RICHARD STEPHENS / PVT A land bill presentation had the attention of people who attended a Beatty Town Advisory Board meeting Wednesday night. Advertisement

Wednesday's Beatty Town Advisory Board meeting was a three-hour marathon prolonged and highlighted by lively debate over business licenses and burros.

Long-time resident Ron Oden, who has been leading a petition drive against the board's ordinance-revising efforts, said that enforcement of a business license would be a burden on small businesses, would discourage new businesses, and would be a hardship on people needing supplemental income.

Some of Oden's remarks were directed against board chairman Larry Gray and against Ed Ringle, who has bought up a number of local businesses. He also said that the board's efforts to have junk cars removed had cost him a month of his time and had caused him to give up his newspaper delivery business.

Bob Barlow, Donna Wright, and Alpheus Bruton also spoke against the business license. Barlow, who called the license a "usury tax," said it would hurt people trying to supplement limited incomes with whatever skills they might possess.

Donna Wright also said that the poorest people would be the ones who were hurt by it. Bruton contended that a local business license is redundant now that the state requires one.

Jolene Brown, who recently closed her Amargosa Toad store, spoke in favor of a business license. She said that if the board had adopted a $15 a day fee for vendors she had proposed years ago, the town could have by now collected more than $97,000 that could have aided its beautification efforts.

Gray moved to the public comment microphone to respond to Oden's comments. He said that Oden had turned his opposition to the ordinances into a personal attack. He also said that someone had maliciously scattered roofing nails all over the parking lot of his business.

As he has before, Gray explained that the proposal for an ordinance to control junk vehicles had resulted from a complaint from a resident, and that he felt he was doing his job by responding to it.

He also noted that he had tried to draft something more lenient than the state law but found out that this could not be done, so what was being enforced was state law.

Board member Joannie Jarvis said that the purpose of a business license is to protect both the public and business owners.

Other board members echoed that sentiment, with Gray saying that it would help "level the playing field" between business owners who have the expense of maintaining a store and paying taxes and fees and those who simply set up a table and an awning and sell.

Gray also said that having a local business license can be a benefit to a business, citing the difficulty of obtaining some wholesale catalogs without one.

Brad Hunt provided another example, saying that the Nevada Department of Transportation had been unable to award a restroom-cleaning contract to locals because they did not have a business license.

Bert Bertram and Theresa Sullivan said that the business license fees were not meant to be onerous or burdensome. Bertram referred to them as a "token amount." The board is considering a tiered fee system, with the lowest license fee being approximately $45 a year.

At the end of the discussion, Sullivan asked for a show of hands from the audience of those who favored the board's continuing to develop and implement a business license. A large majority of those present raised their hands.

The burro nuisance problem was less contentious, but the animals certainly had their supporters and detractors in the meeting.

Jarvis had asked to have the matter put on the agenda. "I feel the burros have bypassed nuisance and become a danger," she argued.

She said that they are destroying vegetation in the park, at the football field, and in people's yards. She also pointed out that they are a danger to vehicles at night when they are hard to see, and she said that she and her daughter were recently charged by one while they were walking in the evening.

Brad Hunt said that the Beatty General Improvement District has already sent a letter to the Bureau of Land Management, requesting a thinning. He said that "we are already about ten times over our quota."

Bob Barlow said that the burros were also getting into garbage dumpsters and scattering garbage.

Jarvis' husband Frank, who is in charge of the Beatty Sheriff's Office, said that there have been recent incidents of burros being hit by vehicles. He said that they also get through the fences onto the highway where they can cause serious accidents.

Some residents spoke in favor of the burros, saying they are a tourist attraction. Ron Rand said that this is open-range country, and that the burros have a right to be here.

The board voted to draft a letter to the BLM in support of the one already sent by BGID. They also responded favorably when Charlie Cook said that the acting BLM manager had requested being put on the agenda for the next town board meeting to discuss the matter with community members.

The acceptance by the board of a proposal for the Beatty Town Advisory Board and the Beatty General Improvement District and other local groups to participate in a "community collaboration project" with BLM facilitators seemed well timed, after town secretary Janet Rogers blasted the BGID's lack of oversight in managing its affairs and the board rejected a BGID request for funds to pay travel costs for a consultant to work on the riverbed trail plan.

Bertram and Gray objected to paying travel expenses for someone who was coming to town "to make money off of Beatty and sell his services."

The board did accept local artist Laura Cunningham as the artist for the town's first mural -- a railroad-themed piece to be placed on the side of the Janda Ribbons building that faces U.S. 95. Cunningham's bid of $9,411.66 (including cost of paint), was the lowest of those received.

Board members noted that this was logical, since Cunningham did not have to include travel expenses. They also approved up to $2,400 in cost of materials for the steel panel on which the mural will be painted and for framework to which it will be attached.

The board forwarded the contract for the project to the County Commission for final wording and approval.

Rogers noted that this will leave the mural committee with $5,000 in the portion of the beautification money set aside for murals.

Bertram asked for clarification from the Habitat Committee regarding charges for conference call meetings.

Committee chairwoman Shirley Harlan said that board member Ryan Tweney was out of town for several months and could participate only via teleconference.

He had offered to pay for the call, but they had discovered that the call, placed to the town office, could not be transferred to the room with the conferencing equipment. It had then become necessary for the call to be placed from the Beatty end.

Bertram was concerned that there might be legal issues involved, partly because the call was placed in order to achieve a quorum. After some discussion, the board decided to bill the BGID for the call, since the Habitat Committee now operates under that organization, and the BGID secretary said that future meetings could be held in the BGID building, which is set up for teleconferencing.

MaryEllen Giampaoli gave a broad presentation on the county's efforts to develop a Nye County public lands bill to propose to Congress.

This bill would be similar to bills proposed and passed for several other counties in the state. Along with addressing a number of lands use issues, the bill could allow the county to receive a portion of the proceeds from the sale of public lands in the county.

The process of developing this bill is complex, involving "stakeholders" both within and outside the county, including residents, land owners, government agencies, and a spectrum of special-interest groups.

Giampaoli said that the presentation in Beatty was the first of a series to be given in every community in the county, and that locals need to do their "homework" and be prepared to contribute to continuing discussion on the proposal.