Neighborhood casino bill faces uphill battle

Ed Koch and Gary Thompson

Wednesday, May 12, 1999 | 11:20 a.m.

The bill to allow Boyd Gaming Corp. to build two more casinos in off-limits Las Vegas neighborhoods may never come to a vote in the Nevada Senate Judiciary Committee, its chairman said Tuesday.

"My sense is the committee doesn't support it," said Sen. Mark James, R-Las Vegas, who heads the committee, and has already expressed his opposition. "I haven't polled them (the committee) but I don't know if it is necessary to bring it up for a vote."

There was overwhelming testimony at the hearing opposing Assembly Bill 522 Tuesday and "it comes primarily from the people who are in the neighborhoods," he said.

Asked if the bill may die without ever coming to a vote, James said, "That's a distinct possibility."

James originally planned not to hold a hearing on the bill and let it quietly die even though the bill unanimously passed the Assembly.

But he changed his mind when other committee members asked him to schedule a session to hear testimony. The others said it wasn't fair that he alone decide on the hearing issue, James said.

He said he has great respect for Boyd Chairman Bill Boyd and his company.

"There is no question about them or their integrity, but I don't think there is any support in the judiciary committee."

Friday is the deadline for bills to be voted out of committee and if no action is taken the bill is dead.

State Sen. Terry Care said he does not understand how Boyd failed to get its exemptions into a 1997 bill that limited the proliferation of neighborhood casinos.

During Tuesday's hearing, which was broadcast live to the Sawyer State Building in Las Vegas, Care, D-Las Vegas, said "gaming lobbyists are strategically placed throughout the capitol."

With so many people paid to look after the interests of casinos, legislators wondered how could such a major player as Boyd Gaming miss the boat on such an important piece of legislation?

"I was shocked -- I thought we were exempted," Boyd, the son of late gaming legend Sam Boyd, testified Tuesday. "The ball was dropped somewhere along the way."

The neighborhoods at issue include Boulder Highway across from Boulder Station and Rancho Road near Texas Station, where a Boyd-controlled trust has long owned property on which he wants to build competing gaming establishments.

Boyd spokesman Rob Stillwell said the controversy concerns 22 acres next to Texas Station Boyd has owned for 17 years, and eight acres opposite Boulder Station the company bought in 1993.

Boyd President Don Snyder, who joined the company at the time Senate Bill 208 was winding its way through the Legislature, said Station Casinos Inc. Executive Vice President Scott Nielsen testified at that time that SB208 was "a work in process" and said the law "would need fine-tuning."

"What they're trying to do is say my testimony in 1997 was the opposite of what I'm saying now," Nielsen said today. "But at that time, there were still a lot of negotiations going on over the bill's final wording.

"I described the bill as a work in progress because Las Vegas is the most dynamic growth area in the country and that in 10 or 20 years, when the population may have doubled or the Bureau of Land Managements releases more land, there may be a need to re-address the issue.

"What I didn't mean was that at the very next legislative session, an individual company would try to come back and sneak in a piece of property," Nielsen said.

"It really is a policy issue of whether lawmakers will respect the limitations of SB208. If the legislature decides not to, then I have some exceptions I want to include in the bill, and I'm sure the Maloofs, Michael Gaughan and others do also."

The Maloof family controls the Fiesta hotel-casino on Rancho and plans to build another resort near the Rio on Flamingo Road. Gaughn's company controls the Gold Coast and the Orleans, two locals hotel-casinos, and has plans for another in Summerlin.

In fact, at Tuesday's hearing representatives of both Station and the Fiesta suggested that if the bill passes, they want it amended to include projects of their own. No written amendments had been filed as of today.

Homeowners also testified against Boyd.

"If Boyd Gaming were to go to municipal government with this they know they would be denied," said Carol LeDuc, representing the Sheep Mountain Homeowners Association. "That's why they are going back door to the state government to do zoning. ... And it's spot zoning."

Snyder said all Boyd Gaming wants is "a level playing field" with exemptions similar to those granted in 1997 before SB208 was passed. He noted that even if AB522 is passed his company still would have to go to municipalities to have the projects approved, and that would allow the public to speak for or against them.

Boyd Gaming could go before the Las Vegas City Council on the Rancho property and the Clark County Commission on the Boulder property and try to get the casinos built on parcels not in established gaming enterprise zones.

However, obtaining permits to put unrestricted gaming in such places may be difficult due to pressure that city and county officials are under to keep casinos out of residential areas,

"Making a change now would undermine SB208," Clark County Commissioner Erin Kenny testified. "I think we should let SB208 run its course."

Boyd's argument is that there already are casinos where the company wants to build, therefore its proposed properties would only solidify the areas as gaming districts and discourage gaming in neighborhoods where there now is no gaming.

Las Vegas residents testified that if the Legislature starts granting exemptions like the one Boyd is seeking for the sake of fair competition then it will, in effect, scuttle the law to halt neighborhood casinos in their present tracks.

Boyd officials argued that Station Casinos was able to get an exemption in 1997 to allow it to build across the street from Boyd's Sam's Town on Boulder Highway and that Boyd deserves similar treatment.

But Nielsen said, "There was a lot of discussion about their land being like our land. But their company only owned eight acres of the two pieces of property they want to get in.

"The 22 acres are owned by a trust controlled by Bill Boyd and including Chuck Ruthe (a former Boyd executive) and others.

"We went out and paid $10 million for a piece of property in the name of our company, went through the planning and zoning process and designed a hotel-casino," Nielsen said. "When SB208 came along, we requested the exemption to protect our investment."

At times, James interrupted Snyder's testimony to correct characterizations he felt were misleading. One was, as Snyder contended, that SB208 had been "rushed" to passage. James said the bill was not rushed but carefully debated for months, indicating that Boyd had plenty of time in 1997 to look after its interests.

Two major public-interest groups weighed in on the bill. The Culinary Union, the largest labor organization in the casino industry, said it was for passage of AB522. The Culinary Union represents workers at some Boyd properties downtown and on the Strip, but the locals casino industry is mostly nonunion.

The Nevada Resort Association, which had been neutral, told the committee it now is against the legislation.

The NRA move came after an hour and a half meeting Monday in which Boyd and Station executives participated by phone. Major Strip casino companies such as Mirage Resorts and Circus Circus Enterprises backed the NRA stance.

Sun reporterCy Ryan contributed to this story.