Thursday, June 10, 1999 | 10:56 a.m.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority plans to issue $150 million in revenue bonds to finance the expansion of the convention center.
The proposal marks a departure for the LVCVA, which in the past has issued general obligation bonds backed by Clark County taxpayers. Revenue bonds are backed by room taxes and space rental fees for trade shows and conventions at the facilities. Debt service on the bonds will be paid from LVCVA revenues.
The LVCVA board agreed at Tuesday's meeting to conduct a public hearing on that financing option on June 22.
How the agency changed course on the financing plan for the two-story, 1.3 million-square-foot south hall expansion doesn't sit well with two opponents of the project.
David Friedman, who represented the Venetian hotel-casino, and Paula Quagliana, president of the Desert Inn Homeowners Association, criticized the agency staff for the lack of information provided on the bond program.
The Venetian has opposed the convention center expansion because the facility competes for trade shows with the Sands Expo Center. The Expo Center and the Venetian are owned by Sheldon Adelson, who contends that room taxes he helps generate are being used to compete against his convention facility.
The Desert Inn homeowners oppose the expansion because they believe the additional traffic the expansion would generate on nearby Paradise Road would be a detriment to their neighborhood.
Both Friedman and Quagliana questioned whether the LVCVA board had complied with the state's open-meeting law because it was considering action without widely distributing information about the bond proposal.
Board members concurred that because they were only setting a hearing date and not approving the bonds that they were in compliance with the law.
In addition to wanting information on the bond proposal, Quagliana's group sought copies of a traffic study estimating the impact of the expansion on Paradise Road. LVCVA officials said they had not released the traffic study because it had not been formally accepted by the Clark County Commission and the state.
Board members ordered that copies of a draft of the study be released to the association.
LVCVA Board Chairwoman Jan Jones, attending one of her last meetings as a member, said information on the revenue bond plan may have been slow in coming to the public because the funding mechanism was only approved May 24 when Gov. Kenny Guinn signed a bill authorizing revenue bonding authority for the state's convention and visitors boards.
Other government entities, like school districts and water districts, have had the authority to issue revenue bonds. LVCVA President Manny Cortez said the flexibility of having revenue bonding authority gives the agency the opportunity to borrow money at lower interest rates.
Because the approval process takes about two months less, the LVCVA can take advantage of bond rates that are low now, but could climb by the end of summer.
In another matter, Quagliana's group also voiced concern about another issue brought to the LVCVA board -- the $350 million private monorail project planned by the MGM Grand-Bally's Monorail LLC.
The Desert Inn Estates homeowners have battled the monorail project ever since the proposed route was announced and they found that it passed near their homes along Sands Avenue and Paradise Road.
Quagliana again protested that the board was in violation of the open-meeting law because the agenda listed "possible action" on the monorail plan.
Bob Broadbent, who heads the monorail development group, gave a report on the company's progress and said it is in the process of developing a detailed ridership study to verify estimates of how many people would ride the monorail. The proposed monorail would link the MGM Grand hotel-casino with the Sahara hotel-casino on a route east of Strip properties.
A detailed ridership study is expected to confirm potential revenues that would retire construction debt and pay for operation and maintenance of the monorail. A transportation consultant hired by the homeowners disputes whether the company can make the financing work.
Jon Twichell, a San Francisco consultant, has prepared a report that says no transportation system in the United States operates without some kind of public subsidy.
Broadbent said he wanted to give a status report as a prelude to drawing a formal agreement exchanging right-of-way on LVCVA land for construction of a $3 million, 50-by-250-foot station on the south side of Desert Inn Road off Paradise Road in what is now a parking lot.
From the convention center station, the monorail route would go north and climb more than 75 feet over the top of a pedestrian bridge that spans Paradise Road near Convention Center Drive. Board members inquired about running the monorail through the structure and building a station there, but Broadbent said that idea was rejected when it was determined that the bridge, completed last year, would have to be demolished and rebuilt.
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