By Vernon Robison
Moapa Valley Progress
Submitted April 16, 2008
The Moapa Valley Television Maintenance District (MVTVD) Board of Directors voted on Thursday, April 10, to approve a tax assessment of $24 per year on all improved residential property in Overton, Logandale and Moapa. The tax will be assessed through the county tax rolls in the upcoming fiscal year, beginning in June. It will be used by the district to pay for equipment updates that are needed to bring the district into compliance with federal regulations mandating the primary broadcast of only digital television signals. The MVTVD action took place amid a flurry of vehement opposition from many members of the public. The Board had held a public hearing on the matter on April 1 where there was heated debate on the issue. About 85 people showed up to the hearing. Most in that group were opposed to the proposed assessment.
Moapa Valley Town Advisory Board (MVTAB) Chairwoman, Judy Metz, requested that the matter be placed on the agenda for the April 9 MVTAB meeting. Metz said that she had received a high number of phone calls in the days following the April 1 hearing from people opposed to the assessment. Because of this she wanted the matter discussed by the MVTAB.
MVTVD chairman, Daniel Pray summed up the history of the assessment issue to the MVTAB members. “Roughly two years ago, when we were working through this same assessment issue, the question came up whether the TV district was needed any longer,” Pray told the board. “The Town Board gave a unanimous vote supporting the TV district at that time.” In a meeting in June of 2006, the MVTAB did unanimously approve a motion that the MVTVD be allowed to continue to exist as a district and recommended that funding efforts include all avenues, with due consideration given to what is best for the community.
Pray explained that, since that time, the MVTVD board had worked to fulfill that recommendation. He explained that an independent study had been done to determine the financial and technological feasibility of the district. The study came back in January of 2007 with recommendations for the district to move forward in securing funding for the necessary updates. The study also included specific designs for a microwave link between the Las Vegas valley and the MVTVD for the reception of primary broadcast digital television signals.
Following the study, the MVTVD Board had worked with the county to go through the legal process of securing the necessary revenue stream to support the updates. “We have met with the District Attorney extensively to make sure that we are doing exactly according to the law,” Pray said. “This is really the ending of a very long road.”
Public comment was mixed at the MVTAB meeting. Many expressed opposition to the assessment because they felt they were being forced to pay for a service that they would never use. Others voiced worries that once the assessment was instituted that it would never go away and that it would most likely be increased dramatically in the future.
“The TV District has served its purpose,” said Steve Tanner, who said he has been a Moapa Valley resident since 1950. “But I think that the world has outgrown that purpose. Having a TV district is not going into the future, it is looking backwards. We have satellite TV available to us now if we want it. I pay $111 for satellite TV. I don’t want another tax. ” Those in favor of the proposed assessment stated that it was good for the community as a whole. They emphasized that many people in the community can’t afford the cost of subscription TV service. Some elderly shut-ins are dependent on the MVTVD signal to provide them with their only link to the outside world, proponents said.
“We are a community,” said Saun Boen of Logandale. “There are a lot of things that we do in the community that maybe doesn’t help me personally but it might help the 8000 other people. We should assist by doing what we reasonably can do. Two dollars a month equates to a couple of drinks from a soda fountain. It is something that we can do.”
Judy Metz asked for a count, by raise of hands, of how many in attendance at the meeting were in favor and how many were opposed. Twelve people in attendance were in favor of the MVTVD assessment. Eighteen were opposed.
Members of the MVTAB expressed a desire to make a definitive determination of what the people wanted. They began talking about the desire to put the matter to a vote among local residents. “If the valley wants it, we should get it; if not, we don’t,” said MVTAB member Gene Houston. “I think we should have a voter initiative to determine what is wanted by the community.”
MVTAB member, Rik Eide felt that perhaps this determination had already been made. Eide reviewed the fact that recent MVTVD attempts to receive voluntary funding from the community by sending out mailings had been disappointing. Eide claimed that this was an indication that people in the community no longer wanted the service. “That being true, the MVTVD Board has taken the position that ‘we can make you take our service anyway’ by making this assessment.” Eide said.
Eide said he felt that the whole thing could be settled by putting it on the ballot for the community to vote on.
MVTAB member, Guy Doty, stated that he was in favor of the proposed assessment. He agreed with the notion that it was an issue for the community good and was worth doing.
Doty also liked the idea of taking a vote in the community. “But I don’t know how you could hold an initiative for every tax issue that comes up,” he said. “In the final analysis, I support this tax.”
Metz made a motion to request the TV District to hold its decision to make the assessment until it could be put to a general vote at the next election in November. The board approved this motion unanimously.
At the April 10 MVTVD Board meeting, before the vote was taken, the idea of an election was raised again. Matt LaCroix of the Clark County Northeast Office told the board that he had spoken to County Commissioner Bruce Woodbury earlier that day. Woodbury had voiced his support of the previous night’s MVTAB vote and urged the TV District to hold an election regarding the assessment in November, LaCroix said. The commissioner did recognize, however, that the MVTVD is a 318 district elected by the community, LaCroix added.
Pray responded that, while he liked the idea of putting the issue to a vote, the TV district didn’t have the luxury of waiting for a November ballot initiative. “We have to have our materials in to the county by the end of April in order to get on the tax rolls in June,” Pray said. The date when all primary broadcast would change over to digital was February, 2009, Pray said. Waiting for a vote would be to delay another year and would effectively put the district out of service, he added.
MVTVD Board Member, Craig Fabbi pointed out that this was the third year that the TV District was going through the process of making the assessment. This was the first year that any opposition had been raised, he said.
“This is not a new thing,” Fabbi said. “We’ve met here in board meetings time and time again; usually without an audience or with very few people here; and discussed all of these things,” Fabbi said. “The newspaper has reported it extensively for the past two years. The feedback we have received before this has all been positive. The Town Board in 2006 urged us forward. This is the end of a long process. A lot of resources have been devoted to it thus far. We have had only positive feedback in the past. We don’t have a lot of option now but to continue on.”
Fabbi made a motion to approve the $24 annual assessment. The motion was accepted with a unanimous vote of the board.
