Thursday, June 4, 1998 | 11:24 a.m.
Leaders of at least two downtown hotel-casinos are urging study of the idea as a way to bring conventioneers closer to the heart of the casino district.
The push comes as the Reno-Sparks Convention & Visitors Authority launches a $60,000 study to determine the feasibility of expanding the Reno-Sparks Convention Center on South Virginia Street.
Scott Beeman, general manager of Circus Hotel Casino, is taking the lead on the proposed downtown study. He's dusted off a 1997 drawing that proposed a horseshoe of retail and exposition space, 1,600-room hotel and parking around the National Bowling Stadium.
It could cost as much as $450 million with the hotel.
"I'm not saying the other Convention Center isn't important, but I cannot in good conscience not ask the question," Beeman told the Reno Gazette-Journal.
Phil Keene, president of the Reno-Sparks Convention & Visitors Authority, said he would welcome a private project, but not in lieu of the expansion plans for the South Virginia center.
He said assembling so much land downtown could be difficult.
Reno-based Comstock Bank long as suggested a downtown convention center would help support the downtown casinos and build the local tax base.
Ferenc Snozy, chief executive of The Sands Regency Hotel Casino, says the project is the kind of bold move Reno must consider.
But John Farahi, chief executive of the Atlantis Hotel and Casino located near the current convention center, said Reno's inability to attract conventions in the past is due primarily to the downtown hotel's refusal to allocate rooms, not the location of the convention center.
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