Election Guide News, voter information Gary Hollis Harley Kulkin Nye County Commission District Boundaries Advertisement

The Nye County Commission District 3 race pits Republican Gary Hollis in his bid for a second term, against Harley Kulkin, a Democrat.

District 3 includes much of the west side of Pahrump.

HARLEY KULKIN

Kulkin ran unsuccessfully for state assembly in 2006, and county District 1 commissioner in 2004. Kulkin owns Servco, a heating and air-conditioning business. He hosts a television show "Eye on Nye." Kulkin switched his residency this year to run in District 3.

"You've got somebody who's been in office four years and I think if the average person asked themselves what that person has done, they aren't going to come up with much," Kulkin said.

Hollis wasn't solely responsible for getting the Home Depot built or roads paved, he said.

Kulkin's campaign song is Tom Petty's composition, "I Won't Back Down."

"I've been in this community 15 years and I haven't given up. Most of the time you see people getting involved and after two or three years they've given up," he said.

Kulkin is strongly against the proposed federal detention center.

"The county is broke, the county has misappropriated the impact fee money that's supposed to be only used for a specific purpose. So they're looking at this as a shot in the arm (for the economy) without any regards for what will happen in the future. It's not Home Depot, it's not Wal-Mart, it will bring a lot of negative things into the community," he said.

Nye County could have a contract with another entity besides Corrections Corporation of America, Kulkin said. He also questioned the logic of a 20-year development agreement.

"These are desperate people. They're not leaders because leaders plan and look into the future," he said. "If we want to attract legitimate businesses why would we want to be known as a brothels and prison town?"

Kulkin said incorporation is not the solution to Pahrump's problems, it would be duplicate government. Instead, he thinks Nye County should be divided in half around Beatty, the northern half should be merged with Esmeralda County.

Nye County should look in the other direction to annex land, he said.

"We know there's Clark County land in our valley, a lot of it before you get up to Mountain Springs. What a lot of people don't know is a lot of that land is on the BLM disposal list and is coming up for disposal in the next couple years. We don't know what Clark County is going to do with that land."

Kulkin said he's not against growth, he just wants "quality growth."

"I concern myself with density and I would like to see a rule of thumb, if you got 40 acres you get 40 lots," Kulkin said. "It's not about size, it's about controlling density. I don't mind growth at all. But what are we doing now? We're spot zoning."

Kulkin said the sheriff's department staff need more training, not more deputies.

"They bring a lot of lawsuits upon themselves because they have such poorly trained officers," he said.

"The fire department is out of control with its spending," Kulkin said. "To put out a fire all we need is something that will squirt water."

Kulkin said Nye county is "the most business unfriendly place I've ever seen. We're in tough economic times we should be bending over backwards and yet we're telling people they should pave their parking lot for their business even though the street in front is made of dirt."

Kulkin said he'd do anything to get wind and solar power in Nye County, though it's not really a big employment base. Instead, Nye County should capitalize on tourism from nearby Las Vegas, like building a theme park, he said.

"The bottom line, I believe Pahrump has a potential to be a great place to live, raise a family and retire and I believe that hasn't happened because we haven't had the right people in office."

GARY HOLLIS

Hollis has lived in Pahrump since 1969, and he is a Vietnam veteran. Hollis was formerly a resident of Las Vegas.

Hollis worked as a driller at the Nevada Test Site off and on from 1980 to 1988.

He served on the Pahrump Town Board from 1996 to 2000.

When asked what will be the big issues in the next four years, he said, "The big issue is the budget, of course, the way the economic times are. The sales tax going down is not going to be easy. The second one would be flood control. The bill we have in Congress is for, I believe, $2 million for Wheeler Wash."

Hollis has been an advocate for a dam project on Wheeler Wash to prevent flooding in the winery area.

He said the county is trying to take steps to limit spending in light of the declining revenues. Hollis said he stays in Pahrump and participates in the first meeting of the month in Tonopah by video conference to save money.

"I'm hoping that we don't have to lay off," Hollis said.

He said the settlement agreement pending with the U.S. Department of Energy for another five years of payments equal to taxes is very important. Congress is operating under a continuing resolution to fund budgets at the same level until March.

Hollis's opponent, Harley Kulkin, questioned what progress has been made in Nye County the last four years.

"We've got fire equipment from DOE that is scattered throughout the county," Hollis said. "We've done a lot of things on water. We have a new water district that we formed from the last legislative session."

Hollis said Nye County is drilling a well right now to study the water coming out of Yucca Mountain, one of several test wells drilled.

Hollis said Kulkin has been wrong on questioning his appointments, or statements that Pahrump should encourage larger, acre-and-a-quarter lots that were common in the old days.

"What he doesn't understand is the state isn't going to allow us to put 8,000 more septic tanks in this valley. They're going to shut it down," Hollis said.

While he welcomes renewable energy projects proposed in Amargosa Valley, Hollis questioned where the 14 companies seeking rights-of-way from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management are going to find water. There's also going to have to be a bigger transmission line, he said.

"Where are you going to find the water to run 14 solar projects? Each one uses say 1,000 or 800 acre feet of water," he said. "I don't know if there's 2,000 acre feet of water for sale in Amargosa Valley."

Hollis said Nye County has gone through all the public meetings necessary for the federal detention center, now being hotly debated. The county planning department sent notices to residents living near the proposed site on East Mesquite Avenue before rezoning the property, he said. The county commission also provided public notice before revising county code that required a 9.5 mile minimum distance to a correctional institution.

The only hurdle left is a development agreement to be executed by Corrections Corporation of America and Nye County.

"Taking that zoning back is going to be hard for the county without being sued. We have the development agreement. County staff today has been working numbers and going over with our attorneys what we can do legally," Hollis said. "We'll ask for whatever the law says legally we can ask for. The time has passed for public hearings."

Hollis said he would be in favor of voting for incorporating Pahrump if the correct information is presented. He would like to see a proposed city charter before agreeing to put the question of incorporation on the ballot.

A request for a ballot question on incorporation in front of commissioners this past year died for lack of a motion.

"They need to have the correct information. They were asking for $9 million from the sheriffs' department budget to start their city police. That would mean the sheriff's department would only have $3 million or $4 million to run the sheriff's department in the whole county," Hollis said.

Besides Wheeler Wash, another project Hollis was promoting was renovating the Calvada Eye building into a county commission meeting room with offices for county administration. Now it's slated for demolition.

Hollis said county commissioners and staff have to come up with a way to finance building a new county building on the Calvada Eye. The county commission recently voted to hire a design-build team to build two more courtrooms on East Basin Avenue. There's other needs as well, he said.

"We have to build a jail. The jail here is too small, it was only built for a holding facility and wasn't to be housing prisoners forever and that's something the commissioners are going to have to start addressing this year if not the first of next year," Hollis said.

His vote approving the half-cent sales tax for more sheriff's deputies and firefighters last December was a hard decision, Hollis said. But he agreed to vote for it if voters approved the ballot question. The sales tax increase passed by 18 votes but the county commission voted it down 3-2.

"I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't do what I said, when I placed it on the ballot. I don't think I have the right to tell voters they don't know what they're talking about," Hollis said.

Nye County should hire qualified people in the community instead of out-of-state consultants, Hollis said.

"As far as nuclear waste, we do have a lot of consultants, they're primarily scientific type people that work in geology and hydrology and nuclear engineering and that kind of stuff. I don't know if we have a lot of people that can consult from Pahrump but we will never know unless we advertise," he said.

Hollis defended much of the commissioners travel as being funded by the county oversight of the Yucca Mountain project.

"These dollars are not coming from the general fund. These dollars are coming from DOE so we can keep abreast of what's going on in the nuclear industry, so we can make decisions based on what we learned. What is a dry cask storage? What does it look like? How are they operating a power plant?"

Hollis admitted there's a lot of uncertainty about Yucca Mountain funding, if U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., gets elected president, who has vowed to pull the plug on the project.

"We get $11.5 million, or are supposed to get $11.5 million in January, If Yucca Mountain goes down the tubes so will that money. We'll survive, we'll do the best we can representing Nye County and trying to get economic development moving in some other direction," he said. "I worry more about above ground and below ground testing we did at the test site than I do Yucca Mountain."

Hollis said he thinks the Nye County Water District is needed and hopes they come to an agreement for water rights on the Nevada Test Site.

Nye County planning and public works has to be consistent in making decisions with developers and be more user friendly, he said.

"Time is money and if we want these businesses to come here we're going to have to be business friendly," he said.

Overall, when it comes to his performance on the commission, Hollis said, "I'm consistent. I don't change my vote because somebody asked me to change my vote. I do my homework, I look at the issues, I do what is best for Nye County," Hollis said.

"A lot of the issues are right down the line, 50 percent will like the decision I make, 50 percent will not like the decision. I have to base that decision on input from the public and the facts I get from staff."