Garth Price

Garth Price

Garth Price

Mineral County Commission Seat B

My Name is Garth Price; I’ve lived in Mineral County/Hawthorne my whole life and have no plans on leaving. I love and care about Mineral County with all my heart and always have. I’ve been a very active member of the community as long as I can remember. I was very active all throughout school, holding many of different positions on the student counsel. My senior year I received the “Most Outstanding Citizen Award” for Mineral County High School.

I served on the Hawthorne Volunteer Fire Department for five years, working my way from a junior firefighter to serving as the president of the board for a year. The fire department taught me a lot about myself and how important team work is. I currently work as a Water Operator at SOC Hawthorne Army Depot. I’ve been there now for four years and have worked in a few different positions. I look forward to serving this county as a commissioner and can’t wait to get to work.

What is the most important issue facing Mineral County at this time?

I believe I-11 is one of the most important issues at this time, we 100 percent need to keep working to make sure that mineral county sees I-11. I think the planning commission has the right ideas and are moving forward very fast. With the help of the commissioners and the town letting the state know that Mineral County wants I-11 i think we stand a great chance.

What can be done to ensure the future of Walker Lake?

Walker Lake always has been and will always be incredibly important to Mineral County, both for our local environment and our economy. Walker Lake has been mistreated for far too long and our county must put forth a better effort to ensure fresh water inflow to Walker Lake. The Walker Lake Working Group along with Senator Harry Reid’s office have been working for years to find a solution to restore Walker Lake to levels that will allow fish life. This is not an issue we should sit back and hope someone else will fix. The county commissioners, along with the community will need to increase efforts to make sure we save Walker Lake and keep it healthy for future generations. The State of Nevada must stand with Mineral County in order for Walker Lake to be saved. As commissioner I will do all that I can to do, to help save Walker Lake and put pressure on the state to assist with the efforts.

What is the best way to attract new business to Mineral County?

I think if we would take pride in our town again and clean up our neighborhoods and Main Street, it would help when business came to Mineral County and see that we were proud of our town. Also as commissioners if we put 100 percent in these business pursuing Mineral County and not give up on them, show these people that Mineral County wants them and are willing to help them any way possible.

What needs to be done to improve the quality of education in Mineral County?

First and foremost I think we need to remember that the children are number one. Also I think as commissioners we could do a better job working with the school board to all be on the same page. We could look within the county’s budget to help out the school district as much as possible. As well as using all resource within the school to seek out and apply for grants that’ll keep us moving ahead in the future.

What is your vision of the future for Mineral County?

A nice healthy/ big lake with lots of people taking advantage of it in the summer time. A clean community with happy residents. I think it’s time we get Mineral County back on the map again. We have so much potential within this county and its people; we just need to start taking advantage of it. I have a lot of plans for the county and can’t wait to get to work.

Richard Bryant

Mineral County Commission Seat A

What is the most important issue facing Mineral County at this time? Pursuing economic development. Mineral County is a poor county. About 97 percent of the count is owned in some manner by the U.S. Government, making it tax exempt. That leaves us a very small tax base to work with. For the past 20 years, we have almost been living off of a residential tax base, with limited revenues. The result has been limited revenues and funds for county government and our schools. Economic development covers three main areas: industrial/business, tourism and housing. Economic development also means taking care of and protecting the businesses you already have by supporting them as best you can, we cannot afford to lose any more. As entities within our county, we must coordinate our efforts and become successful in our quest for development. If we fail, county government and the school district will continue to struggle for funding, small businesses and employers will continue to struggle, as will our communities within the county.

What can be done to ensure the future of Walker Lake?

It was about 40 years ago that I was part of a protest in front of the state capitol carrying signs that read “SAVE WALKER LAKE”. As you can tell, Walker Lake, Mineral County and the Walker River Paiute Tribe have been on the short end of all the proceedings for all these years. Not only has Lyon County and the irrigation district fought us, but the state has sided against us as well. The state has spent hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars on Lake Tahoe over the years for economic reasons while at the same time allowing Walker Lake to die and become unfit for use. The lake dying had a severe impact on our local economy. We lost three sporting goods stores, two fishing charter businesses, fishing derbies and all the winter and summer usage the lake provides. Also lost was the business all these visitors provided to locals stores and vendors. Property value at Walker Lake Township has also taken a financial hit. Does the state give a hoot? Of course not. (At least not yet). We must continue our legal efforts thru every available channel to restore water rights to Walker Lake. It will not be resolved overnight, but it is a fight that must be fought and not only for water, but for compensation as well.

What is the best way to attract new business to Mineral County?

We need to do several things. We need to put pride back into our largest community, Hawthorne. If elected, my first action, if I can get another commissioner to support me, would be to suspend the gate fees at the landfill. Next would be a voluntary effort to clean up Hawthorne. It would start by having several county-sponsored clean-up days over the first few months. County-owned property would be a priority for clean-up. I challenge everyone, drive all around our town and ask yourself, “Would you want to move your business here and have yourself and your employees buy homes here?” Let’s get our pride back and clean up voluntarily.

Next, we have some real negatives against us, but we still have some real positives to market. First the negatives. We have about the highest tax rate in the state, with two assessments on top of it. We do not have any interstate or railway access making shipping and receiving more expensive. We have propane, not natural gas. Our available workforce is largely unskilled and unprepared. Some of our positives. We have land with infrastructure available. We have an outstanding airport that has room for hangers and expansion. We have large parcels of land thru out the county that are available. While we may be ill-suited for many types of businesses, we are perfectly suited for many others. Again, we need to coordinate our development efforts, properly fund them and aggressively pursue these businesses if we are to succeed.

What needs to be done to improve the quality of education in Mineral County schools?

This is a question that is more appropriate for the school board or school board candidates than for a candidate for county commissioner. I have been on the school board and I know that the State Department of Education evaluates the schools and sends the report to the local school board on what needs to be done to improve the quality. It is up to the school board to implement these recommendations. From prior experience and from having been a substitute teacher in our schools, I will say this. Our schools, like the county will continue to struggle with funding for everything, to include wages. Teacher turn-over does affect quality as does being unable to fill vacant positions. Discipline within the classroom is vital to the learning process. One disruptive student in the classroom usually ends the learning process for that classroom for that day. And it happens far too often in our schools. It probably is not your child that is being the problem, but it is your child that is not learning that day, which is your problem because your child is falling behind. Parents need to support their children, teachers, administration and school board and make every day at school a day of learning. That would help quality.

What is your vision of the future for Mineral County?

I envision a county that is working together aggressively to accomplish economic development in all three areas of business, tourism and housing. I see a board of commissioners that is again holding meetings in Schurz, Walker Lake and Mina to listen to people in those communities. I see the development of a formal vocational school so we can train our unskilled and untrained workforce and perhaps reduce some of the local drug usage in our communities. Schurz has much the same problems that we do, an unskilled and untrained workforce, high unemployment and drug usage. We could work with the tribe also, as any increase in employment opportunities here will also result in employment opportunities for the tribe. I envision high usage of our airport and expansion of the hanger area, there have been several serious inquiries recently. We are blessed with a large number of intelligent and well-educated people in our county. The hard part is getting them involved. We will need a lot of them to become involved to be successful. I envision seeing people within the county that finally realize that the success that we all wish and hope for is bigger and more important than any one of them as individuals or any differences that divide us and join and make efforts a truly all for one team effort where every one becomes a winner in the long run and where each township grows to the potential it wants to. I want to see river water return to the lake on a regular flow. I envision the mission at the Hawthorne Army Depot continuing strong and healthy with solid employment numbers and some mining activity picking up again. This is how I see the future.

Chris Hegg

Chris Hegg

Chris Hegg

Mineral County Commission Seat A

Hello Mineral County citizens. My name is Chris Hegg and I am asking for your vote for Mineral County Commissioner, Seat A. I am committed to my county and it’s citizens and believe I have the skills needed to be a steward of your tax money and bring to the table ideas that will better everyone’s livelihood’s in our county. Budget is the key and I will focus on that discussion here. I grew up in Luning where we as a community got things done together. I still believe in this united front and feel it is time we get new ideas on the table and get everyone’s involvement in those ideas. We need to step up efforts toward tourism, bolster our existing businesses, attract new businesses and get rid of garbage disposal as our main topic! Our topics should include job postings, senior citizen facility improvement updates, school rejuvenation progress and all the community events we just can’t miss this month! We need to partner with the districts, businesses, groups and community to make this happen.

Among the many budgets I was in charge of, I maintained the school district’s technology budget and wrote grants totaling almost 1.5 million in five years including helping on a coattail on the Federal Educational bill. And I see many opportunities missed now for funding new projects, like charging Special Use Permit fees for improvements that use or alter our tax maintained streets and roads for bigger business. Assuring we capture grant and Forest service funding is paramount. We need to remain vigilant for these missed opportunities and capitalize on them to bring needed revenue for capital projects. Your tax dollar should circulate within the county departments as much as possible before exiting to get us the most bang for the buck. Spending toward duplicate resources outside the county instead of circulated between separate budgets in-house as much as possible drains the coffers and diverts extra funds that must then be replenishing instead of used for improvements. On that note, improving our county facilities so our staff can do more also means less spending in the long run. It is great to dream up ideas needing funding to accomplish, but first we must find and then plug up any leaks in the budget to get stability for that growth.

Visit my Facebook page http://facebook.com/VoteChrisHegg to learn more or contact me for topics of interest.

What is the most important issue facing Mineral County at this time?

My concern for several years has been the new I11 route and where it will be going through our County. Because if that route bypasses our county we would suffer from the economic impacts of losing a vital presence for transportation and tourism, resulting in loss of new and existing companies that provide jobs to sustain us now and in the future.

The fact that the Fallon Naval Base is retracting public lands in Northern Mineral County is a great concern, yet that segment of land they wish to restrict does play to our favor because it helps block that corridor as practical for the Interstate. Discussing the topic with Assemblyman Ira Hansen and our own Mark Nixon; Nixon explained the good news that the Navy base and Churchill County is on board with the tentative mapped route linking up with their requested county entry point. We need this route for future railroad access and to assure we get I11 routing close enough to remain a visible presence to the freeway traffic and not an out of the way detour. Mineral County remains centrally located along Highway 95 and also I11 to provide travelers and cargo movers services and resting stops. We can be the perfect travel destination between points and we need to start gathering our vision and capitalizing on that.

We have witnessed what devastation freeways have had on communities they bypass along Route 66, Lovelock and even our own short truck bypass. There are shining examples out there of towns what have recovered and thrived next to freeways using ways to divert traffic such as Temecula, Calif. does with giant downtown map billboards and promotional campaigns set along that corridor. It’s our turn. We need to control the outcome of our density and implement such ongoing changes on time to remain viable in the future.

What can be done to ensure the future of Walker Lake?

This should be the first question asked. Mineral County and Walker Lake has felt the effects of sustained droughts and deteriorating water sheds along with the impact of heavy commercial water right use in the adjoining valleys. Changes in the current laws and lobbying to make these outdated water use laws and issues know to everyone is paramount to deal with the legal side of this. And only our community’s active groups, with assistance from what federal and state resources we are offered, are going to win that effort. We must support our groups more and unite to get every asset to them they need to continue spearheading this fight. You want to see action, throw Toby Montoya and the Walker Lake Working Group/Crusaders a real bone and see what heads they knock with it. They are not playing around. You may have noticed all those ongoing efforts of signs, maps, stickers and social media campaigns and legal meetings they are doing with pretty much nothing given on our end. Let’s give them some real teeth for this fight for once and see what happens is all I have to say.

I spoke with several jet ski racing associations, I seen them at the Sparks Marina. They informed me they are starved for places to race and the competitors have cheap travel costs to places to race due to jet ski size. They were very interested in my idea of them coming to Walker Lake to race as saline water doesn’t affect them as much and wider tracks with less impact is what they crave. Points and cash prizes are the staple just like any racing and their big supporters can bring big attention to our saving Walker Lake. Same held true for the college outboard canoe racing teams who open ocean race for 20-30 mile distances. They were interested in a high altitude event and would love to bring support to our cause. They don’t mind rough conditions I am informed.

Sure, promotion is not the end all to win but neither is written legislature. Our controllable water sheds need maintained and brought back to a healthy status and then kept that way. If you think BLM or forestry is doing that now go sit by your favorite pine tree and listen to the pine beetles as they munch away killing them all off one by one. We have vast water shed resources in Mineral County that contribute to the lake and stream levels that need actual physical help to rebuild it back to flourishing aquifers and I am dedicated to seeing that happen. As you can guess, we need better oversite and control of our county public lands to save our trees, animals, water and our cultural resources. We cannot keep reacting to land takeovers and resource depletion after the fact, we must switch to be proactive in our approach and care enough to keep watchful for our future health.

What is the best way to attract new business to Mineral County?

To already be a stabilized and prepared county so we can all decide if that new business is the best fit for us. Would you be ready to take any kind of business that comes along to get jobs here right now? We are at that point aren’t we? My goal if elected is to swing around and take a look at what we have already. I keep repeating we are a diamond in the rough and what I mean by that is we have what it takes to bolster our schools, our community downtown images, our community support services and our available natural resources to shine up our county into an attractive and welcome place any business would want to set roots in and one healthy enough for our populous to decide which types of companies you choose to let in.

I want to partner with our businesses and community to get our vision united and begin connecting our look into a unique theme so we become strong in small business growth and tourism. We do not want to fall prey to big companies that may fall flat on promises we would otherwise take chances on. I think our eclectic history of explorers, mining, ranching, military and railroad give us an unprecedented opportunity to create a haven for a classic community design only dreamed of in other places. If you observe the remodeled businesses of Joe’s and the El Capitan, you will see some of that vision of our past has already resurfaced! If you take a drive around you will notice that look never left us. The old signs, fake fronts and building designs are still standing in many places and getting them working and “polished up” is all we would need to be on our way toward this goal. I believe expanding our museum into open ground static displays near key historic sites such as our old court house grounds is key to provide more walking discoveries for growing tourism which promotes business. Our historic white school could offer up as a Walker Lake history discovery museum. Do not forget our vast outdoor arena, vacant and underutilized, we need to promote the adventure destination we all love so dearly here and be a bustling little place flourishing with activity and with a healthy tax base. So when that big company does come calling we can get it.

What needs to be done to improve the quality of education in Mineral County schools?

As a citizen I am dedicated to our schools. I am willing to seek any way we can assist the school in accomplishing their mission while improving our old school facilities. The health of a rural school is proven to coincide with the gains or loss of business, families and heath care facilities around those communities. They are a part of the very foundation of a community.

Schools are becoming partners in business and municipals everywhere. They no longer have to remain on the single path of education but can team up to promote business, labor force and economics of a county and even bring in revenue and grants not possible without them.

The school bond issue is on the ballet again asking you to decide if you want to continue to divert county tax funds to the school for future facility upgrades. They are asking for what remains of the original bond payoff, which is exhausted in 2017, to continue to go to the school after that payoff so they can catch up on needed facility upgrades. If you do not pass the bond, that piece of the county tax money returns back to the county general fund to be used in the general fund plus the extra .2 cents that was increased by the initial bond. Voters will decide soon on this issue but I believe if the bond is not approved, the board of commissioners should lower the tax rate by removing the current increase of .2 cents as it was added because of the bond.

If the bond is voted down, you place that funding and any possible school district upgrade assistance from those funds back in the hands of the commissioners. I am committed to partner with the school if I win commissioner so we can still assist with funding to get facilities upgraded in a detailed and long-term planned approach. Just as our county does now with the working agreement with the district so labor resources can be shared for facility upkeep. We have already seen businesses and families not come here due to the poor shape of our school and that hurts our tax base that keeps open all of our community support services. Balanced funding for the many needs of our communities in both repair, upkeep and improvement is how everyone will benefit.

We need to fund sidewalks around our school, not in big shots of money, but with a sustained plan of improvements in partnership with the School Board for accessibility and safety. We must keep our schools open and allow them to focus on their job and how they can improve their educational quality. It is not us against them as they are our communities heart and soul we all connect with and derive our feeling of ownership for our community from. “Once a Serpent always a Serpent”. We need to get building and trades classes going strong again. We are a small enough entity that combining resources in unique ways to accomplish these goals is not hard. Our school to work program should incorporate county based job training for willing students to gain experience and us to gain a built-in trained workforce. Communities offer ways to allow past residents and children ways to come home with a guaranteed job for a time and so should we. Ask how many separate vehicle fleets and mechanic shops exist. And different budget moneys that are spent outside our equipped county yards? Cohesive shared resource allocation and required service charges from division to division in-house by every entity in our county is a necessity and reduces overhead for the affected budgets to sustain these needed projects at the school district and within the county as a whole.

I have looked at how the vocational metal building at the high school could be renovated cheaply to accommodate more rooms and later added onto for more space in steps and reasonably. Modular classroom and office units can be bought cheap and placed around it like many districts use today and the front school building can be torn down when that is achieved. Our vocational rooms are very oversized now for our school and more reasonable spaces could be made to replace them. The library could be kept for making an administration office in front when completed. All of these projects could be done reasonably and would save money while modernizing our high school/junior high.

What is your vision of the future for Mineral County?

As you see in my answers my vision is to have a unified vision we can come together on and implement starting right now. If you decide my role is to be one of your next commissioners I would work with my constituents to bring about change to improve public lands access by increasing free outside funding that pays our grader operator wages and strengthens our search and rescue team and find grants that continue to buy us equipment so our budget doesn’t. An all-out focus on grants would be priority and project preparations for capital improvements with no funding must be readied and available so when those grants surface we can go after them. Creating a tight and balanced budget to assure we can move ahead with ideas using creative thinking as a united front.

I wish to remove the extra dumping charge at the waste facility and open it allowing us all to continue to clean the towns up and use cuttings and weed removal material and dirt for coverage reuse on the garbage there. I wish to reverse the charge by taking citizens names who bring up yard and trimmings debris and apply something like a deduction to their own garbage bill monthly and double that to companies who provide any free cleanup services to citizens bringing extra loads by giving the company a deduction and the assisted citizen the deduction to promote local comradery. Trash should not rule our daily lives here.

I envision Mineral County as a destination spot with diverse businesses where tourists find our beautiful towns, lake and mountains full of historic interest and adventurous things to do. Where our classic look keeps them around longer and seeing the change where returning guests are frequent. Our newly formed Flying Club will bring “Fly In” events to the airport bringing pilots from all over. Our lake and lands will have events with large promotional sponsorship driving sport spectator visitation. The county riparian zones and water sheds will be well on their way back to a healthy status. The newly completed USA Parkway extension will be flooding thousands more freight trucks and visitors across our borders weekly who stop here in the middle on their way through with newly hired employees able to transit clear to the parkway living in Hawthorne with our diverse and growing business foundation. We work with all sizes of business to get them going, keep them going and help them grow. Our public lands committee keeps an eye on our land status and we are able to act on the first sign of trouble. We maintain a monthly checkup status informing you the voter what is going on so you don’t have to be at every meeting while working and raising your kids. Everyone from 9-99 knows what is going on in our county and has plenty of community events to keep them here and keep them busy.