Imagine being told you're free to open a Burger King or a Wendy's franchise -- as soon as you can demonstrate to state buraucrats that by doing so you won't reduce by a single dime the sales or profits of any of the city's existing McDonald restaurants, including the one across the street.
You wouldn't be able to do that, would you? The very reason you go (start ital)into(end ital) a business is because you believe you can offer better price or service than the public is getting now. Sure, you hope to develop new customers. But in a free market, you're also putting the competition on notice they'd better shape up, or you will indeed take away some of their trade.
Yet this seemingly absurd scenario is precisely what has ensnared any number of independent operators who have endeavored to go into the taxi or limousine business in Las Vegas, thanks to a Nevada state statute that sets precisely that requirement -- prove your new enterprise won't harm the existing businesses, or no charter.
The Washington-based Institute for Justice is even now pursuing a lawsuit in District Court on behalf of independent limousine drivers lke Bil Clutter and Rich Lowre, who -- having been denied charters -- tried to find ways to operate in the legal gray zone of "third party charters" or "tip-only service," from 1987 (when the current law was enacted) through the fall of 1998.
Busted by undercover police spies, however, Lowre now says "We're out of business. There've been bankruptcies, broken marriages. This is government by the lobbyists for the special interests. I come from one of the most corrupt cities in the country, which is Boston, but I've never seen anything like this."
Into this blatant protection racket disguised as "state regulation" now steps former policeman and Las Vegas City Councilman (and, oh yes, Convention and Visitors Authority Chairman) Michael McDonald, announcing that he intends to go into ... the limousine business.
Will the state transportation bureaucrats and the Bell family, operator of the company which Mr. Lowre's Washington attorney describes as controlling "90 percent of the market," now take the political risk of stepping forward and telling the city councilman his competition is not welcome? Or -- as Mr. Clutter's impounded limousine continues to run up more than $10,000 worth in fines and storage fees after being seized more than two years ago -- will it suddenly be, "Of course, Mr. Councilman. No problem, Mr. Chairman"?
The point is not that Mr. McDonald shouldn't be allowed to buy and operate limousines -- or enter into any other legal business. Nevada, for the most part, expects her elected officials to serve part-time. They're expected to make the bulk of their livings in the private sector, rubbing shoulders with their fellow citizens and operating under the same laws they pass for everyone else. A darned good idea, too.
But the risks of favoritism and thinly-veiled bribery should be obvious here. How easy might it be for someone planning a convention in Las Vegas to get the impression -- rightly or wrongly -- that any number of regulatory headaches might suddenly evaporate if only they signeda contract to throw a good part of their business to the McDonald Luxury Limousine Company -- especially if the man with Mr. McDonald's ear, City Council aide Rick Henry, changes hats and runs the limo operation Tuesdays and Thursdays?
Fortunately, there's an answer which would untie the largest part of this Gordian knot. The Las Vegas City Council should petition the state Legislature to repeal all related legislation, shutting down the Transportation Services Authority -- as a state agency that operates only in Clark County, a misshapen and ill-conceived beast in the first place.
Those victimized by the previous protection racket should be reimbursed their legal expenses and have their impounded cars returned or replaced. Then, Mr. McDonald won't (start ital)need(end ital) any special dispensation to enter into a taxi and limousine business from which others are still barred. So long as everyone's cars meet basic safety standards and their drivers maintain clean licenses, let the councilman compete with Mr. Bell, Mr. Clutter, Mr. Lowre, and all comers -- with no state bureaucrats to lend an advantage to anyone ... and may the best man get all those lucrative round-trips to Pahrump.
Mind you, the proximity with which his chosen industry rubs shoulders with the Convention Authority would still make Mr. McDonald's plan more problematic than, say, a shoe store. But it would be a start.
Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. His new book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement, 1993-1998," is available at $24.95 postaid through Mountain Media, P.O. Box 271122, Las Vegas, Nev. 89127. The 500-page trade paperback may also be ordered via web site http://www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html, or by dialing 1-800-244-2224.
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Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com
"The evils of tyranny are rarely seen but by him who resists it." -- John Hay, 1872
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken
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