How one vote sent Las Vegas’ stadium deal back to square one

By Conor Shine

Sunday, Oct. 26, 2014 | 2 a.m.

Las Vegas City Councilwoman Lois Tarkanian didn’t realize she was the swing vote on the proposed $200 million downtown soccer stadium until it was too late.

She listened to her colleagues lay out their positions during a key vote — three in favor, three against.

Then Tarkanian found herself alone in the middle.

“It’s tremendous pressure on you. You have to be very careful,” she said.

Tarkanian, a 10-year council veteran, didn’t support the stadium. She felt the public’s share of the cost was too high. But she did vote to keep the proposal alive for another month.

The decision thrust the typically reserved Tarkanian into the spotlight.

Stadium developers courted her and reworked the financial plan to make it more favorable for the city. At the height of the frenzy, her office received 60 emails or phone calls a day.

Some people expected she’d support the stadium because of her family’s ties to Las Vegas sports, including her husband’s 19 years as UNLV’s head basketball coach.

But the public response only hardened Tarkanian’s resolve.

Developers now face the difficult, if not impossible, task of rewriting the financial plan to exclude public money before a December deadline.

Tarkanian’s phone rings less often now that the stadium talks are private again.

She says she thinks a soccer stadium could be successful in Las Vegas and is optimistic a deal will be reached. It just can’t include city dollars, she said. The lack of a public-funding component could be a deal-killer, as stadium projects routinely include taxpayer funding, but Tarkanian is resolute.

“I’m not as concerned about the use of the (public) land. And I’m not concerned about building the infrastructure,” she said. “It’s just the use of direct funding.”