Opinion ID: 2593976
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: The opponents' complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief

Text: Because of the difference between the March 8 version filed with the Secretary of State and the version circulated among voters, and on the basis that the initiative, in violation of NRS 295.009, embraced more than one subject, the opponents filed a complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief in the district court to prevent the initiative's placement on the ballot. The opponents' complaint was supported with, among other things, a memorandum, several affidavits, and exhibits, including financial data. According to the opponents' memorandum and supporting documents, the discrepancy between the two versions of the petition in section 4(4) is substantive and massive, amounting to more than a $1.5 billion difference in the initial 2009-2011 state spending limit. Financial analysts assessing the fiscal impact of the different budgetary bases set forth in the two versions of the petition at between $1,390,944,845 and $1,574,747,078 [2] attested that their assessment was based on estimated inflation and population growth in the state between 2006 and 2009, using an average from past years adjusted for projected trends in growth, and that this methodology is sound and well-accepted in the field of public finance. The analysts further attested that state government spending has historically (per biennium period in 1989 through 2007) grown at a rate of 19.3 percent per year but the circulated version of the TASC initiative would allow for a 21-percent increase in state spending during the 2009-2011 budget cycle. In other words, the circulated version promotes a growth in spending beyond Nevada's historic rate of spending growth. On the other hand, the analysts determined that the filed March 8 version would have capped the growth in state spending at 7.4 percent over the previous biennium. Additionally, the director of the nonpartisan Legislative Counsel Bureau (LCB), with the help of the Bureau's Fiscal Analysis Division, calculated that the fiscal impact on spending limits between the two versions amounted to a $1.68 billion difference. This calculation was based on the legislatively approved budget for the 2005-2007 biennium, less funds not included in the TASC initiative's scope and less any amounts authorized but not spent. The LCB's analysis compared the spending limit between the circulated and filed versions, concluding that the circulated version would allow for $13,691,480,461 in spending, whereas under the filed version, spending would be limited to $12,013,868,231, amounting, approximately, to a $1,677,623,230 difference. In other words, the circulated version, which would be presented to voters on the ballot, provided for 14-percent more spending than the filed version.