RULES CHANGE COULD THREATEN SMOKING PETITIONS

Three initiatives that would amend state laws on smoking and marijuana
use could be disqualified in the next few days, and backers are
hinting they might take the issue to court.

Groups supporting two different smoking bans and a relaxation on the
state's marijuana laws thought they had gathered enough signatures to
put their issues in front of the state Legislature in the 2005 session.

Now some are saying that they feel the rules are being unfairly
changed.

Counties weren't due to give final tallies of signatures from the
groups until late Monday, but all three groups had produced thousands
of extra signatures and were feeling confident they had plenty.

One of the clean air groups even held a happy hour Friday afternoon to
celebrate.

Yet word circulated Monday that the secretary of state's office was
waiting on a legal opinion before allowing the measures to qualify,
saying that the groups might have misinterpreted the number of
signatures they needed.

According to a handbook put out by the secretary of state's office
earlier this year, people seeking to amend state law had to collect
51,337 signatures by Nov. 9. That's 10 percent of the votes cast in
the 2002 general election.

The secretary of state's office received a complaint several weeks ago
that those instructions don't jibe with the state Constitution, which
requires petitions to contain "10 percent or more of the voters who
voted in the entire state at the last preceding general election."

Technically, the last general election was on Nov. 2, just days before
the petitions were turned in on Nov. 9.

Based on voter turnout for the 2004 election, groups would need 83,156
valid signatures.

Supporters of the petitions said it's ridiculous to hold them to the
2004 election standards, pointing out that the 2004 election results
were not even certified until Nov. 23 -- two weeks after the petition
signatures were due.

But Chief Deputy Secretary of State Renee Parker said her office is
concerned that the Constitution clearly states that petition
signatures must correlate with the number of votes cast in the last
election.

A state Supreme Court ruling in 1994 followed a strict interpretation
of the Constitution, finding in a recall election that the number of
petition signatures needed must correspond with the last election that
was held, Parker said.

Parker said her office is consulting with its liaison in the attorney
general's office to get an unofficial opinion on the matter.

"We have no intention at this point of saying 2004 or 2002 numbers,"
she said. "We're waiting for the attorney general's office to get back
to us on that."

Parker said she hopes for a ruling in the next few
days.

Buffy Martin, the government relations director for the American
Cancer Society, is one of the many petition drive organizers awaiting
the ruling.

Her group is one of about 25 in the Nevada Tobacco Prevention
Coalition, which is pushing the the Nevada Clean Indoor Air Act, a
tough smoking ban on all public places except the gaming areas of
casinos, standalone bars, brothels and tobacco retail stores.

"We're not going to react until we actually have something to react
to," she said Monday.

Still, Martin said her group, which turned in more than 77,000
signatures, followed the rules in the secretary of state's manual and
kept in constant communication with the office, which she said never
indicated that the 2004 standards would be used.

"We were never informed that those numbers might change," she
said.

Patrick Smith, who is helping to represent the Smokefree Coalition,
which is supporting a looser set of restrictions on smoking, said the
coalition has received no official word about whether his group's
initiative would qualify for the ballot.

The Responsibly Protect Nevadans from Second-Hand Smoke Act would
prohibit smoking in open public areas such as day care centers,
grocery stores and restaurants. Establishments with nonrestricted
gaming licenses, including bars, strip clubs and casinos, could allow
smoking.

The group, funded largely by local bars and casinos, turned in more
than 93,000 signatures and reportedly would qualify under 2002
standards but not under 2004 standards.

"We're still moving forward with our plan," Smith said. "We'll just
wait to see if anything happens."

Backers of the regulation of the marijuana measure, which would
legalize up to 1 ounce of marijuana while strengthening laws against
driving under the influence, could not be reached for comment.

The Committee to Regulate and Control Marijuana submitted more than
84,000 signatures.

Parker said the secretary of state's office is aware that the 2004
election results were not officially certified when the petitions were
due.

Also, she said, the office realizes that groups started collecting
signatures months before the 2004 elections and could not have known
how many people would vote.

"Our first reaction was, OK, they turned it in after Nov. 2, but they
couldn't have possibly known prior to Nov. 2 what the Nov. 2 turnout
would have been," she said.

Still, the 1994 state Supreme Court case, which Parker said was a very
similar situation, convinced the secretary of state's office that it
had to seek an official legal ruling.

"We looked at it and said, 'We need the AG's advice on this,' " Parker
said. "We'll go with what they say."

Tom Sargent, a spokesman for the sttorney general's office, said he
cannot discuss any informal advice his office might give to the
secretary of state because of attorney-client privilege.