Columnist Jeff German: LVCVA put on hot seat over executive’s suspension

Tuesday, April 14, 1998 | 10:48 a.m.

AMONG HER fellow workers at the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, Jean Goldberg is considered a hero today.

The 56-year-old Goldberg took on her bosses at the influential LVCVA and won.

Last week, an independent arbitrator overturned her five-day suspension for poor job performance a year ago and ordered the LVCVA to give her the merit pay raise she was entitled to receive.

The decision means an additional $2,675 in Goldberg's pocketbook.

But more importantly, it is boosting morale among employees in the LVCVA's Facilities Division, which is wracked by internal upheaval.

"Everyone's walking on eggshells there," says one insider. "It's like a reign of terror."

LVCVA spokesman Rob Powers says the tourism agency, which has not been formally notified of the arbitrator's decision, does not comment on personnel matters.

Goldberg was a loyal, hard-working and competent LVCVA employee for 10 years before she landed on the wrong side of Facilities Director Sharon McCloud.

Within a year of her hiring, Goldberg was promoted to a supervisory position, overseeing four people.

Even in that position, according to a two-page decision by Arbitrator Julius Conigliaro, she was over-qualified.

But her exemplary work record took a nose dive last year after the jobs of her underlings gradually were eliminated.

Conigliaro suggests the LVCVA set up Goldberg to fail.

"The workload was placed entirely on the grievant who was obligated to complete her subordinates' work as well as her own job duties," Conigliaro writes.

After her suspension, Goldberg was transferred to the low-level position of communications specialist in the LVCVA's Marketing Division.

Today, she's wasting away answering phones at the LVCVA's visitor's center, while paranoia -- and some say incompetence -- permeates the confines of the Facilities Division.

When Goldberg decided to challenge her suspension, she knew it would be a difficult task.

According to her husband, Bob Goldberg, a fighter from way back, even the Nevada Service Employees Union was reluctant to go to the mat for her.

Golberg says he had to spend $6,000 out of his own pocket to hire Reno attorney John Kidwell Jr. to take his wife's case.

The couple had to go it alone during the arbitrator's investigation because Jean's co-workers were reluctant to step forward on her behalf.

"Everyone was afraid of losing their jobs," Bob Goldberg says.

But now that his wife has been vindicated, others who feel they've been wronged in the Facilities Division may show some courage.

They've found a hero, you see, in Jean Goldberg.

The shuttle bus from the nation's capital to Las Vegas should be busy again this week.

Tonight, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., is expected to be the guest of honor for a campaign bash for Rep. John Ensign, R-Nev.

McConnell, among those leading the charge against campaign fund-raising reform in Congress, plans to help Ensign celebrate his 40th birthday.

Ensign, who's running against Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., turned 40 last month.

On Thursday, Rep. Bud Shuster, R-Penn., who chairs the House Transportation Committee, expects to be here for a fund-raiser at the Las Vegas Country Club for his political coffers.

Developers and casino industry executives -- ecstatic that the House highway bill now includes millions to widen the crucial stretch of Interstate 15 between Barstow and Victorville -- hope to turn out in numbers.

Last week, House Republican Whip Tom DeLay of Texas took the shuttle to Las Vegas for another fund-raiser put together by casino executives.