A commission charged with repairing Nevada's troubled guardianship system will meet next week to continue voting on several major policy issues before making its final recommendations later this spring.
Guardianships are needed when children don't have parents looking out for them or when adults are unable to properly care for themselves.
The commission's goal is to better educate legal guardians on their responsibilities, along with holding them more accountable, and, ultimately, preventing abuse.
"Basically, it is time to look at the entire guardianship process top to bottom and how the courts are managing this docket," says Nevada Supreme Court Chief Justice Jim Hardesty.
Several investigative articles by the Las Vegas Review-Journal prompted him to form the commission and promote change.
"The courts of our state have a lot of pending guardianship cases where there hadn't been any inventories or any annual accountings filed for years," Hardesty adds.
He says the courts have not been adequately staffed and funded to keep up with these complex cases.
State Attorney General Adam Laxalt has also announced a new task force to prevent legal guardians from swindling the vulnerable people they should be protecting.
