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Complaint filed over new election in North Las Vegas race
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LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Updated: Jul. 8, 2011 | 7:58 a.m.
The North Las Vegas Police Supervisors Association on Thursday filed an ethics complaint against City Council members Robert Eliason and Anita Wood over their votes last month in favor of holding a new election in a disputed council race.
The complaint, filed with the state's Commission on Ethics, alleged in part that the two council members violated state law last month when they "decided to order a new election" instead of canvassing the results of the Ward 4 race. Dentist Wade Wagner defeated incumbent Councilman Richard Cherchio by one vote in the race. But election officials discovered that one resident had voted in the wrong precinct, so the council agreed to hold a revote in that same precinct.
That election is scheduled for July 19.
The complaint said that by ordering a new election, the council members "are preventing and circumventing the election recount process for which the candidate they are supporting (Richard Cherchio) would have to pay the costs." Instead, North Las Vegas citizens have to foot the bill for a new election, it said.
Both Wood and Eliason disclosed that they had donated to Cherchio's campaign but didn't feel they needed to abstain from voting on the issue. Mayor Shari Buck recused herself from voting on whether to certify the results of the election, saying that she had donated to Wagner's campaign and that her husband had worked for the campaign.
Eliason did not return a call seeking comment Thursday evening.
Wood said she did not certify the election results in Ward 4 because it was impossible to know what the voters' true intent was. State law says that an election's declared result must represent the true vote cast, she said.
"I don't know what the true result was, so how can I canvass it?" she said. "So I sent it back to the voters to give me clear direction."
The complaint was filed a day after officials with the Clark County Democratic Party said they had asked the secretary of state to investigate Buck and Wagner for allegations of improper financial disclosures related to his campaign.
Buck and Wagner, both Republicans, said they followed the law in their disclosures.
Buck chalked the matter up to politics.
"This is about Democrats trying to help Cherchio steal the election," she said.
Contact reporter Lynnette Curtis at lcurtis@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0285.
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To EveDallas.. yes that's true.. Teamster seems to be giving more that their dose of "blood". From losing over 200 people in a year, Furlough days, 10 last fiscal year, 12 this fiscal year, gave back our Cola and also merit increases. Now they want to take more Teamsters because Fire and Police are greedy.. it's not a fair system.. it's so broken that the only thing left is for the State to come in and "clean" house.. beginning from the top because the majority of them don't have any backbone!!
I agree with you gallos, everyone needs to get it together including poa, psa,iaff, and city council. Show some leadership and pull our city together. I have lived in this city for over 30 years and never seen such selfishness. Im not including teamsters in there because from what i am hearing they are the only group who have actually made some sacrifices.
To EveDallas, yes,everyone needs to get there act together.. but the POA, PSA need to also.. the ship is sinking and they don't want to give their fair share like the rest of the City. No one is saying you have to lose jobs but, you need to give up some $$. They just received an additonal 40 hours of vacation, they received a COLA increase (which no one else did) and they are the only 2 unions that will continue to get mertit increase.. They can't even give up their bi annual uniform allowance that we all know most likely isn't being used for that. You say NLV is the laughing stock of the state but the Police and Fire have lost complete respect for both departments. You send someone to jail and then rehire them when they get out? and give them back pay for all the years (4 of them) that they were gone for? Someone commits a crime, outside the scope of their work and you put them on Admin Leave (paid leave) until the case is resolved? If it was any other business, they'd be fired!!!! And then they wonder why we are up in arms about all of this?? Shame on Police and Shame of Fire!!!
Here we go again.. So why are they really filing the complaint? Because they have Wagner in their pocket and not Cherchio.. They bought Wagner and know that like Shari Buck, he will always vote in their favor.. When is this political ballgame ever going to end? When they stop allowing these unions to give money to political campains and keep the mobster like unions out of politics..
Sickofit......can yu hear the band playing on the deck of the USS Norftown as the life boats are being lowered....every one acting deprtment heads included are scrambling for a life boat to get off the doomed ship.........but he council is standing thre smiling saying how wondrful the music is! The citiens dont care about wht is going on...look how many people voted in this electon....NLV is the laughing stock of the state!
Plastron......yu should write a fiction novel.......the two female officers filed their complaint against the Chief (over 10 yrs ago) at that time because one was passed over for promotion and the other was demoted for cause.......again the city would rather settle those bogus claims instead of fighting them.....as for yur repeated rant about the detached retina.... inmates fighting with each othr and the get injured hmmmm.... is it possible that the injuries were caused by each other...what about the issue of why they were placed together in the same cell when they were rival gang members could that be the actual reason for the lawsuit by the inmate who lost the fight?....But by all means, please don't let facts get in he way of your fantasy. You are obviously very angry and seem to associate EVERY thing happening at the city with this incident, but I don't see whre this ties into the election and the complaint.
Geeesh...Is anyone taking the misappropriations and goings-on in NLV seriously? Now their ACTING City Attorney resigned...why is everyone still in ACTING positions??? You still have an ACTING City Manager!! Serious problems happening there, someone should be conducting in-depth investigation on how this City fell apart!
TO VAN.SNOW: ARE YOU ON DRUGS?!! Your response is inappropriate in relation to the article. Do you just need to show your hate for President Obama at every turn? And you say America is abou to get ugly? With haters like you in this country, America is already ugly. Get you f*ing facts right, by the way. GW Bush made those arrangements long before Prez Obama took office. Get your facts straight, ugly American.
Hey jack.......the greedy supervisors (PSA) got the nerve to file an ethics complaint ... LOL. The same people who whined about not getting their 900 dollar clothing allowance checks and just took a 4.25 percent pay raise july 1 while civilian employees , Officers, and appointed employees are taking pay cuts and getting pink slips ......greedy greedy. But you got yur pay raise didnt yu,,,,,probably went around and waived it in the faces of the guys yu supervise.... Way to lead by example
america is about to get ugly real ugly.obummer has now given mexico the right to drive any damm place they want in america.there goes tens of thousands of truck driver jobs to mexicans.between obummer and the greedy unions america is history.