Today there are twice as many companies and 10 times as many drivers.

A five-member board sets policy that is implemented by the agency's administrator.

Richard Land, a longtime vice president of Nevada Test Site contractor Reynolds Electrical and Engineering Co., recently made a dramatic switch with the authority — after accepting a gubernatorial appointment to the board in 2002, Land resigned last year so that he could take over as administrator.

Since taking over in November, Land has quickly won the respect of cab company owners and taxi drivers as well as the board.

Land talked to In Business Las Vegas about issues affecting the taxicab industry and the challenges growth will have on the future.

Question: What is your role with the Taxicab Authority and what does the authority board do?

Answer: I'm the administrator of the Taxicab Authority and I basically have the job to monitor and implement and execute the regulations that are contained in the Nevada Revised Statutes and the actions that are approved by the board.

The Taxicab Authority oversees taxis in Clark County, and the Transportation Services Authority oversees limousines and taxis operating in the rest of the state. Isn't this a duplication of resources?

It could be considered that. However, there's quite a bit of difference between the taxicabs of Clark County and the rest of the types of vehicles that are under the authority of the TSA, such as buses, tow trucks, heavy transportation vehicles, moving vans. There's a total difference in the amount of interfacing that goes on between the Taxicab Authority and the drivers and the certificate holders than there would be in the other types of transportation.

Of course, in Clark County there are a lot more cabs than there are in other parts of the state. Kind of a big job?

It is. There's a full-time staff here of 65 people. Thirty-seven of those are police officers, and there are 11 airport control officers assigned at McCarran (International Airport) all the time and about 11 vehicle inspectors. The rest work in the front, processing new applicants and doing background checks.

How many cabs do you monitor and how many companies are involved?

There are 16 different companies. There are approximately 4,600 cabs and some 5,200 drivers permitted.

Taxi drivers and limousine drivers are constantly at odds over issues involving customer pickups and staging at resorts. How do you resolve issues when limousines are regulated by a different agency?

It's tough to do. Most of the conflict takes place at the entrance areas of the hotels. There are often insinuations that limousine drivers and doormen at the hotels are in cahoots and the drivers give a kickback to the doormen. Whether that's true or not, I can't really comment. But that's a comment we hear often on the taxicab side: the doormen not allowing the cabs to pull forward and pick up passengers. The doormen will ask a limousine driver to pull forward a lot of times instead of a taxicab, so there's a lot of animosity that has developed over the years.

Because this occurs on resort property, can you even involve yourself in that?

No. Not on-site.

There are mixed signals about how the industry feels about the Las Vegas Monorail and Citizens Area Transit's Deuce buses. Are the mass-transit modes competitors to taxis? How does everybody get along?

Before the monorail was completed, the taxi drivers were upset about it cutting into their business and didn't want any more taxicabs on the streets because of the potential popularity of the monorail. That hasn't happened. The drivers barely consider the fact that the monorail is there now. It certainly hasn't impacted the taxicab business. I don't see it happening for a long, long time.

And the Deuce buses?

The Deuce buses, the closest I can measure there is during the closing of major conventions during the period when they're in operation at the Las Vegas Convention Center. They've brought the Deuces out there on a couple of occasions when we didn't have enough taxicabs out there. The buses staged in the same area that taxicabs picked up in and very few people would board those buses. Some of these taxicab companies have shuttle buses and they really have to get out there and bark about a $2 bargain to get passengers to get out of the taxicab line to get on the shuttle buses. The Deuces so far haven't had a big impact.

Do you foresee any scenario in which the Taxicab Authority and the TSA are merged?

That's a conflict that occurs every two years (in the Nevada Legislature). I have no idea how real that is and where it would stand right now. I'm not sure it will ever fly, and I don't know how much truth there is to the rumors that are starting right now on the next session of the Legislature. There are a lot of disgruntled employees on the TSA side as well as the Taxicab Authority side, and I think sometimes those folks generate as many of those rumors as anybody else. Right now, I'm not concerned about it. I think there's enough business for everybody.

What are the biggest issues facing Clark County's taxi industry today? How is the board attacking those issues?

I think the biggest issue we've had in the last couple of years has been the installation of cameras in the cabs. A couple of companies installed them early on, basically on their own, with the type of equipment that everybody thought would perform the best. They indicated early on that there were safety factors involved that helped them reduce the number of accidents they had. It also, in most cases, significantly reduced their insurance costs, enough so that it diminished some of the arguments the other companies had. There's still one major company that hasn't installed them, even though the certificate holder in that case told me in February that he would have them installed in a couple of weeks. But I learned as of yesterday, he has not installed any so far, but they are on order, quote unquote.

The Taxicab Authority's primary directive is to serve the riding public. Where do the cab company owners and the taxi drivers fit into the equation?

That's kind of a tough one. The taxicab owners' first interest and love, I think, is taking care of the Strip and the various hotels, mainly the tourist gaming area. There are remote locations now for some of the new hotels like Red Rock, for example, and South Coast. We've kind of been surprised at how well they are being served by the taxicabs. However, we still have the problem of the elderly folks who go to MountainView Hospital (in the northwest valley) or some of the residential locations in apartment complexes. We get calls frequently from little ladies waiting to be picked up at the beauty shop. They've been waiting for four hours and finally some nice patron comes by and asks them what's wrong and they tell them and people offer to take some of those folks home. That is a big problem across the valley and that ties into our constant griping about blown shifts. "Blown shifts" just frankly means that cabs and/or drivers are not being utilized to take care of that outlying residential area.

What exactly is a blown shift?

A blown shift is a medallion that has been issued but not used.

And a medallion, basically, is the authority to operate a cab, right?

To operate a single cab, yes.

If public citizens have a complaint against a taxi company, how do they make them?

We get them in several different ways. In a lot of cases, we, the Taxicab Authority, get letters from tourists who have been wise enough to get the driver's name or the taxicab company and/or the taxicab number. They will write and give us that information and what the problem was. Once we receive that type of information, we can follow through with it and check out what the problem was. A lot of complaints come in and say, "I was picked up at the airport on Nov. 23 at 11:30 p.m., and the driver cussed me out because I wouldn't give him a tip," and they sign their name and we have nothing else to work with. So there's not much we can do to follow through on that particular type of complaint.

We also get a lot of complaints through our dispatch office here and those, we're able to get the information we need to follow through with it. In those cases, and even the cases where a tourist will write and give us all that information that we need, we follow through with each and every one of those.

Let's get back to cameras in cabs. Why was there so much difficulty in establishing a regulation to require cameras in taxicabs? Isn't it a safety issue and a crime deterrent?

You're absolutely right. Some of the certificate holders thought that the installation of cameras was infringing on their right as an owner and they would be sued by the passengers, depending on what they played. As it's turned out, there were one or two of them who were bent on not having cameras in their vehicles because of the installation costs. I think that's pretty well gone by the wayside at this point, with the exception of the one bigger company. There's also one smaller company that hasn't, but most everyone else has cameras and they're working very well.

There also was a controversy involving a passenger's First Amendment rights wasn't there? How was that resolved?

A lot of people, including the American Civil Liberties Union, thought that any recording of comments or conversations inside a taxicab could be used for their own purposes or sold by some of the drivers that are very entrepreneurial in many senses. As it turned out, the audio portion of that is very limited and who has access to that is extremely limited also. The drivers don't even have access to it.

Tell us about the new safety regulation that would incorporate putting cameras in cabs.

The camera regulation has gone through probably six meetings where it has been revisited and I's dotted and T's crossed and it's been submitted to the Legislative Council Bureau in Carson City for review. They bounced it back to us and made some minor changes. We've had that back for probably two months now. It was scheduled for what we had hoped would be a final review on Aug. 1, but we had to change that to Sept. 7 because of a lack of a quorum for that meeting with summer vacations. Hopefully, at that meeting in September — it's a special meeting just for that purpose — we will get that resolved.

One of the issues aired frequently at Taxicab Authority meetings is the spotty pickup record at big shows at the city's convention centers and when things get busy at McCarran International Airport. Why is this such a problem? Can't you just cite and fine companies for failing to meet the board's directives?

Yes, we can cite them and fine them. The big controversy really started at the MAGIC convention this past spring. The Convention Center and the show manager had been complaining for quite some time about the lack of cab service at the Convention Center and at times, people were standing in line for two, to three, to maybe four hours at the Convention Center, waiting on a cab.

When I came on board, I decided as administrator I was going to get out there and see what was taking place. I started going to each one of those shows on a daily basis. I'd be over there at about 4 in the afternoon and I'd stay until 7 or 7:30 in the evening when you'd assume most of the traffic would be gone. During that particular MAGIC show, the first evening I was over there, we had a total of 14 cabs come to pick up during that period of time. And I got on the telephone and called every cab company in town. Some I could get, some I couldn't get. In many cases, I talked to the owners themselves and tried to get them to roust more cabs over to the Convention Center. It didn't work.

After that show was over with, we decided to do an audit of the trip sheets that the various drivers turn in, just to find out where they went during that four-hour period they were supposed to be at the Convention Center. We had added 16 medallions per company for that particular show. But we found that less than 9 percent of those total medallions ever went to the Convention Center during those four days, not just that one evening. Then, we found out there were going to all kinds of different places — strip clubs, hotels, restaurants and all the other things that are out there. It was from that audit that we decided to file show-cause notices to the various companies. That issue went on for quite some time and it was pretty much resolved in the attorney general's office with all the certificate holders and their lawyers. The outcome of that meeting was that the AG and myself got assurances from all the companies that we would collectively work together in the future for any of these major shows. Hopefully, we won't have this problem again.

So far, it's worked (Land knocks on his wood desk) and we'll continue to monitor it very much in the near future. MAGIC comes up again at the end of August. That was the one that really got the ball rolling. I think we're pretty sure as a result of (the July 25) board meeting that the cooperation will be there.

In fairness to the drivers, the reason they wouldn't go to the Convention Center is that they didn't want to get stuck in a major traffic jam, right?

That's right. The traffic pattern around the Convention Center at that time, and even today, is a constant problem. One evening, I rode in a cab from the north entrance of the Convention Center, went across Paradise (Road), down Convention Center Drive toward the Stardust and it took us 56 minutes because of the traffic to go that distance. In addition to the driver and myself, we had two passengers who were on their way to the Bellagio to pick up their luggage. They had already checked out in the morning and all they had to do was go to the bell desk and pick up their luggage, and then they were heading to the airport. Needless to say, we didn't get them there in time to get their luggage and make their flight.

Also, when they got out of the cab to pick up their luggage, they made it pretty clear to the cabdriver how unhappy they were and they didn't give her much of a tip. They gave her $2 for what should have been considerably more. I could have walked to and from the Stardust in the amount of time I had in the cab.

Are "long-hauling," diversion and driver kickbacks still issues the authority has to address? What are you doing about them?

Long-hauling (the practice of taking passengers on a longer route through the McCarran International Airport tunnel at a greater cost to the customer) and diversion (talking customers into patronizing a different business that may offer cabdrivers a kickback) are constantly problems. What we do about it is use our police force to monitor the traffic in and out of the airport tunnel.

Also, if we see anything strange on the freeway, we go after that. We often stop taxicabs going into the tunnel as well as exiting the tunnel, whether they're speeding or not, just to check to see if the passenger has given the driver approval to take them on the long route to their destination. In many cases, they say they were never asked and in that case, the driver is cited for giving a long haul. It's not uncommon to find passengers from the airport being taken to the Bellagio or the Flamingo, for example, via the freeway. With traffic being what it is on I-15 right now, especially during those early evening hours, there's no question that the passenger is paying more and the drivers are taking advantage of the passengers.

Recently, the board had a presentation about how crowded the Strip is going to get in the next few years with all the new development. Is this going to be a problem for the taxi industry? How are you addressing it?

It's going to be a big-time problem for the taxicab industry. I think that a number of steps have been taken so far to alleviate the traffic in front of the Convention Center with participants pretty well across the board. The convention authority people have been able to get everyone's cooperation — Metro Police, RTC, the county — to block out the right-hand northbound lane from in front of the Renaissance Hotel down past the Convention Center and almost to the front of the Hilton where you can turn left on Riviera to the Strip. That feat in itself is noteworthy because many, many times a taxicab or a bus or a limousine cannot get close to the Convention Center during that period of time and this will really enable them to move down there. Right now, it's only one lane. Hopefully, it will go to two. That should ease our problems of getting in and out of the Convention Center. Something similar, undoubtedly, will have to happen all over the valley. You hear a lot of comments about some of the major streets going one way. That's one alternative and I'm sure there's got to be many, many more.

The local industry may get a little more crowded with at least two companies expressing interest in entering the Southern Nevada market and another looking to expand. Can the city handle that many additional cabs?

The one cab company that's asking for an expansion probably won't have any trouble at all fitting in in the valley. He basically handles the west side of the valley and doesn't go to the Strip or the airport. His application not only asks for permission to do that as well as take care of the residential areas on the east and southeast side. That could probably be accommodated without any serious impact. Another applicant that I think you're referring to is called City Cab and I'd be speculating if I said anything about where that might go.

What's next in your personal career? Do you have any desire to move into any other government service?

No. I've really kind of enjoyed this. I certainly enjoyed being on the board, and I think there are an awful lot of challenges for improvement to the overall system. Cooperation between the Taxicab Authority itself as well as the certificate holders and the drivers ... there's all kinds of improvements that are knocking at the door to be made out there.

The overall transportation system is a challenge the whole valley has got. It's not just a taxicab problem — it's gridlock for the whole city. And not just on the Strip. There are other places that are worse than the Strip. That is what I think is one of the biggest problems facing the whole valley and it's something that can't be overlooked too much longer.