Hill promises tax reform, end to ‘billionaire giveaways’ in gubernatorial campaign announcement

By Dana Gentry

Nevada Current

Washoe County Commission Chair Alexis Hill says if she’s elected governor of Nevada she’ll put an end to tax giveaways to billionaires such as Elon Musk. Washoe County, she noted, lacks the infrastructure to support Musk’s factories.

“We know from the Governor’s Office of Economic Development that these do not pencil,” Hill, a Democrat, said Thursday at her gubernatorial campaign announcement in Las Vegas. “The juice isn’t worth the squeeze.”

Attorney General Aaron Ford, also a Democrat, declared his candidacy in late July for the state’s top spot, and announced Thursday he’s raised more than $1.1 million since.

Ford, who served as senate majority leader before his election as AG, voted in 2014 to approve a $1.3 billion tax incentive package for Musk’s Gigafactory in Storey County and in 2016 for $750 million in public funding for Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.

Hill praised Ford, who she said “has committed his life to state service.” She said she’s running because she doesn’t think “the change that we need is actually happening. And so I’m not scared because the establishment has supported AG Ford.”

The difference between herself and Ford is “I’m not afraid to tell you what I think. … I believe in fighting Trump, but it’s more than just filing lawsuits against Trump,” she said, referring to Ford’s filings, in tandem with Democratic attorneys general from other states, against Trump’s initiatives such as ending birthright citizenship.

“I’m more of a policy wonk than a bomb thrower,” said Hill, a Reno native who is serving her second term on the commission.

Hill is largely unknown in Southern Nevada and acknowledges she is learning the issues, which she says appear to be similar to those in Washoe, “just bigger.”

As local governments struggle to provide basic services, Hill says now is the time to start the process of tweaking the state’s property tax cap, which limits increases to 3 percent for a primary residence and 8 percent for a commercial property.

Efforts to make even minor adjustments to the cap have failed.

“I actually think that a lot of lawmakers want to see this happen and need someone to lead the charge,” she said.

Hill acknowledges her experience is confined to local government, where she worked as a planner before running for the commission.

“I have been told that it is not my time to run for office and that I need to wait my turn,” Hill said, adding she considers her lack of service in state government to be an asset. “I am closer to the people. I am a fed-up mom. I know Nevada can be better.”

In addition to ending tax giveaways to the wealthy, Hill promised to:

—tax corporate investments as assets;

—reset property tax upon sale “to ensure people are paying their fair share when they come into our community;”

—impose temporary caps on rent;

—ensure companies that employ electric vehicles and pay no gas tax, such as Amazon and Tesla, contribute to road construction and maintenance; and,

—get the unhoused the help they need. “The federal funding is not going to be coming to us anymore,” she said.

Hill characterized Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo’s $100 million housing initiative, which is intended to subsidize market rate housing for homebuyers earning up to 150 percent of area median income, as a “drop in the bucket for the real construction costs that it takes to build housing.”

By capturing tax revenue lost to “folks who are taking advantage of tax controls in our state,” governments can do more at the local and state levels.

Hill says she supports Sen. Jacky Rosen’s plan to release federal land for housing in Northern Nevada because it conserved sensitive lands. She says she “believes in infill,” which she considers critical to achieving the density required to make mass transit work.

She says she’s campaigned on a platform of workforce housing, but has taken heat from some residents of Lake Tahoe’s Incline Village and Crystal Bay communities, who say her support for greater density, on the commission and as a member of the Tahoe Regional Planning Authority, is exacerbating water quality issues, supplanting affordable housing with luxury development, and increasing the threat of an evacuation disaster in the event of a wildfire.

Some Tahoe residents say they are considering filing a lawsuit against Washoe County, which last week adopted housing amendments approved by TRPA.

“I don’t even know if these code amendments will get as much housing as we need,” Hill said. “But it’s a start, and I don’t want to just sit around and do nothing.”

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Dana Gentry is a native Las Vegan and award-winning investigative journalist. She is a graduate of Bishop Gorman High School and holds a Bachelor's degree in Communications from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.