Reckless rhetoric. Last week, S&G called B.S. on senatorial aspirant Sharron Angle‘s faux solicitude for the unfinished casinos along the Strip. Turns out, if she had her way, there’d be at least one more: Aria, plus all the other components of $8.8 billion CityCenter. Taking up a meme from Religious Right dirty tricksters Floyd Brown and Gary Kreep (who seem to have “krept” out of town after then-MGM Mirage sicced its lawyers upon them), Angle says it was wrong for Sen. Harry Reid — and, by extension, GOP counterpart Sen. John Ensign — to pick up the phone on CityCenter’s behalf and jawbone the banking industry. Better to let it fail, she posits.
You can’t argue with Angle’s contention that CityCenter diluted hotel occupancy and rates along the Strip. Everybody knows that. As for her assertion that the opening of CityCenter depressed the local job market … on what planet does this woman live? Not only did the project, however misguided, create new jobs in hospitality, gaming, retail, etc., it also opened vacancies elsewhere in the MGM Strip chain. If Angle wants to excoriate someone for job losses, she might well look to those masters of the universe, Harrah’s Entertainment and Station Casinos, who helped wreck the local economy with their reckless borrowing, and then move onto Fontainebleau, Echelon, Cosmopolitan, Trump International, Sheldon Adelson‘s derelict Stump Regis and the rest of the bubble … etc.
I remember the days when CityCenter was justthisclose to bankruptcy (before certain concessions were made to Dubai World) like they just happened. A pall of gloom and uncertainty hung over the Strip, as we feared what could be the most catastrophic event in Las Vegas‘ economic history. You could cut the apprehension with a knife. Thousands of construction jobs (12K, approximately) would disappear, another 10,ooo CityCenter jobs would never materialize and the ensuing “ghost city” would deal a deep and severe wound to both Vegas’ image and its civic morale. If you think the Strip looks like a war zone now, imagine an unfinished, bankrupt CityCenter and we’d be talking about a war zone in which the war was lost.
But that’s all good on Planet Angle, where the Strip is the Titanic and CityCenter merely rearranged the deck chairs. Thanks for that vote of confidence, ma’am. Same to you.
Speaking of Harrah’s, a top-hush agreement was reached with the Assistant District Attorney Bernie “Blofeld” Zadrowski and the case against über-whale Terrance Watanabe quietly went thataway — although civil litigation remains in a holding pattern. The D.A.’s case against Watanabe was steadily losing momentum and reporters with good connections to law enforcement suggested that Watanabe’s countercharges that Harrah’s deliberately kept him intoxicated were substantive enough that District Attorney David Roger didn’t want to take this one to court. (The accusations aroused the interest of the Nevada Gaming Control Board, which continues to probe Harrah’s conduct.) The Newspaper That Must Not Be Cited has a particularly good story by Jeff German, if you’re interested.
Still crazy after all these years. Even though three out of four Nevada Republicans kicked him to the curb in favor of class act Brian Sandoval, Gov. Jim Gibbons still entertains delusions of relevance. To wit: “The governor in February demanded [President] Obama shoot a commercial promoting Nevada as a tourism destination.” Seriously.
What did I tell you? Yesterday, I predicted that we’d see schizoid economic indicators for Las Vegas when May’s tourism numbers rolled. Sho nuff, visitation was up 2% (despite a falloff in air traffic). Increased convention visitation helped and even ADRs tiptoed up 2%, while occupancy stood just shy of 83%. Compare this to a 6% slippage in Strip gambling revenue and there’s your new paradigm for Las Vegas: “Thrift, Horatio!” With national consumer confidence currently at “63” on a scale of 1 to 100, that will be the Vegas rallying cry for some time to come, I’m afraid.
And people wonder what’s wrong with this nation? Our entire government is filled with dumb fucks like her.
Putting aside the politics (you either have to vote for someone who is far left or far right this election), I think the importance of CityCenter continues to be vastly overstated. I’m not sure if LVA readers are in a frenzy about it, but mine simply don’t care. I can’t ever remember a resort opening that has drawn less interest (and 30% of my readers make $100k or more, so it isn’t a demographic issue). M Resort has gotten more interest/comments/feedback than Aria.
The failure of CityCenter wouldn’t have doomed Las Vegas. It was under construction for so long that people were used to it simply being a construction zone there (just like they are used to the cranes above Palazzo).
The continuation of the construction jobs simply postponed the inevitable: Las Vegas construction was going bye-bye for a few years and those workers were going to be out of jobs for quite some time. Over the next year, those in that trade will realize this and walk away from their homes (homes they could afford on a union construction wage but not on unemployment, no matter how long it is extended).
Don’t get me wrong: I wanted to see CC get finished like everybody else did. Best case scenario. But it’s importance to Las Vegas has been vastly overrated. If it sat unfinished, I seriously doubt is would make a difference in the number of visitors we are currently getting.
I have a coming blog post regarding why building so many high-end properties even during a boom was foolish (something that I told everybody I knew back then). In a nutshell, just because someone has cash doesn’t mean they want to blow it on a high end room! Unfortunately, Cosmo is going to have an uphill battle as well.
As always, great blog post. You say what you think and get the rest of us thinking!
Ted Newkirk
I was hoping City Center would increase visitation and interest in Las Vegas but so far 2010 only looks slightly better than 2009. One good thing about City Center is that it eliminated many condominium projects that were proposed (and thankfully never built) because City Center has to sell (or rent) over 2000 condominiums. There is enough half built casinos/condominiums on the Strip already.
“A pall of gloom and uncertainty hung over the Strip, as we feared what could be the most catastrophic event in Las Vegas‘ economic history”
If Sharron gets elected to the Senate, that pall will extend over the whole state.
Still, like I said before, your election will be fun to watch from outside.
Ted, I agree with some of what you said – but some, at least, of those CC construction workers were probably able to set aside enough of their wages to save their homes – and keep them off the unemployment rolls for at least awhile.
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Revenue Management, David McKee. David McKee said: New posting: Sharron Angle, casino analyst (she's hardly worse than Larry Klatzkin, though) https://www.lasvegasadvisor.com/stiffs-and-georges/?p=3992 […]
[…] The full context of her slam on CityCenter is available, including a wacky parenthetical remark that Nevada needs “real jobs” (i.e., not casino-resort jobs, which Ms. Angle seems to think exist in a finite quantity). Seriously, this notion that adding 10,000 positions at CityCenter cost 10,000 other Strip employees their jobs is Flake City, unsupported by credible evidence. […]