Schools, LVCVA dig in for tax battle

Benjamin Grove and Adrienne Packer

Friday, April 9, 1999 | 11:12 a.m.

Local school officials are preparing for a showdown with the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority over an estimated $12 million a year.

They say a brewing battle between "casinos and kids" is one they expect to win.

"I don't want a fight with the Convention Authority," Joyce Haldeman, who oversees school bond money, said. But she added the district will go toe-to-toe with the LVCVA if necessary.

"If we have to win this battle one more time, we will."

At issue is tax money that the district and the LVCVA both want. The money is generated by five-eighths of 1 percent in room taxes paid by hotel guests.

The funds have been flowing to the LVCVA for special events and make up 10 percent of the organization's budget. The LVCVA promotes the city in an effort to draw tourists.

But the 1997 Legislature mandated that beginning in July of this year, the money will be deposited in the coffers of the school district to be used for school construction and renovation.

Now the LVCVA wants the money back because it suspects the district will have plenty of money for construction during the next decade.

LVCVA representatives said today they support a bill that calls for an audit of the money spent on the school district. They suspect the district does not need all the unforeseen tax revenues it will reap in the next 10 years.

"We'll abide by what the audit says," LVCVA spokesman Rob Powers said. "But if the audit shows our money wouldn't be funding school construction and instead is going into a vast surplus, it doesn't make sense from our perspective to cut the amount of money we use to bring in more visitors and just park it somewhere."

Powers last week said the organization had not pressured lawmakers to divert the money back to the LVCVA.

"A lot has changed," Powers said. "At that time we weren't going to go to battle with the schools, but now some legislators out there are rethinking the revenue issue."

District officials had expected to raise at least $3.5 billion for school construction during the next 10 years through property taxes ($2.5 billion), room taxes ($662 million) and real estate taxes ($356 million).

But LVCVA representatives and lawmakers are eyeing new figures calculated by analysts who say the district's construction fund may pull in nearly $600 million more than the expected $3.5 billion.

For the LVCVA to get the five-eighths of a percent back, the organization would have to convince lawmakers to change the law crafted in 1997. District officials say the LVCVA is quietly lobbying lawmakers.

"We're really worried that something could happen at the last minute" in the Legislature, Haldeman said.

So the district has drawn up a battle plan to convince lawmakers that the district needs the money for construction projects in the fastest-growing school district in the nation. They say growth patterns indicate 145,000 new students will flood the district in the next 10 years.

"We are trying to be proactive," Superintendent Brian Cram said. "We're not taking any chances."

School officials have lots of plans for any "extra" money that is generated beyond the $3.5 billion. Among the projects is a new proposal to tear down the district's oldest schools and replace them with new buildings. The district will have 78 schools that are at least 40 years old by 2008.

"The school district has legitimate needs for these funds," Haldeman said.

School officials today made their case to the Oversight Panel for School Facilities, a group created by the Legislature to watch over bond money used to build schools.

"Why in the world would I as superintendent be willing to give back money that flowed to us legally ... when we have these kinds of needs?" Cram said. "I'm dug in on this. We need to let this work the way it was designed."

The panel, made up of local business, government and parent leaders, voted to take a position in favor of the five-eighths of a percent remaining with the district.

"For them (LVCVA) to renege on their deal now is unconscionable," panel member Stephanie Smith, a teacher, said. "I think we need to send the message that kids come first."