New Incorporations Increasing in Nevada

According to the Quarterly Business Report from Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller posted on April 14, 2011, new entity filings in Nevada for the first quarter of 2011 have increased by 11.6% over the first quarter of 2010. The most significant increases were in filings for new Limited Liability Companies (LLCs) with 1,382 more LLCs filing as new entities in Nevada in the first quarter of 2011 than in the first quarter of 2010.

Nevada Ranked 47th for Business in 2010

A CNBC Special Report ranked Nevada 47th for business competitiveness among the 50 states. In the ten categories in the study, Nevada only ranked above 20th in two categories, workforce (19th) and business friendliness (15th). Nevada was ranked at the bottom in two categories, economy (49th) and education (50th). In the other six categories, Nevada ranged from 31st to 40th. The other categories are cost of doing business, quality of life, transportation and infrastructure, technology and innovation, access to capital, and cost of living. CNBC's 2009 report and 2008 report are also available online.

Researching Nevada Business Cases

Researching Nevada business cases presents some challenges. There is not one publicly-available statewide database for business cases. Making business cases and records more easily available will contribute to the development of a body of business case law, which can contribute to predictabilty and consistency.



Second Judicial District Court (Northern Nevada)

It is possible to search online for cases in the Second Judicial District Court, which is located in Washoe County. One way to do this is to use Contexte CourtConnect. However, some specific information about the case such as the last name or company name is necessary to run this type of search. It is also possible to search for Judge Adams's cases by searching the calendar for cases in his department, Department 6. Unfortunately, this list does not indicate whether the cases are business cases or other types of civil cases.

For current cases on the calendar, the Second Judicial District Court has links to business cases for Judge Adams and business cases for Judge Flanagan. With a case number, it is possible to search for information about a specific case here.

Eighth Judicial District Court (Southern Nevada)
It is possible to search online for case summaries and information for the Eighth Judicial District Court, which is located in Clark County. However, business cases are grouped together with other civil cases so it is not possible to initiate a search for only business cases. Business Court judges dockets include non-business civil matters in addition to business matters. This means that it is not possible to search for business cases using the judges names alone.
There are a variety of ways to search for business cases in the Eighth Judicial District. One way to search for case summaries is to search the District Court Civil Calendar for Clark County by "Judicial Officer," the name of the judge, and "Case Category," in this case civil. Then the results list should be sorted by "Hearing Type," in this case business court. This sorts the list of results so that all Business Court cases are listed first. Then this list can be used to identify the case numbers for business cases for that particular judge.
To access case and case summaries, it is necessary to return to the District Civil Records search page and use the a case number (or parties or attorneys) to pull up a register of actions with links to the minutes, which give a brief procedural summary of the case. Records for civil cases are only available at present through requests at the Las Vegas Justice Court Clerk's Office.


Hat tip to:

• the research librarians at the Wiener-Rogers Law Library and Shana Brouwers (Boyd '11), a research assistant at the Law Library, for providing information on researching Nevada Business Courts, and
• Cindy Fladagar in the technology department of the Second Judicial District for clarifying the process for confirming the process for researching business cases in the Second Judicial District Court.

Nevada Business Law Wiki

I have started a Nevada Business Law wiki. Please contribute content to help build this site and create a collaborative community resource for business law in Nevada. Join this page or add content anonymously. If you are not sure what a wiki is, there is a great explanation of Wikis in Plain English on YouTube.

Business Licensing Transfer of Power

The 2009 Nevada Legislature has taken further steps to consolidate responsibilities for business licensing in the office of the Nevada Secretary of State. Pursuant to Nevada Assembly Bill No. 146, the authority to issue state business licenses will be transferred from the Nevada Department of Taxation to the Nevada Secretary of State's office. The transfer will be effective on October 1, 2009. This transfer of responsibilities moves Nevada one step closer to the Delaware one-stop-shopping model for businesses.

Nevada Business Law

Despite Nevada's growing popularity as a location for the incorporation of new businesses, Nevada business law resources are few and far between. There are some basic public resources: the Nevada Revised Statutes are available online and Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller has developed a website to answer the question "Why Nevada?" The Nevada Law Journal, which is run by students of the William S. Boyd School of Law at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, publishes Nevada Supreme Court Summaries, Nevada Supreme Court Commentaries, Nevada Legislative Summaries, and Nevada Legislative Commentaries. A local law firm, Lionel Sawyer & Collins, also publishes a guide entitled "Doing Business In Nevada: A Practical Guide." However, although Nevada has dedicated business courts and judges, case law is limited because lower courts in Nevada do not publish opinions and, in fact, often do not issue opinions. On this blog, I will post information about Nevada business law and, hopefully, create a space where practitioners and others will contribute their knowledge of business law in Nevada and engage in a useful discourse.