This Is Reno obtained two-and-a-half years of City of Reno public records on discretionary spending to see how the Mayor and City Council members spent those funds. Hours were dedicated to poring over numerous travel receipts, city council donations, candidate disclosures and other documents. Findings reveal that some council members have used their budgets for extravagant and at times what appears to be personal travel that may violate city policies. Expenses also have unclear benefits for the Reno community.
This is part four in a 10-part series, which is being published over the coming days. Read the complete series here. Subscribe here to get access to all This Is Reno articles.
Nevada’s code of ethics for public officers and employees restricts using their position to gain “unwarranted privileges, preferences, exemptions or advantages” for themselves and from “using governmental time, property, equipment or other facility to benefit a significant personal or pecuniary interest.”
The code goes on to state that limited use of governmental resources is allowable for personal purposes if “the cost or value related to the use is nominal and the use does not create the appearance of impropriety.”
John Pelissero, director of government ethics at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University, said deciphering personal versus community benefit boils down to looking at the expenses.
“One might need to look for any expenses or reimbursement requests associated with the travel that are not part of the official’s duties or purpose for the travel,” Pelissero said. “Elected officials should always be able to demonstrate that they are not mixing official city business with private, campaign-related interests.”
Findings in a recent internal audit of the University of Nevada’s Extension service show how travel expenses can be unclear because of inadequate documentation. An employee requested reimbursement for a rental car and parking while staying at the conference hotel, giving the impression the car was for personal activities on the trip.
“My reputation for being fair, kind, and ethical is important to me and my family.”
-Reno City Council member Devon Reese
The reality was that the conference was 200 miles from the airport and the car was needed to get there. Auditors said proper justification and description of travel would help to demonstrate the business purpose of the expense.
Justifications such as this were not found in any of the travel records provided by the City of Reno for council members or the mayor.
A search of the Nevada Commission on Ethics’ database of opinions handed down over nearly five decades revealed cases that appear to have similarities to the Reno mayor and council member expenditures.
In 2020, the commission reviewed a complaint where Clark County School District Superintendent Jesus Jara was accused of using district resources for personal travel. Details in the opinion reveal that Jara added personal travel to work-related trips he’d taken to Boston and New York, taking advantage of the district-paid flight to spend some extra time in each place. Jara’s travel requests identifying the personal travel were approved and complied with district policy. The airfare costs did not increase because of his personal travel, and “he did not seek reimbursement or expense the District for the cost of this personal travel.”
He was, therefore, cleared of any potential wrongdoing. Had he billed expenses on those extra, non-work days back to CCSD, he likely would have been found guilty of violating ethics laws.
In the opinion, commissioners noted: “When a public officer or public employee requests a governmental entity pay all or a portion of his personal travel there is a likelihood that such conduct would be sufficient to create an appearance of impropriety to implicate a violation of the Ethics Law. In safeguarding the public’s trust in government, the Commission considers these matters seriously and urges governmental entities to be transparent and avoid a perception of impropriety, partiality or favoritism by its public officers and employees.”
In city travel records, Reno City Council members at times arrive at a conference city days early or stay additional days without providing a purpose or schedule of city-related activities.
In another opinion rendered in 2020, commissioners said an audit found that former Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority CEO Rossi Ralenkotter booked “personal/non-business travel totaling approximately $17,000 … through the in house LVCVA travel office for Ralenkotter and his family members and paid for with Southwest Airline gift cards,” which were purchased by the LVCVA.
The commissioners ruled that Ralenkotter violated state ethics laws. He was forced to pay more than $24,000 in fines for the ethics violations. He was also charged with multiple felonies and accepted a plea deal. He remains a celebrated figure at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, however.
Both Reno Mayor Hillary Schieve and Council member Devon Reese have had ethics complaints filed against them in the past, but neither were fined or disciplined. Members of the commission in January, in a split vote, could not agree that Schieve violated ethics laws by failing to disclose a business relationship, but they strongly encouraged her to take ethics training.
Reese, in 2022, was the subject of a complaint to the state ethics commission, which resulted in a deferral agreement. The complaint alleged that Reese violated the personal benefit portion of the ethics code as well as the portion dealing with conflicts of interest by engaging in city labor negotiations without disclosing that the unions were represented by the law firm where he was a partner. Commissioners ruled there was no evidence to support the former, but there was evidence to support the latter. The commission found there was enough evidence to advance the complaint to a full-panel review.
Reese instead signed the deferral agreement that required him to take an ethics course in order to avoid a full-panel determination over whether, in fact, he ultimately violated state ethics laws.
Following local news reports on the agreement, Reese took to social media on June 1, 2023, to share his thoughts.
“I work hard to be the best, most ethical public servant I can be,” he wrote. “One of the challenges of being a public servant these days is constantly having your ethics not just questioned but maligned, especially based on misunderstandings or misreporting. … My reputation for being fair, kind, and ethical is important to me and my family.”
Read part five tomorrow.
