Those watching the Las Vegas City Council Ward 6 election might be experiencing déjà vu. 

Much like in 2022, one of Nancy Brune's opponents in the June 9 primary is a police officer. She was successful then and is now the incumbent, but there are two others gunning for her seat. 

They are Las Vegas Police Protective Association President Steve Grammas, who touts his law enforcement background and leadership in the union, and Dave Marlon, an addiction treatment activist and nonprofit leader. 

The top two vote getters in the primary will move on to the general election unless one candidate gets more than 50 percent of the vote, in which case that person will win the seat outright. 

Las Vegas City Council members serve part time and are paid $108,900, according to a press release last year. 

Here's a closer look at the candidates and their positions. 

The candidates 

Brune's background is academic, almost scholarly. She holds five degrees, a political science doctorate from Yale on top of two masters from Yale, as well as two degrees from Harvard.  

Prior to her time in office, Brune served as a founding executive director of the Kenny Guinn Center for Policy Priorities, a policy research center, and has experience working as a policy adviser and consultant for think tanks, organizations and colleges across the United States. She is a registered Democrat. 

Brune has almost $559,000 in the war chest, with contributions from Mayor Shelley Berkely, County Commissioner William McCurdy II, some local casinos as well as the Las Vegas Firefighters Local 1285 PAC Fund. 

As a lifelong police officer, Grammas' background has been shaped by his experience in law enforcement. He started out as a cadet for the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department in 1998 as his parents could not afford to send him to college after high school. He earned an associate's degree in criminal justice in his 40s. 

Grammas has been the president of the Las Vegas police union for a decade and has advocated for police causes in the Legislature; his support of a "Peace Officers Bill of Rights" that granted protections to officers accused of misconduct put him at odds with progressives who sought to repeal it during the 2020 Black Lives Matter movement. He is a Republican and an outspoken advocate for President Donald Trump. 

Grammas was named in a lawsuit brought by a former police officer who alleged that he ran a "personal smear campaign" targeting him over a personal dispute. The plaintiff, Capt. Landon Reyes and his wife Sgt. Alejandra Zambrano, alleged that the Las Vegas Police Protective Association union had hired a mobile billboard to display the phrase "Do not support LVMPD's CAPTAIN REYES" as well as Reyes' face with the words "morale killer" next to it, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. 

A motion to dismiss the lawsuit against Grammas, Las Vegas Police Department and the police union called the suit a "textbook example of a meritless lawsuit targeting protected speech." The case is pending. 

Grammas has nearly $200,000 in campaign cash on hand to spend, with donations from local business, trade organizations and $5,000 from Station Casinos. 

The founder of the nonprofit treatment center Vegas Stronger, Marlon's background has largely been in substance abuse treatment, mental health support as well as working in homelessness recovery. He founded the CARE Coalition and The Solutions Foundation, both of which combat substance abuse. Marlon is a registered nonpartisan. 

Marlon has four degrees, including a doctorate in psychology from Walden University, an online school geared toward working adults, and two master's degrees from UNLV. 

In 2012, Marlon was arrested for domestic violence against his ex-wife Erin Smith, daughter of now-deceased Nevada lawmaker Debbie Smith. He was arrested again for a domestic disturbance related to his ex-wife in 2015, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Neither arrest led to a conviction, and Marlon said in an interview with The Nevada Independent that his ex-wife recanted allegations of physical abuse. However, in an interview with The Nevada Current in 2019, Smith alleged she was pressured to change her statement.

In 2021, when Marlon was CEO of the addiction treatment center CrossRoads, he was also sued by his assistant at CrossRoads, who accused him of sexual abuse and harassment. Though the suit was eventually dismissed and he struck a confidential settlement with the plaintiff, Marlon stepped down from his position as CEO. 

Marlon has a little more than $115,000 in available cash to spend according to an April campaign finance report — alongside contributions from a construction company and various individuals, he loaned $50,000 of his own funds to his campaign. 

Budget and the economy 

Las Vegas dealt with a $110 million budget deficit last year following an expensive settlement with the owner of the Badlands development and waning tourism revenue. In 2024, the city settled with the developer for $286 million after a prolonged legal battle. 

Since then, Brune said the city's been extremely conservative with its spending. 

"Our city has been doing such a great job," Brune said, adding it didn't have to rely on layoffs or hiring freezes as initially expected, though it did pause some capital projects. But Brune said declining tourism revenue was more concerning than how the city handled the settlement. 

"The challenge we're facing right now, it's not even Badlands," Brune said. "Tourism is down, and we rely heavily on sales tax." 

Brune said this economic uncertainty was the biggest challenge facing Las Vegas — gaming and tourism visitor numbers were down in 2025, and revenues stayed largely flat. Brune said the city was already working to diversify the city's economy with investments in the medical district, healthcare and biotech while also bringing in events such as the Super Bowl.  

On the Badlands settlement, Grammas said many of the sitting council members were to blame for digging "their heels in" on the issue, including Brune, who, alongside former Councilmember Victoria Seaman, voted against a move to prolong the legal fight in 2024. 

However, Grammas, who called himself a "fiscal conservative," said there were other chances to trim spending on unnecessary things, including a Las Vegas Boulevard sign erected in 2020. According to Grammas, the budget needed to be parsed with a fine-tooth comb to reduce waste. 

On the economy, Grammas said the city could do more to incentivize and attract tourists, such as providing free parking for visitors. However, he also said he wanted to look into bringing in businesses, such as Amazon or California-based companies, to set up shop in the city. 

Marlon, who said he was more familiar with the budget than "any" of the sitting council members, said there was opportunity to be more efficient in the budgetary process. He also said he wanted to draw more opportunities to Las Vegas to invigorate job growth and tax opportunities.

Housing and homelessness 

Homelessness in the city has been on the rise for the past decade, hitting a high in 2024 after increasing 20 percent from 2023. This year's homelessness count is slated to be released in the  summer.

Marlon said the city has not done enough to address homelessness and that the issue has only gotten worse since Brune was elected in 2022. 

"We need to get our unhoused into treatment and into help, address their mental health or substance use disorder issues," Marlon said.

He's advocated for cutting food aid for homeless people in order to stop enabling them to live on the streets. To address the root issue, he said the city needed to tackle mental health issues and drug abuse first. 

Marlon said he would like to set up a hotline people can call if they see a homeless person, then have the city send a van to "scoop them up" and take them to a care facility.  

Grammas has a similar idea, though he advocates for arresting homeless people for public violations and coordinating with the sheriff's department after their arrest to provide them resources. According to Grammas, chronic homelessness is not fair to citizens who might be accosted for money or harassed. 

"We have to take a tougher stance on homelessness," Grammas said. 

Brune said the city has been doing a lot to tackle homelessness, noting the city was the only jurisdiction in Clark County that had emergency shelter services, allocated money for Campus for Hope, as well as provided funding for a recuperative medical care center for unhoused people.  

Other issues 

Las Vegas, unlike neighboring Henderson and North Las Vegas, is not a charter school authorizer, meaning it can't open or close charter schools.

Grammas said he supports moving money from underperforming public schools to charter schools, and wants to give kids alternatives to college in areas such as the trades and law enforcement. 

Brune spoke highly of Jhone Ebert, superintendent of the Clark County School District, who she said was "great" and open to being more innovative. One thing that she wanted to prioritize was creating programs that would allow schools to act as community centers and hubs, such as fields being repurposed for community use after classes or placing daycares on school campuses. 

Marlon said education was a part of the American dream, and that something had to be done about the high chronic truancy rates in the Clark County public school system. As for charter schools, he said he would let the Legislature solve that question. 

On water conservation, Marlon said Clark County's attempt to take septic tanks away from some residents is a case of government overreach. He proposed doing a comprehensive water study in the region to find the "water solution," whether that be desalination plants pulling in water from aquifers or drawing from the Mississippi or Columbia rivers. 

Brune said water and resource conservation were a huge consideration for Southern Nevada, but the solutions need to go beyond just curbing water use.
Grammas said Las Vegas was doing a good job in conserving water and was in a good spot. But he acknowledged that experts are a bit more concerned. Still, he points out that Las Vegas has been a national leader in water conservation and recycling.