Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo has introduced his second bill of the 2025 Nevada Legislative Session.
This one is centered around public safety and is part of the Governor's Safe Streets and Neighborhoods Act.
On Tuesday, the governor, joined by local law enforcement officials and state prosecutors, held a press conference at the Carson City Sheriff's Office.
"This legislation was drafted to put teeth back in Nevada's penal code," Governor Lombardo said. "Hold criminals accountable, empower judges and prosecutors, and support victims of crime... As a law enforcement officer for 34 years and former sheriff, I've seen public safety legislation impact our communities and neighborhoods firsthand, both for the better and the worse."
Local sheriffs from Carson City, Washoe, Douglas, Storey, and Churchill counties were all at the conference showing their support.
"Not only does this bill protect those victims, but it also keeps our neighborhoods and our state safe," said Washoe County Sheriff Darin Balaam.
The Washoe County District Attorney, Christopher Hicks, also broke down why he feels this bill is important for the efforts of fighting crime.
"Our task was to identify common sense criminal justice reforms needed in Nevada that will protect victims of crime and improve the safety of our communities, he said. "That solution is SB457."
Senate Bill 457 is an 84-page bill that is going after a lot of different crimes.
The governor touched on a few that were some of his top priorities with the legislation.
"By eliminating diversion programs for crimes of abuse and exploitation of children and elderly or vulnerable adults, ensuring justice for Nevada's most at-risk populations."
The bill includes tougher penalties on crimes such as retail theft, repeat offenders, DUIs that end in death, and more.
"The Safe Streets and Neighborhood Acts also crack down on fentanyl and drug trafficking," Lombardo said. "In alignment with my commitment to combat the opioid crisis. The bill introduces harsher sentences for fentanyl, including mandatory minimums and increased penalties for large quantities."
In the 2023 session, Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford sponsored legislation on fentanyl trafficking that was passed.
The Governor's bill has similar language to that bill in its first draft.
Both bills were trying to get four to 14 grams of fentanyl to be enough to charge someone with a low-level trafficking charge. Current law has that threshold at 28 to 42 grams.
Ford's bill moved that threshold up, but Lombardo is trying to implement the stricter guidelines again.
2 News Nevada asked the governor what he thinks will be different this go-round.
"More data was needed to attempt to promote what I wanted to achieve in the last session," Lombardo said. "We have more data that addresses the particular issue with fentanyl. Hopefully, it'll be met with a positive result this time. Now I don't want to downgrade what occurred last session; we made some improvement in that space, but I think we just have to go a little bit further with the understanding of what the drug does to our communities."
The American Civil Liberties Union here in Nevada does have some issues with this bill.
"It's hard to say what I like with this bill because what the bill does is attempt to reverse criminal justice reforms that were put into place a few years ago," said Athar Haseebullah, Executive Director for the ACLUNV. "The reason these reforms were put into place was to stop the prison population from exploding."
That concern with prison population increasing comes from last week's Interim Finance Committee meeting.
The Nevada Department of Corrections revealed they are in about a $53 million shortfall in the budget.
They also talked about how they're spending about $60 million on overtime, partially due to staffing shortages.
Lombardo was asked about this at the press conference and says they are looking at ways to address it.
"We are currently evaluating time served for nonviolent offenses," he said. "We'll make an adjustment for the budget numbers that go into the future, sentencing, and removal of incarcerated individuals in the environment."
The Democratic Party does have the majority on both floors.
Lombardo says he wants to work across the aisle and understands there will have to be some amendments and adjustments before it can pass.
