218A.260 - Procedure for filling vacancy in office.
218A.260 Procedure for filling vacancy in office. Where a vacancy occurs in the office of State Senator, Assemblyman or Assemblywoman during a regular or special session of the Legislature or at a time when no biennial election or regular election at which county officers are to be elected will take place between the occurrence of the vacancy and the next regular or special session, the procedure for filling the vacancy is as follows:
1. Where the Senator, Assemblyman or Assemblywoman was elected from a district wholly within one county, the board of county commissioners of the county from which the former incumbent was elected shall appoint a person of the same political party as the former incumbent and who actually, as opposed to constructively, resides in the district to fill the vacancy.
2. Where the former incumbent was elected from a district comprising more than one county, the county commissioners of each county within or partly within the district shall meet to appoint a person of the same political party as the former incumbent and who actually, as opposed to constructively, resides in the district to fill the vacancy, under the chairmanship of the chair of the board of county commissioners of the county whose population residing within the district is the greatest. Each board of county commissioners shall first meet separately and determine the single candidate it will nominate to fill the vacancy. Then, the boards shall meet jointly and the chairs on behalf of the boards shall cast a proportionate number of votes according to the percent, rounded to the nearest whole percent, which the population of its county is of the population of the entire district. Populations must be determined by the last decennial census or special census conducted by the Bureau of the Census of the United States Department of Commerce. The person who receives a plurality of these votes is appointed to fill the vacancy. If no person receives a plurality of the votes, the boards of county commissioners of the respective counties shall each select a candidate, and the appointee must be chosen by drawing lots among the candidates so selected.
3. The board of county commissioners or the board of the county which has the largest population within the district, as the case may be, shall issue a certificate of appointment naming the appointee. The county clerk or the clerk of the county which has the largest population within the district, as the case may be, shall give the certificate to the appointee and send a copy of the certificate to the Secretary of State.
(Added to NRS by 1965 Special Session, 7; A 1977, 514; 1981, 340, 1743; 1999, 2169)—(Substituted in revision for NRS 218.043)