No One Asked Me But… (October 31, 2018)

By DR. LARRY MOSES

No one asked me but... Last week I reviewed ballot Questions 1, 2, and 4. This week I will undertake a review of Questions 3, 5 and 6. After a discussion of each of these questions, I will reveal how I will vote on each question. I will review Question 3 and Question 6 together as they both deal with the electric power industry in Nevada.

Question 5: Shall Chapter 293 of the Nevada Revised Statutes be amended to establish a system that will automatically register an eligible person to vote, or update that person’s existing Nevada voter registration information, at the time the person applies to the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles for the issuance or renewal of any type driver’s license or identification card, or makes a request to change the address on such a license or identification card, unless the person affirmatively declines in writing?

While I maintain my reluctance to legislate by referendum and there is presently a myriad of methods to register to vote, I see little harm in the automatic voter registration offered in Question 5. Presently military personnel or others outside the country can register to vote by going to Nevada’s Secretary of State website. You can complete a voter registration when applying or updating your current registration on line during a change of address, license/ID or duplicate request. The new license application or renewal requires a passport, birth certificate, proof of naturalization, and two proofs of residence.

Question 5 eliminates the need to re-register every time you move, because your registration moves with you when you change your address with the DMV. Question 5 undoubtedly streamlines the registration process by automatically verifying eligibility and keeping voter records updated and accurate.

The operative words in Question 5 are “eligible person to vote”. One must understand that all persons who apply for a driver’s license or ID card are not eligible to vote. It is, therefore, important that all persons that are registered to vote under this law should prove that they are truly citizens. What in the past has been an opt-in process would now become an opt-out process.

I have no problem with Question 5 if safe guards are established to restrict the automatic registration to “eligible persons”. I will vote ‘Yes’ on Question 5.

This brings me to Question Three and Question Six. I will deal with them as one as they both are calling for an Amendment to the Nevada Constitution. Further, they both deal with the providing of electrical power in the state, and they both reflect the growing ‘Californication’ of Nevada.

Question Three: Shall Article 1 of the Nevada State Constitution be amended to require the Legislature to provide by law for the establishment of an open, competitive market that prohibits the granting of monopolies and exclusive franchises for the generation of electricity?
If this amendment is approved and enforced as written, it should not affect our local provider OPD #5. This amendment reads “prohibits the granting of monopolies and exclusive franchises for the generation of electricity”. OPD #5 does not generate electricity; it purchases electricity for the people in its service area.

One of the desires of the supporters of Question 3 is that they will be able to shop for the best prices from a number of for-profit generators of electricity that would be available in their service area. Let me suggest to you that we in the OPD #5 service area already have that option. OPD #5 is a non-profit quasi-governmental agency rule by the people in OPD #5’s service area. The company is run by a seven-member board elected by the people in the service area which hires an energy expert, who through his employees, shops for the best electricity for the best price throughout the United States. In essence, the people have the power to shop and have hired someone to shop for them. The people in the OPD #5 service area have the opportunity to provide their own power with personal solar panels, wind turbines, or any other ingenious method they so desire.

In full disclosure, I must tell you that I served on the OPD #5 board and was the President of the board for a number of years. I, however, am now merely a satisfied customer who can see no advantage in amending the State Constitution in this manner. I will vote NO on Question Three.

Question Six: Shall Article 4 of the Nevada Constitution be amended to require, beginning in calendar year of 2022, that all providers of electric utility services who sell electricity to retail customers for consumption in Nevada generate or acquire incrementally larger percentages of electricity from renewable energy resources so that by calendar year 2030 not less than 50 percent of the total amount of electricity sold by each provider to its retail customers in Nevada comes from renewable energy?

This amendment would require a gradual move to a position whereby all providers of electricity in the State of Nevada would by 2030 have to receive half of their electrical needs from renewable resources. What these resources are is not defined with specificity, but would probably include solar, geothermal, wind, biomasses and hydro-power.

While environmentalist have championed the cause of solar power in the state, I would suggest that the full ramifications of making the State of Nevada one large solar panel have not been fully explored. There has been little information forthcoming on the effect of large solar fields on the environment of the State.

We do know that birds are killed by solar fields and the land consumed by large solar fields are no longer available to animal or plant life. Wind turbines are harmful to bird life and a recent study has link them to global warming.

Now I must admit that I am not a champion of global warming, as a man-made disaster. But those who are must be willing to accept the fact that their drive for the reduction in fossil fuels is not necessarily the complete answer to the perceived problem.

Legislating by Constitutional Amendment is always a bad idea. No one can tell what the energy industry will look like in the future and any adjustment in the way energy is handled in the future would require a new amendment which is at least a four-year process. I will vote NO on both Question 3 and Question 6.

Thought of the week…The Constitution is the guide which I never will abandon.
– George Washington