{"id":25708,"date":"2019-12-27T09:16:11","date_gmt":"2019-12-27T17:16:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=25708"},"modified":"2020-10-16T07:08:51","modified_gmt":"2020-10-16T15:08:51","slug":"damp-november-in-nevada-dirty-dealings-in-illinois","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/damp-november-in-nevada-dirty-dealings-in-illinois\/","title":{"rendered":"Damp November in Nevada; Dirty dealings in Illinois"},"content":{"rendered":"

Could the good times be coming to an end for Las Vegas<\/strong>? The Strip was down 3% last month but, worse still, locals revenue was off by 4%. The \"\"prior-year comparison was difficult (+6.5%) but not impossible, while December looks more promising in that respect. Strip casinos won $518 million, but slot win was flat ($278 million) and baccarat dove 23% on 31.5% less wagering. Non-baccarat table win was up 4%, so that was a bright spot. Locals won big at the slots, with casinos taking home 8% less on 1.5% lower coin-in. A favorable calendar (one extra weekend day) didn’t do anything to help the casinos. (Incidentally, isn’t Park MGM<\/strong>\u2014photo by Greg Askins<\/strong>\u2014the butt-ugliest thing you’ve ever seen in gaming?)<\/p>\n

Downtown<\/strong> was down 6% to $52 million, while North Las Vegas<\/strong> tumbled 15% to $19 million. The Boulder Strip<\/strong> slid 9% to $58 million, miscellaneous Clark County<\/strong> gained 1.5% to $105 million and Laughlin<\/strong>\u00a0slipped 2% to $41 million. Snowbirds fled Lake Tahoe<\/strong>, which fell 19% to $14 million. Nearby Reno<\/strong> was down 1% to $50 million, while while Elko<\/strong> gained 7% to $27 million and Carson Valley<\/strong> was off 2% to $9 million. But I wouldn’t worry yet. Wendover<\/strong>, the Silver State’s most reliable economic harbinger was up 9% to $19 million.<\/p>\n

* Illinois<\/strong> slot-route operator Rick Heidner<\/strong> is back in the news\u2014and not in a good way. The Illinois Gaming Board<\/strong> is taking action to pull Heidner’s gaming license after more hanky-panky turned up. Faced with the loss of 44 routes leased from Laredo Hospitality Ventures<\/strong>, Heidner offered a $5 million “illegal inducement” to preserve the status quo. Heidner offered to buy Laredo’s restaurants at a $5 million markup. Trouble is, you can’t own the establishments in which your slot machines are hosted. It’s the law.\u00a0\u00a0Being afflicted with stupidity as well as avarice, Heidner left a paper trail in the form of a series of text messages.<\/p>\n

The none-too-smart Heidner sent a spokesman out to declare,\u00a0\u201cIn November 2018, Rick discussed assembling a group to make a legitimate purchase offer to Laredo.\u00a0Rick would not have had any personal or financial interest in the proposed transaction.\u201d Except that he was the point man on the deal\u2014and his slots would stay in place. Heidner is painting himself as the victim of “an orchestrated smear campaign” set up \"\"by a competitor who wants the slot routes for himself. Now he’s facing two counts of violating the Video Gaming Act<\/strong>, one for\u00a0\u201cgiving anything of value to an establishment as an incentive or inducement to locate [slots]\u00a0in that establishment.\u201d The other is similar in language. You may remember Heidner as the individual whose purchase of Tinley Park<\/strong> for a racino was blocked by no less an authority than Gov. J.B. Pritzker<\/strong> (D, pictured<\/em>). He’s also mobbed up and implicated in Illinois’ favorite sport, political corruption. Heidner is a shady character and the Land of Lincoln would be well rid of him.<\/p>\n

* Sex robots are a particularly creepy concept. Remember\u00a0Pris<\/strong> (Darryl Hannah), the ‘pleasure model’ in Blade Runner<\/em>? It is, as director Ridley Scott<\/strong> put it, “a totally fascist concept. I don’t even want to talk about it.” Well, sex robots are here and they’ll be on display in Las Vegas at the AVN Adult Entertainment Expo<\/strong>, which is migrating<\/a> to the Hard Rock Hotel<\/strong> this January. It’s the most popular trade show in Vegas, the ‘trade’ in this case being porn. Hey, it’s a big business so I guess we have to respect that. As for those sex robots, they’re powered by artificial intelligence<\/a> and could be classified as “mammals” within a few years. Scary. It’s something for the person who has lots of money but still can’t get a date. (Think Harvey Weinstein<\/strong>.)<\/p>\n

*\u00a0Phil Ruffin<\/strong>‘s $823 million purchase of Circus Circus<\/strong> is a done deal. The Nevada Gaming Commission<\/strong> signed off on the acquisition, which will \"\"retain Circus Circus’ bargain-friendly status, bring bingo back to the Strip and see a redo of the hotel rooms. Ruffin is getting offers for the 37-acre Rock in Rio<\/strong>\u00a0festival grounds but won’t sell because that’s the linchpin of the whole deal. Ruffin is one of the true entrepreneurs in gaming and whatever he does is bound to be exciting.<\/p>\n

* New York State<\/strong> hasn’t banked much\u00a0money yet from sports betting<\/a> or marijuana sales but already counties are lobbying hard to spend it on road repairs (Pot for Potholes<\/a>?).\u00a0\u201cNew York state must step up and meet the backlog of pavement deterioration, which we witness every day as drivers are dodging potholes on subpar roadways and suffering damage to our vehicles,\u201d said\u00a0Construction Industry Council of Westchester &\u00a0Hudson Valley<\/strong> Executive Director John Cooney<\/strong>. Between cannabis and sports wagering, the Empire State expects to net $400 million. That would make a nice little nest egg for infrastructure work. Despite declining fuel efficiency of cars and SUVs, the New York gas tax is sacrosanct and shan’t be raised.<\/p>\n

* Cats<\/em> was projected to bring in $12 million during its opening weekend. It made a kitten-sized $6.5 million<\/a>. But we’re not yet out of danger: Universal Pictures<\/strong>\u00a0rushed a new, ‘improved’ version into theaters and it will be eligible<\/a> for Oscar<\/strong> consideration, meaning that Jennifer Hudson<\/strong>‘s infamous digital snot could win a visual-effects statuette. Oh, the humanity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Could the good times be coming to an end for Las Vegas? The Strip was down 3% last month but, worse still, locals revenue was off by 4%. The prior-year comparison was difficult (+6.5%) but not impossible, while December looks … 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":[88,51,149,58,76,49,224,10,207,101,78,119,25,79,92,243,8,9,100],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25708"}],"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=25708"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28270,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25708\/revisions\/28270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}