County bypasses casinos’ rancor on funding of pedestrian bridges

Adrienne Packer

Wednesday, Nov. 18, 1998 | 11:12 a.m.

Fed up with casino executives bickering over assessment fees to help construct two pedestrian bridges at the Strip and Flamingo Road, Clark County Commissioners abandoned efforts Tuesday to create a special improvement district.

An SID would have shifted more of the costs to affected hotels. The lack of an SID means the county will pay an additional $2.4 million out of resort-corridor funds generated by taxes collected from tourists.

The county has spent months trying to work out a deal with Caesars Palace, Bally's Grand and Barbary Coast hotel-casinos so that the $12 million cost to build the bridges could be split equally.

"I would feel like I was in the wrong meeting if this issue wasn't on the agenda," Commissioner Mary Kincaid said, clearly agitated at the hotel-casinos' inability to reach an agreement.

The county had already agreed to pay for half the cost, and commissioners thought a special improvement district would be the most just way to share the remaining amount.

Special improvement districts are created to make improvements to neighborhoods. Assessment fees associated with each district vary, depending on which property benefits most from the improvements.

While representatives from the three hotel-casinos have argued that properties up the Strip and down Flamingo will benefit from the footbridges, county-hired appraiser Rick Biers of Appraisal Sciences Ltd. disagreed.

He testified Nov. 3 that the three corner hotel-casinos will benefit most from the bridges, one of which will link Caesars to Barbary Coast and the other between Bally's and Barbary Coast.

Caesars Palace attorney Mark Fiorentino argued that the hotel-casino already paid for the bridges through impact fees and pitched in $1 million toward the bridge linking Caesars to Bellagio.

"Caesars' special benefits have nearly doubled since we first started this," Fiorentino said, adding the hotel-casino would be pitching in $4.3 million under Biers' plan.

Bellagio paid the bulk of the cost for the two existing bridges that reach toward Caesars and Bally's.

If the county went forward with the special improvement district, commissioners feared it would be taken to court by one of the hotel-casinos.

"It doesn't make sense to move forward down this road when we know there would be a legal challenge," Commissioner Yvonne Atkinson Gates said.

While it has tried to hammer out an agreement with the hotel-casinos, the county has continued work on the design of the bridges. Public Works Director Marty Manning is expected to make a recommendation on a bridge design in December.

Commissioner Bruce Woodbury said the bridges will be paid for using impact fees owed by several hotel-casinos and with resort corridor funds -- money collected from hotel room taxes.

Caesars Palace owes the county about $2.6 million in impact fees, Flamingo-Hilton hotel-casino owes about $510,000, Harrah's owes $25,612 and the new Paris hotel-casino owes $794,000.

The county will now pay about $8.8 million toward the bridges over and above the fees collected from the hotels. With an SID, the county would have paid $6.4 million.

In addition to the two county pedestrian overcrossings, Flamingo-Hilton officials are going forward with a fifth bridge at the intersection. That bridge will connect with the landing for the Caesars-Barbary Coast span.