Senators OK bills with conflicting provisions

CARSON CITY -- Some members of the state Senate appeared to want it both ways Monday when it came to the question of whether illegal immigrants should get a subsidized college education in Nevada.

First, the Senate rejected an amendment that would have allowed such students to receive a Millennium Scholarship to pay for part of the cost of college if the students first signed affidavits saying they would seek to become citizens if given the opportunity.

Senate Bill 415, introduced by Sen. Joe Heck, R-Henderson, instead was left intact on a party line 11-10 vote. If approved by the Legislature and governor, it would prohibit illegal residents from accessing the scholarship, the subsidized college education made available to legal Nevada residents or any other state-sponsored financial aide offered through the Nevada System of Higher Education.

Residents pay fees subsidized by taxpayers to go to college in Nevada. Nonresidents must pay tuition as well.

But later in the day, senators approved a different measure, Senate Bill 52, which would make a number of changes to the Millennium Scholarship, including establishing new criteria to determine eligibility for the program and providing increased benefits for students pursuing certain degree programs.

As amended by the senators, the bill contained an identical provision sought earlier by Democrats for Senate Bill 415, allowing illegal Nevada residents to receive the funds with the affidavit requirement.

Some of the same Republicans who voted against the affidavit amendment for SB415 voted for the affidavit in SB52.

Both bills face a final vote in the Senate today.

Heck acknowledged that the two bills contain conflicting provisions.

But the amendment to SB52 came from the Senate Human Resources and Education Committee, which Heck said he did not support in the Senate floor vote.

The amendment was adopted on a voice vote, so it was not possible to clearly determine who supported it.

But the amendment had previously been unanimously approved by the Human Resources Committee, including Heck and committee Chairman Maurice Washington, R-Sparks.

Heck said he voted for the amendment to SB52, including the affidavit requirement, in committee, but that he did so for other reasons.

"The reason for my personal vote on the amendment was because there were other provisions in that bill that I deemed worthwhile for further consideration by this entire body," he said.

"Don't forget that both of these bills are going to the other house, where they'll have the opportunity to be reconciled," Heck said after the discussions. "There are two schools of thought. There's the SB415 school of thought, which says no. And there is the SB52 school of thought that says a little bit."

Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, called SB52 a common sense approach to the scholarship issue.

SB52 came out of Human Resources with a unanimous vote, she said.

"Obviously that committee thought that the affidavit approach was better than the approach you find in (SB)415, and yet for some reason the sponsor wants to continue with (SB)415," Titus said. "We're wasting time, we're wasting paper, we're wasting energy. Why are we not just considering SB52?"

In the earlier debate on the Senate floor for the amendment to SB415, Sen. Maggie Carlton, D-Las Vegas, said a few other states have also adopted the affidavit requirement.

"I just think it's the right thing to do to help kids get an education in this country," she said. "Because we know that with a college education you can go much further than without."

But Heck said some of those states are being sued over the affidavit requirement, which is why he continues to support SB415.