California Eye » Education

Education in Nevada

Featheriver — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 19:31:20 +0000

In trying to balance the budget of Nevada it appears to me that cutting spending costs in education is the wrong road to travel. Untrained and under educated people find it almost impossible to find employment, except, perhaps careers at fast food establishments at minimum wage.

When I was a teenager in the 1940s finding a job was rather easy, if you were willing to do farm labor. Back then manufacturing jobs were plentiful spurred by World War II. Times were changing. Women could even find jobs outside the home in defense plants. The fairer sex additionally were entering into a new world which permitted them to pursue traditional professional employment in medicine, law, engineering and the like.

When World War II ended a new concept emerged allowing GIs access to higher education by means of the GI bill. Millions of us, otherwise unable to afford a college education, were suddenly enabled to pursue and achieve college degrees in all kinds of disciplines. The employment doors opened up to a wider range of Americans equipped to compete in the job markets.

It was a sociological evolution on many fronts in American life. Adaptation of nuclear power to peaceful energy uses were pursued. Computer technology became common place in the home with the advent of the desktop computer and useful software for the ordinary person’s use in school, business and the home. Man traveled into space, walking on the moon. The Internet came into ordinary life allowing anyone to communicate with anyone else on the planet.

All those innovations came about as a product of a better educated citizenry in the United States. Finally, the United States became the undisputed super power of the globe. America was leaning forward.

Education played a significant role in all those innovations. But now, Nevada, is on a path to reverse that progress. The world has become global. Competition has become more intense. As the Boy Scouts have said, “The world belongs to those who prepare for it.” It does not appear that Nevada wants to prepare for it.

John Kao, an innovation expert, says, "The United States is in danger of becoming a nation of innovation haves and have-nots."

Nevada clearly would fall into the category of an “innovation have-not.”

Kao also said:

“We’ve learned that innovation has been the key to our dramatic economic growth and rising standards of living, as Steven Johnson showed us earlier. There’s no question of its importance.”

“…innovation comes in many varieties – from the private sector and the public sector, from businesses and universities.”

“…innovation isn’t just about science and technology… it’s about inventions in business and business processes. And these kinds of innovation really come out of a fertile private sector. We saw the perfect example of that in Google.”

“…the fastest growing economies in the world today – China, South Korea – are using government to promote innovation. In industry after industry, they’re establishing commanding leads because of the government policy.”

“…we need both government and the private sector to foster innovation.”

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2010 Nevada spent 6.7 percent of its total state expenditures on higher education. This ranked far below the national average of 10.1 percent. In comparison, Colorado spent 8.3 percent of total expenditures on higher education; neighboring Utah spent 10.1 percent.

In 2007, Nevada ranked 48th in per capita state and local government expenditures on higher education at $490 per resident. Wyoming spent nearly twice as much at $973 per resident and Utah spent $896. Every other Western state ranked above Nevada.

“Retraining our workforce for the jobs of the future depends on a strong system of higher education. Governor Sandoval is eliminating that option, and cutting off the possibility of a robust economic recovery or long-term economic diversification as a result,” wrote Mike Trask in U.S. News Las Vegas.

Other Republican Governors see education differently than Governor Brian Sandoval. Republican governors of Virginia, Kansas, New Jersey, and Nebraska view higher education as the key to turning their state’s lagging economies around. They are resisting cuts to higher education, and some are even proposing to increase funds, despite budget shortfalls.

Conservative Virginia Governor Robert McDonnell recently announced a $50 million investment in higher education, aimed at increasing the percentage of Virginians with higher education credentials from 42 to 55 percent in the next 15 years. McDonnell cites:

· For every $1 the state spends on higher education, it generates $13 in GDP

· For every $1 the state spends on higher education it generates $1.39 in state revenue

· Higher education accounts for more than 144,000 jobs and $9.5 billion in spending

Sadly, we are stuck with Governor Sandoval, thanks to Nevada’s voters. One lesson to learn is to avoid electing any politician who promises not to raise taxes. Those who make that promise cuts-off that potential avenue of fulfilling their obligation to their constituents, even when it is necessary. Remember, we get what we vote for.

How to get an education affordably

Featheriver — Tue, 10 May 2011 23:42:32 +0000

With regard to the struggle of Nevada’s students to get an education in Nevada I’ve had the thought for some time that there is a potential solution to this whole mess. To explain it I must describe my own personal experience. Bear with me.

First, my path to getting an education followed a rather long, disjointed, way. I was raised on a farm in Oklahoma and went to high school at a rural school. The student body was made up of kids from family farms in that school district. Oklahoma, at least back then, was not exactly a center of a good education program. My high school managed to meet the minimum requirements required to graduate from high school under then existent standards. We had the usual classes of English and history. We even had typewriters (this was back in the 1940’s) and a typing class. It would be accurate for me to assert that the most beneficial class I ever had in that high school was learning to type.

My main impetus in going to high school was playing on the baseball and basketball teams. Academia was not of any particular importance to me.

I do not recall a single instance of any talk at that school about going to college, either from the teachers or among my classmates. It never crossed my mind that I would ever go to college. Everyone I knew lived on a farm, basically dirt-poor. Our school year continued through the summer months (when most schools are out for summer vacation) because our “summer vacation” was really a “Fall vacation” because our school let out for us school kids to work on the family farm during the fall harvest season.

I dropped out of high school in the second week of my Senior year because I joined the Air Force in July 1950. The Korean War had just begun about a month before I enlisted. So in I went for my 4-year enlistment. Things began to change for me. I was 17 years old, green as grass.

During those four years I heard of a thing called the GI Bill and that it would pay for going to college once I was discharged. During those four years I began to realize and understand the value of a college education.

Upon my discharge I began college at a junior college (now called a community college) in Ventura, California in 1954. Boy what a difference that was as compared to my high school years. I was taking French, Biology, History, English, Geological Science, Psychology, etc. The GI bill paid $110 per month plus I worked part time at the local library as their gardener to supplement my income.

I stuck with it until I finally got my Bachelor’s Degree in Education and a minor in psychology from the University of California at Fresno.

That led to me being hired as a Probation Officer, which, in turn opened a door to an interest in law. (I was once told by a co-worker that life was a series of Y’s in the road and perpetual decisions to be made whether to choose going either of two ways at each such intersection). I was interested in going to law school because of the experience as a Probation Officer. However, there was no law school within 100 miles of where I lived.

I noted a magazine advertisement about taking law from La Salle University in Chicago, Illinois via a correspondence course. I signed up for it, paid the subscription cost, and began the correspondence course.

California requires that a law student that was not attending an accredited law school had to pass a “baby bar exam” before the California Bar would recognize the student after the first year of study.

I signed up for the baby bar, drove to Los Angeles to take it, spending the night at a slum district hotel, complete with bed bugs, the night before the exam was administered. I did not pass that exam but came close enough that I concluded if I could just get to a real law school I could make it.

By that point I was 31 years old, married, with three little kids, and working as a Parole Agent for the California Department of Corrections in Bakersfield, California. I secured a transfer from Bakersfield to Sacramento and enrolled in McGeorge School of Law, University of the Pacific, a private school. I had to attend law school at night which takes 4 years rather than 3 to complete.

I shelled out the tuition (the GI Bill was no longer an option) and began in 1964. Tuition was a big bite out of our income (my wife had to work full time right along with me for us to live and pay the bills. Each year the tuition increased.

Law school is not easy. One has to devote his entire attention to attending classes and reading law books—Torts, Contracts, Criminal Law, Corporations, Wills, Legal Research, etc. The first night at law school there were some 300 students at the orientation session. I recall one of the professors inform us to look to the person on our left and then our right admonishing us that two-thirds of us would not finish. He was right. It was almost a cliché that “the law is a jealous mistress” and one must focus on the task at hand. I used to call it selling your soul to the devil.

I cannot describe how difficult is was to manage support the family, pay the bills, do the job, and simultaneously attend school. It is a terrific price. Basically my wife raised our three kids alone. Every free minute I could get I was studying law books for that four years including weekends.

But we managed and I graduated in 1968 with a Juris Doctor Degree. But, I still had to pass the California Bar Exam, which took another couple of months in San Francisco in a cram review of the entire subject matter of law school in preparation for the bar exam.

I passed on the first try at the bar exam and spent the next 27 years practicing law as a prosecutor, defense attorney, and tort trial lawyer.

All that are the influences on me now when I propose a thought on how to improve the education system and get around all this current nonsense in education budget cuts, Governor Brian Sandoval, and the rest which drag down good students back at the beginning of their educations, saddling them with immense debt if they stay in school and depriving them of a successful life because they cannot afford to go to school.

Here is what I think. Back when I went to school there was no Internet. To go to class one had to get in his car drive to school and back, all taking valuable time.

Now open up your mind for a bit and think. Most of your experience in high school, college and yes, law school was spent listening to teachers lecturing. All of that can be done over the Internet just as well, just as effectively, as it is sitting in a classroom somewhere. Further, for example, suppose that the very best professors of say, English, Torts, Contracts, History, etc., recorded their lectures so that you could take their entire course via the Internet. Or was obtainable on CD ROMs. All of it accessible from your home at any hour of the day.

You can receive the same education as any student at Harvard or Yale or any of the big name Universities.

There would be no need for building school houses and all that goes with it, or need for school buses, and the myriad of other things appurtenant. If the best of the best teachers were used for such curriculum there would no longer need to be thousands of teachers and all that goes with the personnel problems that come with that kind of a system. The cost of education would decrease substantially within reach of every student.

Think of the online Phoenix University to get an idea. No more governmental budgets to worry about.

Students would have access to best education possible from the best teachers possible. If all this was done nationally there would no longer need to be local school boards and all that.

Yes, I know, some people think that school should be controlled locally. But the fact is most people just allow their kids to be baby-sat during the day and really pay no attention to school as we currently think of schools.

I hope you get the general idea of what I mean. There are some kinks that would need to be worked out, such as how would one manage laboratory work in a biology course, and such. But that can all be addressed and worked out with some thought.

Had all that been available during my school life it would have been immensely easier and affordable. Anyway, I got all that off my chest.

Kate Marshall sponsors bills to help education

Featheriver — Tue, 10 May 2011 14:54:27 +0000

Nevada State Treasurer, Democrat Kate Marshall, is sponsoring two bills to the Nevada State Legislature: SB75 and SB64. [Nevada Appeal]

“SB75 is an investment vehicle designed to increase funding for K-12 education in the state, while also providing investment dollars for new businesses in Nevada, existing businesses that are expanding, or businesses which agree to relocate to this state.”

“SB64 creates a Certificate of Deposit Link Deposit Program that allows the state to invest up to $20 million of the state’s general portfolio to qualified Nevada lending institutions at a reduced rate of interest, provided the Nevada lending institution completes loan packages to qualified small business entities at a similarly reduced rate of interest.”

The program is patterned after successful programs in Missouri and Washington, among others, notes the Nevada Appeal.

I hope that helps Nevada’s students. Be interesting to see how the state’s legislature handles both bills and what Governor Brian Sandoval does with it.

Crashing Governor Sandoval’s Picnic

Featheriver — Sun, 08 May 2011 04:56:56 +0000

Students and Nye County Democrats protest Governor Sandoval’s cuts in budget.

Today, twenty-seven people gathered at the Pahrump Winery to protest Republican Governor Brian Sandoval’s drastic reduction of Nevada’s education budget for Nevada’s schools.

Twenty-one UNLV students filled a bus in Las Vegas and came to the Pahrump Winery to participate in the demonstration. Two Great Basin College students joined with them to protest. Four Nye County Democrats also participated in the protest.

The demonstration was initiated, organized and conducted by the students use of their Facebook Group called “Nevada Students Unite Here,” and coordinated it with members of the Nye County Democratic Party.

Yvanna D. Cancela, Political Director for the Culinary Workers Union, Local 226 in Las Vegas provided logistical support for the demonstration.

The protesting group marched along the roadway opposite the picnic sponsored by the Nye County Republican Party in celebration of Governor Sandoval’s election as Nevada’s Governor. Attendees paid $50 a head to attend the picnic.

The demonstrator’s chanted “SOS – Save our Schools” as they displayed their signs of protest in clear view of the Governor and his picnic party.

The Governor sent a representative to inform the protestors he heard them and commended them for exercising their First Amendment rights.

The picnic and demonstrators were covered by members of the local news media, the Pahrump Valley Times and the Pahrump Mirror. Reporters interviewed some of the demonstrators and Jack Wood, administrator of the Facebook group “Nye County Nevada Democrats.”

Nye County school closures considered by School Board

Featheriver — Sat, 07 May 2011 03:45:21 +0000

Republican Govenor Brian Sandoval of Nevada

Fely Quitevis, Chair of the Nye County Republican Party Central Committee informed the Pahrump Valley Times the event is only open to “anyone” who wants to donate $50 and is a registered Republican. She sees the picnic as a “celebration of Sandoval’s victory in the November elections, not a time to pose difficult questions to the governor.”

“Sandoval has pledged not to increase taxes amid a major budget shortfall,” reported the PVT.

While Quitevis celebrates Sandoval’s victory and doesn’t feel it time to pose difficult questions to him, The Nye County School District Board would probably like to ask Sandoval how can they save Nye County’s education system to comply with his budget.

I would bet many school kids and parents in Nye County would like to ask him some questions too while the Nye County Republican Central Committee celebrates Sandoval’s election.

At the trustee’s Nye County School District’s Board (NCSD) meeting on May 3, three more scenarios were presented by Ray Ritchie, chief administrative and financial officer, to solve the district’s budget crisis.

Consideration of closure of schools in Pahrump, Gabbs and Tonopah was presented as a way to save teacher positions in view of a $5.8 million budget loss for the school district this coming school year.

The $5.8 million shortage for the budget was attributed to a decrease in the number of students in the school district and a decrease in the assessed valuation for the county resulting in lower property tax revenues. Additionally, Republican Governor Brian Sandoval seeks to cut education spending back to levels existent before 2007. That reduces the budget by nine percent.

Trustee Edna Forsgren addressed the board, about closing the school in Gabbs, saying, “I think we find that the schools are the heart of the community and a lot of times, when we take the schools away, we gut the community.”

Board President Harold Tokerud seemed to concur with Forsgren. “I thought about the culture of schools and the culture of a small town. You take out the school, you kill the town. There’s no doubt about it. It’s a tremendous responsibility we have to try and get this budget together.”

Ritchie said Governor Sandoval was not backing down from his proposals.

Pathways (Alternative) High School in Pahrump, the school in Gabbs and Tonopah Elementary/Middle School attending Tonopah High School is contemplated for savings. Gabbs School currently has 60 students and seven teachers for all grades. Closing Gabbs School would amount to savings of $248,950, according to Ritchie.

Pathways has 170 students and four teachers. The state pays the school $1,023,230.

The proposal of closing Tonopah Elementary and Middle School and combining the students at Tonopah High School was discussed and rejected. Ritchie informed the board that the move would require the addition of five modular classrooms to handle the increase of students attending.

While families of Nye County are struggling to survive and educate their children Governor Sandoval holds to his campaign promise not to increase taxes, just cut state support of schools. I wonder how happy Nye County Republicans and their families are (the ones that can’t afford $50 to attend the picnic or pay for private schooling) now about having elected Sandoval Governor? Wonder if they’d do it again?

Sources: Pahrump Mirror and Pahrump Valley Times

Bernie Sanders on the Republican Agenda

Featheriver — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 16:43:55 +0000

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) writes today about how we got into this horrible national debt, what the Republican intend to do to get us out of it, and his alternative to the Republican agenda. I have extracted the following verbatim. You can read his entire article on Huffington Post.

Everyone agrees that this country has a major deficit crisis, but few discuss how we got there. When George W. Bush inherited the White House from Bill Clinton we had a significant surplus. Now we have a $1.5 trillion deficit. How did that happen?

First, against my vote, Bush and Congress launched a war in Iraq. By the time we take care of our last veteran that war will end up costing us some $3 trillion. When the war drums were beating do you recall any of our Republican friends wanting to know how that unnecessary war was going to be paid for? I don’t.

Second, Republicans for years have pushed for huge tax breaks for the wealthiest people. I didn’t hear them ask how that was going to be paid for.

Third, under President Bush and a Republican-run House, Congress passed a $400 billion-plus Medicare prescription drug program. Written by the insurance companies and the drug companies, it barred the government from negotiating better prices. It drove up drug costs, padded pharmaceutical company profits and added to the deficit.

Fourth, again over my objection, Congress voted for a massive bailout of Wall Street. I didn’t hear too many people talking about how we would pay for that $700 billion to bail out Wall Street. I didn’t hear them worrying that it would drive up the deficit. Wall Street, having destroyed the economy through their reckless and illegal behavior, needed a welfare check and Congress provided it. End of story.

Those are some of the reasons we now have a deficit crisis, reasons Republicans don’t talk much about when they provide soaring rhetoric about the dangers of large deficits.

…

[T]he Republican House passed budget bill, HR 1, would bring about for low and moderate income families. Let me briefly mention just a very few of their cuts.

The Republicans want to decimate the Head Start Program. Every working family in America knows how hard it is today to find affordable childcare or early childhood education. At a time when we have the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world, the Republican solution is to slash Head Start by 20 percent, throw 218,000 children off the program and lay off 55,000 Head Start instructors.

The cost of college education today is so high that many young people are giving up their dream of going to college, while many others are graduating deeply in debt. The Republican solution? Make a bad situation much worse by slashing Pell grants by $5.7 billion and reducing or eliminating Pell grants for 9.4 million low-income college students.

Social Security is another target. We get calls in my office every week from senior citizens, people with disabilities, widows who are having a hard time getting a timely response to their Social Security claims. It takes much too long to process the paperwork today. What is the Republican solution? They want to slash the Social Security Administration, the people who administer Social Security, by $1.7 billion. That means half a million Americans who are legally entitled to Social Security benefits will have to wait significantly longer to receive them. (Become a citizen member of the Defending Social Security Caucus)

When it comes to health care, we have 50 million Americans with no insurance today, and 45,000 Americans die each year because they don’t get to a doctor in time. Last year, as part of health care reform, I worked very hard to expand community health centers so that more and more low-and moderate-income people could walk into a doctor’s office, get health care, dental care, low-cost prescription drugs, mental health counseling. What is the Republican response to the health care crisis? They want to drastically cut-back funding for community health centers and deny primary health care to 11 million Americans.

For the poorest of the poor in our country, the Community Services Block Grants provide the infrastructure, the mechanism to get out emergency help for food, heat, housing and other very basic necessities of life. With homelessness and poverty increasing, the Republicans want to slash $405 million from the Community Services Block Grant Program.

In cold weather states like Vermont, where the weather can get to 20 below zero, home heating assistance is critically important. In fact it is a life and death issue. At a time when home heating oil costs are soaring, the Republicans want to cut $400 million from the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program.

After decades of progress cleaning up our air and water, and preventing much illness, the Republicans want to slash the EPA by 30 percent and undercut enforcement of the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act.

Republicans also want to cut the WIC program, which provides supplemental nutrition for women, infants, and children. They want to cut that by $750 million.

Everybody understands we have problems with education right now, including large dropout rates. At a time when states are laying off hundreds of thousands of teachers, Republicans want to cut $5 billion from the Department of Education.

On and on and on it goes.

In my view, we do need to boldly address our deficit crisis, but we need to do it in a way that is fair — that is not on the backs of the sick, the elderly, the children and the poor. In other words, we need shared sacrifice. The wealthiest people in this country, who are now doing phenomenally well, are also going to have to help us with deficit reduction. That is why I introduced legislation which would place a 5.4 percent emergency surtax on income over $1 million. The revenue would go into an Emergency Deficit Reduction Fund. Just doing that – asking millionaires to pay a little bit more in taxes after all the huge tax breaks they have received — will bring in up to $50 billion a year.

I think that is a good idea, but it is not just me. An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll recently asked the American people about the best ways to go forward on deficit reduction? Eighty-one percent of the American people believe it is totally acceptable or mostly acceptable to impose a surtax on millionaires to reduce the deficit. My legislation also would eliminate tax loopholes that enable the big oil companies from avoiding their fair share of taxes.

The American people get it. They understand that we cannot move toward deficit reduction just by cutting programs that working families, the middle class, and low-income people desperately need. They understand that serious, responsible deficit reduction requires shared sacrifice. They know that at a time when the top 1 percent earn more income than the bottom 50 percent, that when the effective tax rate for the rich is now lower than at any time in recent history, that it is absurd not to ask the wealthiest people in this country to provide additional revenue to help us lower the deficit.

The federal budget is not just a bunch of big numbers. It is the document that speaks to the values of our country, our national priorities and our hopes for the future. At a time when the gap between the very rich and everyone else is growing wider, it is a moral abomination to give more tax breaks to millionaires and billionaires, while cutting programs for the most vulnerable people in our society — the children, the elderly, the sick and the hungry. The Republican budget proposal must be defeated.

UNR football coach up for $75,000 raise

Featheriver — Sat, 12 Mar 2011 16:42:01 +0000

As the Nevada Higher Education System is preparing for cuts that, as Chancellor Dan Klaich recently put it, would seriously undermine the mission of the Nevada’s colleges and universities, the Board of Regents will consider a contract extension for UNR’s football coach that includes a $75,000 raise over the next two years.

Photo: NLV coach Bobby Hauck congratulates UNR coach Chris Ault after game Oct. 3, 2010. UNR won the game 44-26 to run its win streak over UNLV to six.

In Southern Nevada, UNLV is planning to eliminate 315 positions, including 120 faculty positions; eliminate 12 department and 33 degree programs; and make substantial cuts to the law and dental schools.

In Northern Nevada, UNR would eliminate most foreign language instruction, close the College of Agriculture. CORRECTION: The College of Agriculture was slated to close last year, but was reorganized instead. It is not proposed to be closed under the most recent round of budget cuts. Glick has proposed cutting degree programs in French, dance and theater. Significant funding would be reduced for student services and the university would cut 225 positions.

Glick is also proposing to cut the athletics department by $500,000.

Ault’s contract will be taken up at the Board of Regents meeting Thursday and Friday.

Source: Las Vegas Sun

Nothing like getting it’s priorities in order in Nevada. No wonder Nevada is among the lowest ranked states in education.

Nevada: 54% budget shortfall

Featheriver — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 21:35:40 +0000

Nevada is currently facing a 54% shortfall in our state budget. Governor Sandoval’s plan is to cut all of it.

Can you imagine living in less than half a state?

During these hard times the last thing we should be doing is cutting things like education and essential medical services for the poor and unemployed. These are things a state needs to be prosperous in the future.

I’ve signed a petition to the state legislature telling them that cutting 54% of the budget is not an option – we have to raise revenue!

Please join me here: http://bit.ly/SaveNV

Thank you!

Source: Progress Now Nevada

The above came from Erin Neff’s blog, Progress Now Nevada. I signed her petition. I join her in asking that you also sign the petition. Speak now or forever hold your peace.

Coffee and the Papers

Featheriver — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 18:34:17 +0000

Medical Marijuana: Nevada Assemblyman Ed Goedhart, R-Amargosa Valley, who represents Nye County, has submitted a bill draft request providing improved access to medical marijuana. He says his bill would not make marijuana legal for everyone, but would improve on legislation already approved by the voters. The marijuana would be obtained at special distribution clinics or qualified patients could grow a quantity of the drug, he said.

“Right now these people with medical marijuana cards are still getting their medical marijuana but they’re buying it on the street. Let’s take it off the street and put it into a safer, better regulated environment. This is in response to what the voters voted in 1999 and 2001,” Goedhart said.

I agree with Mr. Goedhart on this approach and commend him for taking the step. I hope he succeeds with it.

The news about Goedhart’s move coincides with a Guest Editorial entitled Too Big To Fail by Ron Ferraro in last week’s Mirror. I have previously written about my views of the use of marijuana as a medical product prompted by a criminal case I was involved with in California a number of years ago. I think Mr. Ferraro’s editorial far exceeds the column I wrote. I learned a lot from his article of which I was unaware. If you have not read his editorial I recommend you do so.

Over the past weekend I also caught a documentary-news report on TV about the marijuana industry in Humboldt County, California. Tons of marijuana is being grown in that county and tons of money is being expended to eradicate it. All part of the War on Drugs. It is a war being lost and millions of dollars being spent futilely.

Nevada Brothels: Also last week on the Mirror’s front page is a story about Senator Harry’s Reid’s pitch to the Nevada Legislature to end legalization of Nevada’s brothels. He feels it deters attraction to businesses locating in the state. The Senator’s reason doesn’t sound persuasive to me. It didn’t cut much ice with Joe Richards, author of On Target, and publisher of the Mirror either. Prostitution has been around as long as sex. Mr. Richards points out that “Metro Sheriff Doug Gillespie openly admits there is now more than 32,000 engaged in prostitution in Las Vegas,” where it is illegal. If the brothels of Nevada were closed, it is argued, those engaged in it would simply continue on. At least the legal brothels are licensed and regulated. As stated by Mr. Richards, legal brothels bring “Zero toleration of drug use, the near abolishment of any sexually transmitted disease, as well as total safety for both the sex worker as well as the client. There are many more subtleties that make legal brothel activity so much more superior and so much safer for all involved than uncontrolled and non-regulated illegal activity.”

When you think about it, perhaps Clark County should consider legalizing brothels in their county. I suspect sex is here to stay, notwithstanding the moral implications involved. Maybe Governor Sandoval and the state’s legislature should consider it in view of Nevada’s need for monetary revenue.

Nye County Schools: Governor Sandoval’s proposed budget seeks a tuition increase along with a 29 percent cut to higher education in Nevada. Nevada’s education budget has undergone a series of cuts over the past few years. It appears that Great Basin College’s Pahrump Valley Center may be closed, along with other community colleges in Nevada. The Mirror quotes GBC Campus Director Bill Verbeck as saying “it will be impossible to sustain higher education as we have known it.”

Great Basin College is, in my view, one of the treasures of Pahrump and Nye County. A loss of the college will result in deprivation of a pathway for students, adults included, to pursue their education. A real tragedy for the town of Pahrump and Nye county. I read somewhere that Nevada could consider a state income tax to secure revenue to keep the educational system going. From my viewpoint that sounds like the only way to retain some measure of educational facilities, distasteful as it may be to many.

A Request to Governor Sandoval

Featheriver — Sun, 23 Jan 2011 16:34:50 +0000

Bob Fulkerson, State Director, Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada

My thanks to Progress Now Nevada from whom I came across this video.