Reno Casino News Source: http://news.rgj.com
Union petitions to restrict casinos
Susan Voyles (SVOYLES@RGJ.COM)
Culinary Union officials say they will submit at least 15,000 signatures today on petitions for a Reno ballot question on whether casinos should be allowed outside downtown and other traditional areas.
"People are just sick and tired of the small, inside club of developers and casino interests and their lawyers making decisions on their behalf," said Bob Fulkerson, director of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada that joined the Culinary Union effort.
"People feel they don't have a say. This initiative gives them the biggest voice they've ever had," Fulkerson said.
If adopted by voters Nov. 7, the measure would require casinos outside downtown, near the convention center or airport to help reduce the debt of the Reno Redevelopment Agency or the city's railroad trench project. The amount of each contribution would have to be approved in subsequent referendums.
The measure would be retroactive to November 2005 and include Station Casinos' planned hotel-casino at the Redfield Regional Center on Mount Rose Highway.
In a 15-year struggle, the measure is just one more tactic the union is using to harass the company, said Lori Nelson, spokesman for Station Casinos Inc. Station employees in Las Vegas aren't unionized.
"We really didn't feel it would be difficult (to gather the signatures), especially how they misled the public," Nelson said. "We just feel the union has made Station Casinos the issue. It's not really in the taxpayers best interest."
If the signatures are valid, "we are going to review any legal action," Nelson said.
Under state law, county officials have 20 days to determine at least 5 percent of the signatures are from registered voters. The petitions must have at least 11,661 valid signatures to qualify for the ballot.
"We had paid volunteers. We had volunteers. It was going to the rodeo, farmers markets, signature-gathering parties," said Chris Bohner, Culinary Union spokesman in Las Vegas.
Some south Washoe County residents opposed the Station project at Redfield. Citizens in Spanish Springs have opposed a proposed casino on Pyramid Highway. And southwest residents helped kill a proposed casino on West Fourth Street in 2004.
Bohner said the union sponsored the initiative to protect its 2,000 workers at Circus Circus Reno and the Grand Sierra Resort, the former Reno Hilton.
The union contends Station Casinos will draw tourists from downtown Reno and harm casinos there.
Bohner said Station officials always say the union is trying to harass the company.
"That's their standard line," he said. "Our union has been here since 1936. Our members helped build this city."
Bohner said Station's massive radio campaign against the initiative shows they are afraid the question will go on the ballot.
Nelson said the Reno-Sparks Chamber of Commerce, construction trades, the Nevada Resort Association, including downtown gaming operations, oppose the initiative.
If the initiative becomes law, labor leaders are worried about collateral damage. Rich Houts, secretary-treasurer of the Building & Construction Trades Council of Northern Nevada, has said other casino companies could decide to pass on Reno if voters must approve their locations.
"If you are going to have a two- to three-year process to maybe get a casino, it's going to be bad," Houts has said.
His group, representing 8,000 union construction workers, has withdrawn from PLAN over the issue.
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