{"id":19343,"date":"2017-02-08T09:18:24","date_gmt":"2017-02-08T17:18:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=19343"},"modified":"2018-06-29T08:56:12","modified_gmt":"2018-06-29T16:56:12","slug":"tumult-at-golden-gate-icahn-to-sell-trump-taj","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/tumult-at-golden-gate-icahn-to-sell-trump-taj\/","title":{"rendered":"Tumult at Golden Gate; Icahn to sell Trump Taj"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s been a busy week or so for Derek Stevens<\/strong>. Last week, he started turning earth on the La Bayou<\/strong> site, preface to construction of a two-story slot parlor that Stevens expects to \"\"have finished by August. (He wastes no time.) That bit of news was overshadowed yesterday by the precipitate closing of DuPar’s<\/strong> in the Sal Sagev<\/strong>, known to you and I as the Golden Gate<\/strong>. “DuPar’s has struggled with payments over a period of time,” ran the austere official announcement, one that Stevens felt compelled to clarify with a tweet that the “payments” in question had nothing to do with the rent. VitalVegas<\/em> thickened the intrigue<\/a> with a rumor that DuPar’s owner Biff Naylor<\/strong> was at odds with the IRS<\/strong>. As if that weren’t enough drama for a day, the closing was moved up by 30 hours, with midnight on Feb. 8 superseded by 6:30 on the evening of the 7th. DuPar’s occupies an awfully prominent space, so we’re confident that Stevens will have something else in there sooner rather than later.<\/p>\n

* This was bound to happen sooner or later. In Nevada<\/strong>, you can vote at age 18 and volunteer to get your ass shot off in Iraq but Heaven forbid you should gamble. That may be about to change. A bill just landed in the hopper<\/a> of this year’s Legislature that would lower the legal gambling age from 21 to 18. Now I know there are going to be some who say that this is a cynical ploy by the casinos to enlarge their revenue pool, which it would certainly, handing them a large tranche of Millennials. But the greater cynicism is making those between 18 and 21 years of age bear the burdens of society without enjoying some of its privileges. Hey, and while you’re at it, lower the drinking age<\/a> too. OK?<\/p>\n

* If you were skeptical about the financial depth of Carl Icahn<\/strong>‘s commitment to Trump Taj Mahal<\/strong>, pat yourself on the back. The mogul is putting the Taj on the selling block rather spend $100 million or more to make it competitive in the Atlantic City<\/strong> market. He’ll be lucky to get a sum higher than the low eight figures for the behemoth. In making the \"\"announcement, Icahn couldn’t resist taking another shot at bete noire<\/i> Stephen Sweeney<\/strong> (D), president of the state Senate. \u201cI believe other large investors will similarly have no interest in investing significant amounts in Atlantic City or New Jersey<\/strong> as long as Sweeney is in control of the Senate,\u201d Icahn grumbled, making one wonder why he’s bothering to try and sell the Taj<\/a>, given his bleak outlook. Former Taj workers, for their part, were scapegoated by Gov. Chris Christie<\/strong> (R) as he vetoed the Legislature’s get-Icahn bill to retroactively prevent casino owners who close their doors from reopening them for five years. Christie said the bill was a “\u201ctransparent attempt to punish the owner of the Taj Mahal casino for making the business decision to close its doors after its union employees went on strike and refused to negotiate in good faith.\u201d Funny, but I remember it was Icahn who refused to bargain in good faith, handing Unite-Here Local 54<\/strong> an ultimatum and then walking away from the bargaining table. For that alone, let’s hope he’s stuck with the Taj for a good long time. In his own defense, Sweeney said,\u00a0\u201cThe only person who will benefit from this veto will be billionaire investor Carl Icahn. [It]\u00a0will allow Icahn to exploit and manipulate bankruptcy laws and casino licensing regulations in ways that would enrich himself at the expense of regular casino workers and the families who depend on them.\u201d<\/p>\n

If the New Jersey Lege took revenge on Icahn, it might bend over backwards rather than lose Glenn Straub<\/strong>. The Revel<\/strong> owner could be the beneficiary<\/a> of a tailor-made bill introduced by state Sen. Raymond Lesniak<\/strong> (D). It would carve a hole in the state’s gaming regulations to allow Straub to reopen Ten<\/strong> (formerly Revel) with gambling but without a gaming license for Straub. We have complete confidence in Straub but don’t think New Jersey lawmakers should be playing favorites among casino owners. What’s sauce for Straub ought to be sauce for Icahn, too.<\/p>\n

* The Democratic caucus in the Alabama<\/strong> Lege wants to legalize casinos<\/a> in this session. Good luck on that. Dems only hold eight seats in Alabama’s state Senate, less than a fourth of that august body. So they’ll have to make a lot of new friends on the GOP side of the aisle. Even then, it’s not a done deal, as the matter would have to put before the voters for their approval. However, given the popularity of electronic bingo in Alabama, we think that would be the easier part of the process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s been a busy week or so for Derek Stevens. Last week, he started turning earth on the La Bayou site, preface to construction of a two-story slot parlor that Stevens expects to have finished by August. (He wastes no … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[135,23,82,155,18,51,185,207,33,157,196],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19343"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19343"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21984,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19343\/revisions\/21984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}