Late last week it became abundantly clear that even the slightest nod to educational options that aren’t part of the traditional public school system will be sure to cause partisan gridlock in our divided state government. 

Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo threatened to break out his veto pen and nix the education budget after Democratic leadership refused to fund a charter school teacher pay increase. 

“I’ve been clear and consistent on this. I will not sign an education budget that does not include equal pay for public charter school teachers,” Lombardo said in a statement.

His request for higher pay for public charter school staff is not new, nor is it unreasonable. 

Charter school employees were already excluded from a 2023 bill that provided raises to teachers and staff in traditional district schools — creating a clear disparity between the two systems. 

It’s a disparity that is hard to justify, considering public charter schools are a growing and important component of Nevada’s educational landscape. As the second largest “school district” in the state by student population, charters have become far more common than they once were — and like any growing “district,” attracting top talent is critical for serving the needs of the students who attend them.   

According to Republicans, treating those employees as second-class educators by excluding them from pay increases that apply to other public education employees is simply unacceptable — which is why GOP lawmakers voted against the education budget in committee. 

However, to hear Democrats tell it, Republican objections to their education budget is little more than anti-education “GOP math,” and completely unnecessary partisan tomfoolery because Democrats haven’t ruled out allowing such raises in separate legislation.  

Assembly Speaker Steve Yeager (D-Las Vegas) said on Friday that “it’s been made abundantly clear by the members of this committee that we are still working on the charter school teacher pay raise increase.” Senate Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro (D-Las Vegas) echoed his sentiment, saying there was no reason to include the raises in the education budget because “we can do two things at once.”

Of course, splitting the issue into a separate piece of legislation doesn’t feel like “doing two things at once” — it feels like doing two things individually. Nonetheless, Cannizzaro insisted the exclusion of the pay raises doesn’t merit any sort of partisan gridlock. 

“We can approve a budget for the things that we know and then we can also work on legislation to implement things that are new,” Cannizzaro said. “That is not a reason to not vote for this budget.”

However, the lack of charter pay raises is absolutely a valid reason to vote against the majority’s proposed budget — just as it’s a reason for Lombardo to get his veto pen ready. And it’s actually a pretty good reason, considering the fact that political promises are notorious for being less than reliable. 

Even in the best of political climates, “trust us” doesn’t go too far in the throes of a legislation session — least of all when one considers the majority party’s history of hostility toward the charter system.

In 2019, for example, Democrats attempted to place an outright moratorium on new charter schools. Over the years, national Democrats have publicly called for blocking federal funding for charters. And let’s not forget that, as mentioned above, the very same Democrats who run the Legislature today refused to include charter employees when they hiked teacher pay in 2023. 

In fact, the failure to include charter employees in the last legislative session’s pay raise was one of the reasons for a budget impasse that led to a special session — a special session that still failed to treat public charter school employees the same as their district counterparts. 

That track record certainly seems like more than enough justification for Republicans to doubt the notion that Democrats will graciously extend Lombardo a win on one of his key priorities without a little pressure being applied. 

After all, if such pay parity is genuinely in the works and as uncontroversial as Democratic leadership would like us to believe, then one has to wonder why separate legislation would be needed at all. Wouldn’t it behoove everyone involved to merely include such (ostensibly) bipartisan pay equality in the education budget — the same budget that Democrats seem to think is otherwise largely uncontroversial? 

In other words, if Democratic leaders are sincere about exploring a way to ensure public charter school teachers aren’t treated like second-class educators, they shouldn’t be throwing a political tantrum over Lombardo’s veto threat or acting indignant over the dissenting votes of their colleagues. 

Instead, they need only include the funding in their budget and watch the bipartisan “yea” votes come rolling in as a result.

Michael Schaus is a communications and branding expert based in Las Vegas, Nevada, and founder of Schaus Creative LLC — an agency dedicated to helping organizations, businesses and activists tell their story and motivate change. He has more than a decade of experience in public affairs commentary, having worked as a news director, columnist, political humorist, and most recently as the director of communications for a public policy think tank. Follow him on Twitter @schausmichael or on Substack @creativediscourse.