Rebottling a genie

One would hate to think how many businesses in Clark County get by on the revenue from slot routes, rather than from their primary purpose. But county commissioners didn’t think to define “incidental” — an understandable oversight — when making regulations in 2011 that were intended to curb the growth of slot routes. So your “tavern” might be deriving 90% of its income from your 15 slots and there’s nothing the county can do about it. The legal definition of these establishments as “restricted” gaming operators takes on an ironic twist. Ergo, the commission has imposed a 90-day moratorium on new business licenses for restricted locations, to sort out what’s incidental revenue and what’s primary.

“We don’t have a problem if you have 15 (slot) machines because the bar is doing an enormous amount of business. It’s like a pool table. It’s an amenity. If it’s your main business, that’s where the problem comes up,” said Commissioner Steve Sisolak, the most headline-seeking member of the body. “When the sewing store didn’t make it, when the puppet store didn’t make it, they have survived, they have paid rent, they have hired employees,” replied trade-association attorney John O’Reilly. (He’s got a point.)

The slot-route genie is so far out of the bottle, it would seem as though Clark County would have little chance of recapturing it now. It could try and compromise by reducing the size of the routes, but the tavern association has little incentive to cut deals, so sizable an economic presence is it.

In a related story, the district attorney of Kern County, California, which includes Bakersfield, is extending a double-edged olive branch to Internet cafes in the area: stop offering “sweepstakes” play or face prosecution. “Let them go into the night and they had a good run at it. As long as they stop right now, we’ll call it good,” said District Attorney Greg Pulskamp. Not only could the cafes be prosecuted on a wide variety of counts, Pulskamp may go after their software providers, too.

By contrast, the Bakersfield City Attorney had only sent advisory letters to the sweepstakes cafes under its jurisdiction. However, recent rulings by the Fifth District Court of Appeals could give Bakersfield the standing on which to prosecute, too. City Attorney Ginny Gennaro is preparing a fresh batch of cease-and-desist letters for the cafe owners, while Pulskamp wants them to come in for a little chat. One cafe owner tried to blame authorities, saying they were “too vague,” although it looks pretty clear-cut from here.

$35 million doesn’t get you much of anywhere when renovating in Las Vegas. But Carl Icahn is putting part of that sum into his Tropicana Atlantic City and looks as though he’ll obtain a lot of bang for his buck. Not only will 434 hotel rooms “in dire need” of work get redone, so will seafood restaurant Fin. A two-story gym will be added, along with more retail (four stores). And, for a bit of “wow” factor, a nightime LED show will play on nine screens retrofitted onto the casino-hotel. Approvals for Casino Reinvestment Development Authority money, to the tune of $18 million, are still needed but what’s not to like?

At least one horse track is having a booming economic impact … although that’s probably more from Centaur Gaming‘s Indiana Grand‘s slots and table games than from its equine entertainment.