Guinn says more money needed

By Erin Neff / Las Vegas Sun

Mandalay Resort Group executive Mike Sloan, left, is greeted by Gov. Kenny Guinn as he makes his way to the podium before his Yucca Mountain veto speech on April 8 at UNLV. Photo by Aaron Mayes.

Governors typically only become household names nationwide when they appear heartbroken on national news broadcasts about floods, hurricanes or other disasters.

Kenny Guinn is no different. Only the disaster in Nevada -- approval of Yucca Mountain as the nation's nuclear waste dump -- is still something Guinn thinks is possible to avert.

Guinn, a Republican friend of President George W. Bush, is Nevada's unlikely poster boy in the fight of the state's life.

"Republican or Democrat, that doesn't matter right now," Guinn said in a recent interview. "The time is coming closer and closer to finality on my watch, and I've got to do whatever I can to help."

That has meant opposing the leader of his party with the nation's first veto of a president by a governor and new fund-raising efforts, aimed not at his re-election bid, but at the state's opposition to the repository.

"I look at it from the standpoint that I've done whatever I could do," Guinn said.

Guinn vetoed Bush's recommendation on April 8 a few weeks after an Oval Office meeting in which the governor explained Nevada's position.

"It was not hard for me because it was the right thing to do," Guinn said of his veto. "I explained the law to the president about the veto and the court challenges available to us and said 'I want you to know that I'm going to act on behalf of the people of Nevada' and he said, 'Some things may have to be settled in court.'"

Ultimately that is where Guinn believes Nevada will win the fight against Yucca Mountain.

"Going into court is different," Guinn said. "Right now I kind of feel like we're David fighting Goliath and we could get a lucky punch. Right now this is David vs. Goliath, but in the courts it's going to be fair."

By law, Guinn had the right to veto the president's recommendation, giving Congress the power to either sustain or override Guinn's veto. The House of Representatives voted May 8 to override Guinn's veto. The Senate is expected to vote on the matter in the next two months.

As both Nevada and the Nuclear Energy Institute, the lobbyist of the nuclear industry, eye the U.S. Senate, the state is spending thousands of dollars on an advertising campaign aimed at swaying senators in key states.

During the 2001 Legislature, Guinn proposed $5 million for the state's legal and public relations expenses. Ultimately $4 million was approved and, with $1 million from Clark County, used to create the Nevada Protection Fund.

Guinn said if he had known the current administration was going to recommend Yucca Mountain so rapidly, he may have been able to do more.

"This has been going on now for 19 years," Guinn said. "You can't just get up one morning after all of this and suddenly have your entire case planned."

For years the state readied its legal challenges, but had no one to sue until the Energy Department recommended Yucca. Similarly, Guinn said, the Nevada Protection Fund was ready for donations, but saw few trickle in until the day he vetoed the recommendation.

"I thought there would be more," Guinn said. "Some people aren't as committed to issues as the rest of us are."

Cities throughout the state have donated to the fund -- from the $1,500 tiny Wells sent in to the $150,000 earmarked by Las Vegas. Clark County has contributed $2.5 million.

"Some people say that when their city gives the money, they're giving through them," Guinn said.

Guinn said he thinks the travel downturn after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks has made it "awfully hard" to get donations from the business community.

And, if his role as the state's chief executive is any indication, Yucca Mountain is not the only thing on the radar.

"Yucca is important, but it's not the only thing," Guinn said. "I have to cut $250 million out of the state budget and we have the medical malpractice (crisis) and Nevada Power rate case."

Similarly, he said, businesses already suffering through a national recession were hit even harder by the tourism slowdown and have fewer dollars to pick up rising health care costs, donate to election campaigns and have money left for the state's Yucca fund.

Guinn said he is convinced that Nevada could win the U.S. Senate vote "if we had unlimited funds."

Television ads running in Vermont and Utah focus on concerns about transporting nuclear waste through 43 states en route to the proposed repository in Nevada.

Guinn has been one of the key focal points of that message -- stumping for the state during three trips to Washington -- and making the circuit on C-Span, MSNBC and CNBC.

"We're in a political war right now, and we're a small state," Guinn said. "We've got to do whatever we can."

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