MUTH’S TRUTHS

At the heart of the end-of-session debate in Carson City this week is what, if anything, the Legislature should do about highway construction projects, especially in Clark County.

Democrats, with a smattering of GOP support, have proposed some $2 billion in higher taxes and fees…including a hike in the cost of your driver’s license.

Gov. Jim Gibbons has proposed taking some of the existing revenue from the tourist room tax in Clark County - currently going to subsidize operations at the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA) - and redirecting it from advertising the best-known resort city in the world to laying some asphalt.

Citizen Outreach invited Rossi Ralenkotter, the head of LVCVA to discuss this option in a public forum over three months ago, along with Bill Weidner, an LVCVA critic who runs the competing, privately-owned and non-taxpayer-subsidized Sands Convention Center in Las Vegas. Mr. Weidner agreed to the debate; the LVCVA chief declined.

However, refusing to discuss this proposal doesn’t make the questions go away. In fact, Dave Berns, host of NPR’s “State of Nevada” radio show, has come up with a pretty comprehensive list of darned good questions for both sides of this discussion. What a shame the LVCVA continues to duck these important, reasonable, common-sense public policy questions.

I wonder what they’re trying to hide?

1.) What impact does LVCVA marketing and advertising have on tourism to Southern Nevada?

2.) What impact does the marketing and advertising campaigns of individual casino companies have on tourism to the region?

3.) Is there any way to determine if one is more effective than the other?

4.) Do they complement each other?

5.) Are they needlessly redundant?

6.) How many views of a city/region/state’s brand must an individual have before he/she decides to visit that region?

7.) How many individual messages, meetings, promotional mailers, receptions, views of the Las Vegas brand does it take to persuade a tourist, meeting planner or convention booker to come to Las Vegas?

8.) Is there a way to quantify how many individual views of the Las Vegas brand are generated annually?

9.) Is there a way to quantify who generates each view?

10.) What exactly would be lost and gained by reducing the revenue available to the LVCVA? Has anyone done a reliable, comprehensive study?

11. Critics have long-argued that Clark County traffic studies are deeply flawed and have long downplayed the effects from the construction of major Strip projects. Should the county develop more accurate traffic studies that effectively assess the impact of a project?

12.) Should Strip projects be downsized if traffic studies find them to be generating too much traffic, further contributing to gridlock?

13.) Are major gaming companies willing to pay higher tax rates on casino winnings to help ease the transportation crunch? After all, the soon-to-be 6,000-room Venetian complex will be a major contributor to increased traffic, as will MGM Mirage’s City Center, Boyd Gaming’s Echelon and Wynn’s expansion.

14.) Should room tax dollars be used to build a stadium for a pro sports team that would theoretically compete with the casino industry for entertainment dollars?

 
Inquiring minds wanna know. You go, Dave!

Posted on May 21st, 2007 by Chuck Muth
Filed under: Nevada