{"id":22975,"date":"2018-11-26T09:10:56","date_gmt":"2018-11-26T17:10:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=22975"},"modified":"2022-12-12T06:45:36","modified_gmt":"2022-12-12T14:45:36","slug":"sin-city-still-sinful-pot-comes-to-the-strip","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/sin-city-still-sinful-pot-comes-to-the-strip\/","title":{"rendered":"Sin City still sinful; Pot comes to the Strip"},"content":{"rendered":"

Las Vegas<\/strong> beat out Los Angeles<\/strong> by a comfortable margin<\/a> to nab the top spot on WalletHub<\/strong>‘s survey of America<\/strong>‘s most-sinful<\/p>\n

\"\"cities, a category dominated by such activities as pathological gambling and smoking. Casino-enhanced cities dominated the list, with North Las Vegas<\/strong> logging in at #14, elbowing aside Phoenix<\/strong>\u00a0(#15) but preceded by Detroit<\/strong> (#12), Philadelphia<\/strong> (#8), Miami<\/strong> (#7) and St. Louis<\/strong> (#5). Note to Georgia<\/strong> governor-elect Brian Kemp<\/strong> (R): If you get off your high horse about gambling, Atlanta<\/strong> (#6) has a serious shot at the top of the list. Metrics of sinfulness were, shall we say, unusual and not exactly quantifiable.<\/p>\n

Vegas was 16th in anger and hatred (just read the comment threads on the Las Vegas Review-Journal<\/em>‘s Web site), but only 35th for jealousy and 33rd for excesses and vices — which I refuse to believe — but it was 12th for lust and fifth in greed. Lady Las Vegas ranks fourth in vanity and third in laziness. Perhaps the reason the Las Vegas Convention & Visitors Authority<\/strong> isn’t trumpeting these findings is that it would require too much of an effort.<\/p>\n

Sin City is also claiming to be home to the world’s largest marijuana store<\/a>. Customers can bliss out at Planet 13<\/strong>, strategically located close to Wynncore<\/strong>, Venelazzo<\/strong> and Treasure Island<\/strong> (and to LVA<\/em> HQ for when that deadline stress kicks into gear). Since Planet 13 engages in on-site cultivation, that surely accounts for much of its 40,000 square feet of grass. Bloomberg<\/em> paid a visit and reports, “Planet 13 feels like someone put an upscale jewelry store inside a night club. Alongside tasteful wood and glass display cases, are the glam embellishments\u00a0one associates with Las Vegas. The floor lights up when you step on it. Massive screens play trippy 3-D images.”<\/p>\n

You can even sample the “bouquet” of the products on sale. Owners\u00a0Bob Groesbeck<\/strong> and\u00a0Larry Scheffler<\/strong> are far from done. A tasting \"\"room is on the to-do list, as is a coffee shop. (Uh, wouldn’t the caffeine and the ‘wacky tobaccy’ cancel each other?)\u00a0\u201cWe wanted to take this out of that head-shop mindset,\u201d Groesbeck (pictured<\/em>) explained. Loco weed is such a cash crop in Nevada<\/strong> that Green Thumb Inc<\/strong>. recently went on a $290 million acquisition spree that included pioneering dispensary Essence<\/strong>. Even a legal brothel has been converted to a marijuana farm. No, the Silver State will never be the same, especially with pot-friendly Steve Sisolak<\/strong> (D) in the governor’s mansion.<\/p>\n

* It’s Cordish Gaming<\/strong> all-in, Watouche “Bob” Manoukian<\/strong> out at Stadium Casino<\/strong>, to be rebranded Philly Live<\/strong>. The disclosure that Cordish was buying 100% of the project scotches rumors that the \"\"partners were going to scrap the casino-hotel altogether. The news is ironic in that Manoukian went to great difficulty to get the license even though his Greenwood Racing<\/strong> already controls the biggest share of the Philadelphia<\/strong> market out at Parx Casino<\/strong>. Cordish asked the commonwealth for a delay of the casino’s opening until 2021 but the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board<\/strong> replied frostily<\/a> that waiting until 2020 would be “more than adequate.” After all, the license was issued four years ago<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If the casino is ever finished<\/a>, it will have a 240-room hotel, 2,000 slots and 125 table games. A master plan was approved in late 2018 but progress has been slow, to say the least.<\/p>\n

* Hurricane Maria<\/strong> broke the back of Puerto Rico<\/strong> in more ways than one. Now the U.S. colony is examining the idea of legalizing slot routes, seeing in them as a new form of tax revenue. An estimated 50,000 black-market machines are said to exist on the island. Gov. Ricardo Rosello<\/strong>‘s proposal would bring them out into the open.<\/p>\n

* \u201cGiven MGM Resorts<\/strong>\u2019 willingness to partner and its successful track record partnering with third parties such as Pansy Ho<\/strong> in Macau<\/strong> and Dubai World<\/strong> at CityCenter<\/strong>, we believe MGM Resorts is one of \"\"the best-positioned, if not the best-positioned global gaming operator\u201d in Japan<\/strong>, say Nomura<\/strong> analysts. Undeterred, Galaxy Entertainment<\/strong> is kicking the tires<\/a> on seven different municipalities. It doesn’t have a Japanese partner yet but could share the development costs with Monaco<\/strong>‘s Soci\u00e9t\u00e9 des Bains de Mer<\/strong>. \u201cGalaxy Macau<\/strong> has already become the number one IR in the world in just eight years. If you look at the balance sheet, we have over US$4 billion in our bank account and are without debt,” said Galaxy Deputy Chairman Frances Lui<\/strong>. Being debt-free is a major asset when development costs could run to $10 billion and having cash on hand doesn’t suck either.<\/p>\n

* Even in the wake of Amendment 3<\/strong>, Florida<\/strong> remains open for sports betting (and DFS). Attorney Dan Wallach<\/strong> explains why<\/a>, although the achievement of this laudable goal will require some threading of the legalistic needle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Las Vegas beat out Los Angeles by a comfortable margin to nab the top spot on WalletHub‘s survey of America‘s most-sinful cities, a category dominated by such activities as pathological gambling and smoking. Casino-enhanced cities dominated the list, with North … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20046,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[109,56,70,44,227,134,26,36,201,152,172,171,62,224,245,39,78,110,95,25,92,240,243,31,9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22975"}],"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=22975"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22975\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32037,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22975\/revisions\/32037"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}