Buckley could be next Speaker

CARSON CITY - As a 20-year-old, Barbara Buckley took a trip from her Philadelphia home to Las Vegas to visit her best friend, who had just had a baby. What began as a brief visit turned into a permanent move West.

"Instead of staying for two weeks, I stayed a few months and got a job as a maid with the culinary union," she remembers. "Hardest job in my life. Then I went back to Philadelphia, saved $700 over the next year and moved to Las Vegas."

Now, nearly a quarter-century later, Buckley, 44, has completed her third session as the majority leader of the Nevada Assembly and her 11th year as the Democratic legislator representing District 8 in Las Vegas.

With Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins, D-Henderson, expected to relinquish his seat to run for governor next year, Buckley is the overwhelming favorite to replace him as speaker in 2007. She would become the first woman to hold the key legislative post in Nevada.

"I would be honored to be speaker if I am fortunate enough to be re-elected and we are fortunate enough to retain the majority," Buckley said. "I believe I will be the only nomination from our (Democratic) caucus."

Buckley says she might someday run for statewide office, perhaps attorney general or governor in 2010. Unless the state's voters repeal term limits, the Assembly careers of Buckley and several other veteran legislators will end that year.

It's been a pretty heady career for someone who arrived in Las Vegas with no interest in politics and with doubts that she'd ever go to college.

Buckley found a job as a legal secretary and a friend and mentor in her boss, Las Vegas lawyer Richard Myers. She earned her bachelor's degree taking night classes at UNLV and attended law school at the University of Arizona.

Outside the Legislature, Buckley is a lawyer and mother of a 6-year-old boy and a teenage stepson. Her husband, Chan Kendrick, prefers to stay out of the public eye.

Buckley has served since 1996 as executive director of Clark County Legal Services, which provides legal assistance to the poor. The organization offers help for abused children and victims of domestic violence. It also offers classes that teach people to represent themselves in small claims court.

"We work for people getting the raw end of the deal," Buckley said. "I love the job today as much as the day I began."

The work offers her insight into problems people experience. What she learns often induces her to write bills.

Buckley's imprint was on many bills that concerned average people at the 2005 Legislature. She and Assembly Minority Leader Lynn Hettrick, R-Gardnerville, worked out a compromise that limits property tax increases on owner-occupied residential property to 3 percent a year and 8 percent on commercial property.

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