LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — The 8 News Now mayoral primary debate on Thursday night produced contentious discussion about possibly breaking up the Clark County School District.

Whoever is elected mayor won’t have the power to dissolve it, but they would play a key role in creating a school district if it happened.

“I would absolutely like to see it to be broken up,” Victoria Seaman, a Las Vegas mayoral candidate, said.

Seaman, currently a Las Vegas city councilwoman, helped introduce a bill in 2015 when she was a member of the Nevada Legislature to break up CCSD, and she came close.

“It passed but went into interim committee and ended up completely different,” Seaman said.

For her opponents in the race for Las Vegas mayor, the devil is in the details and they want to see how he looks.

“That’s more of a catchphrase, we need to just break up the Clark County School District. There’s never been a comprehensive strategic initiative, plan, that talks about what that looks like,” Cedric Crear, a Las Vegas mayoral candidate, said. Crear is also on the city council.  

Former U.S. Congresswoman Shelley Berkley, another mayoral candidate, also gave her thoughts on the matter.

“Those people that were pushing for a breakup of the school district, how is it going to work? How is it going to function? How is it going to improve educational outcomes for our children?” Berkley asked.

The most recent 8News Now/Emerson College/The Hill poll done in 2022 showed 44% of those polled supported breaking up CCSD into smaller districts. And 40% were unsure or had no opinion.

“Having worked only in Title 1 schools, our most needy schools, I feel like breaking up the school district is not a solution,” Marie Neisess, president of the Clark County Education Association (CCEA), said.

CCEA is the largest teacher’s union in the state and they have not endorsed a mayoral candidate.

Neisess says separating CCSD into smaller districts would only worsen inequities in the valley when it comes to a quality education. CCSD data shows the highest vacancies are concentrated in the urban core.

“How are you going to make sure that North Las Vegas, east Las Vegas is going to have the same things as Henderson and Summerlin schools? There’s already a disparity,” Neisess said.

An effort in 2022 to put the breakup CCSD question before voters in this year’s November election failed.