Contractors board official admits error in phone rules enforcement
Contractors, sleep peacefully tonight. The Nevada State Contractors Board is not going to penalize you for failing to answer the phone correctly.
Executive Director Margi Grein was clear about it. No hedging or waffling on her part.
"We made a mistake, we were wrong," she said Monday. "There is no law that regulates the way you answer the phone."
Las Vegas contractor Tom Delahunty was absolutely right when he said the contractors board had no right acting as the state's phone police.
Grein first learned of what her agency was trying to do on Sept. 20, when she opened the newspaper and started reading about Delahunty's dispute with the contractors board over how he answered the phone. Not the quality of his work, not his billing, not any of the myriad of things the board usually delves into while trying to protect the public.
Nope.
How he answered the phone.
Delahunty was warned by Compliance Investigator Ernie Talavera that the contractor could get fined and cited if he didn't use the full name of his company, Advantage Builders of Nevada, when he answered the phone. It would be part of his permanent record, Talavera warned.
Delahunty and his staff had been answering the phone "Advantage Builders."
I almost didn't believe the story when he first told me about it, but in my initial calls to the contractors board, I was told that yes, Delahunty was facing a citation for how he answered the phone.
Another example of absurd overreaching by a state agency.
But coming back from my vacation in Philadelphia visiting friends, I learned Grein had contacted Delahunty, apologized and assured him there would be no citation because no law was broken.
The investigator and his supervisor who backed him up had been wrong.
It was a "misunderstanding by staff of an interpretation of the law," the executive director said. "We've taken steps to ensure this isn't going to happen again."
Delahunty had been prepared to take the issue to the board and figured he would have won it at that level, but it would have taken longer.
"The article exposed a bureaucracy running wild that had a light shown on it, and now hopefully some checks and balances will be restored," Delahunty said.
Common sense prevailed.
Wish I could write that more often.
BURNING CAR AND HAPPY MEALS: Then there was my column about the North Las Vegas man who pulled a woman to safety from a burning car a car she didn't know was on fire.
Jeanette May-Chin was reading my column as usual on Sept. 23 and suddenly realized, "That's me!"
I hadn't discovered her name when I relayed the story of John Guerrero, who pulled May-Chin from her burning car shortly before it was engulfed in flames Sept. 14. He was driving behind her when he first noticed smoke, then fire.
She called me to ask for his phone number because she wanted to thank him.
"It was exactly true, right down to the Happy Meals," she said, referring to his two sons' Happy Meals that she sat on when he brought her to his car for safety. May-Chin, 62, works for the Department of Veterans Affairs, and said the story he told was exactly what happened.
"There were blobs of fire dripping from under my car, and I didn't realize it until I pulled up to the light and he rushed over to me. I thought I was being hijacked."
Instead, she was being saved by a stranger.
"He is a hero, he did save my life. If not for him, I would have been killed."
Wish I could write that more often as well.
Jane Ann Morrison's column appears Monday, Thursday and Saturday. E-mail her at Jane@reviewjournal.com or call (702) 383-0275. She also blogs at lvrj.com/blogs/morrison.
