middle -- in per capita state and local tax collections. The Tax Policy Center ranks Nevada 22nd. The argument that Nevadans don't pay enough taxes is hollow.

The people who assert that selfish Nevadans can afford to hand over more of their money in a recession are the same folks who've long said Nevada has to decide what it wants to be when it grows up. But our elected leaders made that decision decades ago -- without putting it to a vote. For more than 20 years, the top priority of Nevada governments has been providing public employees with a standard of living that's much higher than the private-sector workers who pay the bills.

Nevada has long been in need of revenue reprioritization. There's no way for Sandoval and the Legislature to carry this out in a 120-day regular session that includes so much other business, so the revenue-grab-for-home-rule trade is a reasonable alternative.

I can't wait to see the county and the cities of Las Vegas, Henderson and North Las Vegas launch their own tax-hike campaigns to make payroll when so many of their firefighters, so-called "concessions" notwithstanding, are still pulling down more than $200,000 a year.

Let's see how that goes over in a valley with 14 percent unemployment.

Glenn Cook (gcook@reviewjournal.com) is a Review-Journal editorial writer.