Bargaining rights bill vetoed by Gibbons

CARSON CITY -- A bill granting state workers some collective bargaining rights -- excluding talks on wages or other economic matters -- was vetoed Thursday by Gov. Jim Gibbons.

Besides the bargaining rights measure, Assembly Bill 395, the Republican governor also rejected Senate Bill 376, which makes changes in laws dealing with the state's prevailing wage requirements.

AB395 granted collective bargaining rights only for non-economic matters such as work conditions. But unions considered it a major step toward getting state workers the broader bargaining rights enjoyed by teachers and local government employees.

Gibbons said he vetoed the bill because lawmakers enacted "the largest tax increase in state history" to cover state spending, and AB395 "would dramatically increase the cost of state government even further."

"I find it unfathomable and unconscionable that the Legislature would pass a bill that would result in further increases in state spending and would require even further tax increases to fund that spending," Gibbons said in his veto message.

Supporters of AB395 included Sen. Mark Amodei, R-Carson City, whose district includes many state workers. Amodei said after watching this year's budget cuts develop, he saw AB395 as a fairness issue.

He said that state workers were treated worse than teachers and others during this year's budget process.

In rejecting SB376, the governor said it expanded the scope of projects to be considered by the state labor commissioner in setting prevailing wage rates and that "would effectively increase the costs of all county public works projects."

The governor said the bill continues the lawmakers' "distressing practice" of increasing government spending "while ignoring the economic recession gripping our state and nation."

The vetoes will be in effect until the 2011 Legislature, when lawmakers can override them.

Gibbons' veto total stands at a record 43. Twenty-five of those have been overridden by lawmakers, another record.

The previous record for most vetoes in a session was 33, set by then-Gov. H.G. Blasdel shortly after Nevada became a state in 1864, according to Legislative Counsel Bureau records.

Blasdel was overridden 10 times, a record only now surpassed by Gibbons.