John Barrette- Sunbelt Digital Media

Despite a legislative panel giving thumbs up to a regulation approving health care benefits for domestic partners of Nevada state employees, a hurdle called hard times might intervene.

The regulation, which includes same sex domestic partners, was approved 3-2 by the Subcommittee on Regulation but it could carry a $4.1 million state general fund price tag the first year and a $4.5 million cost the second. Budget constraints may prevail.

"If the shoe were on the other foot, they'd find the money," said Holly Wilson, former Reno chapter president of PFLAG (Parents, Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays). She felt benefits should be the same for domestic partners, gay or straight, as they are for married couples. She said domestic partnership advocates, including PFLAG, should favor the idea.

"I have no doubt that they'll get behind that," Wilson said. She said adoption of the regulation, even with the funding question yet to be determined, is another small step in acceptance of domestic partnerships.

"It's getting better," she said. "I think PFLAG (as a national organization with local chapters) has done a fantastic job,"

The subcommittee voted for the regulation but Sen. Randolph Townsend, R-Reno, a member of the panel and the chairman of the Legislative Commission that oversees the subcommittee, said funding questions still must be dealt with by the full Legislature.

That might prove difficult, given Gov. Jim Gibbons' directive for state agencies to prepare for cuts of up to 14 percent or more. In fact, the Public Employee Benefits (PEB) Board - whose members are gubernatorial appointees - isn't including the funding in recommendations.

So said Leslie Johnstone, executive officer for the board, who added that means a legislator would have to propose the additional money and shepherd it successfully into law if the current monetary cost projection is to be met.

Of course there is also the option of altering the amounts in health care premiums picked up by the employee and state. In other words, the regulation could be implemented but the financial benefit involved might also be altered. The state now provides $626 monthly for each state employee covered.

The potential for change exists, of course, for any employee in the public or private sector when employers alter terms because of cost or due to insurance provider changes.

The PEB board is grappling with just such questions regarding benefits to all state workers, according to Johnstone. "So we're looking at shifting (some of) the cost to employees and reducing benefits," she said.

That response to difficult economic times in Nevada, and lessened state revenues, keeps boards and agencies looking for ways to curtail spending, absorb inflationary pressures and meet the Gibbons' directive. As Johnstone put it about funding the regulation, "the governor made it pretty clear" it wouldn't be in his budget plan for 2009-11.