Columnist Jeff German: Gamers still unsure of legislative agenda

Thursday, Feb. 4, 1999 | 1:51 a.m.

It's the first week of the 1999 Legislature, and Nevada's influential casino industry, usually a dominant force in Carson City, still hasn't put together its agenda.

To some this isn't all that surprising. The industry usually muscles its bills through the tail end of the Legislature.

But others see a tentativeness on the part of the industry this session that could be a sign of the uncertain times that lie ahead. Industry leaders continue to deal with stepped-up scrutiny in Washington.

Examples of the uncertainty about the future of the industry are everywhere.

In Las Vegas, the Strip is experiencing its biggest growth spurt in years, yet tourism officials are having a tough time luring enough visitors to town to fill the new hotel rooms.

Gaming here continues to reap big profits, but casino bosses are worried about competition from Indian tribes in California, which just passed a ballot initiative to allow Las Vegas-style gambling on reservations.

"We have an industry that once had a monopoly in the entire country, but now we have ferocious economic competition all around us," says Jim Mulhall, vice president of governmental affairs for the Nevada Resort Association, the industry's chief political arm. "That's the new economic and political reality we face."

Mulhall, a former chief of staff for retired Gov. Bob Miller, heads the NRA's high-powered lobbying team this year. His boss, longtime NRA president and chief lobbyist, Richard Bunker, plans to go to Carson City only if needed.

But don't get the idea the industry is slacking off.

The biggest goal of any gaming legislative agenda is to fend off a biennial push for higher gaming taxes.

That's the focus for the time being in Carson City for Mulhall and his associates, Billy Vassiliadis, Harvey Whittemore and Greg Ferraro.

This session in particular, as lawmakers scrape for money to fund projects that Gov. Kenny Guinn wants to cut, many will look to gaming, the state's biggest cash cow, as a source of funding.

Casino lobbyists know how quickly momentum can build for a gaming tax hike. All it takes is one key committee chairman to get things started.

On Wednesday, state Sen. Joe Neal, D-North Las Vegas, put the industry on the defensive when he introduced his bill for a tax increase along with other anti-gaming measures.

Still, industry leaders seem to have their eyes focused more on Washington this year, where new threats to gaming surface nearly every week.

In June, the National Gambling Impact Study Commission wraps up its two-year study of the spread of gaming across America.

The nine-member panel will deliver a report to Congress and the president that almost certainly will show that the industry needs to do more to address the social and economic problems it causes. That, in turn, will lead to renewed pushes on Capitol Hill to tax the industry and ban it from participating in the political process.

Gambling also is expected to become an issue in the 2000 presidential race. Segments within the Republican Party already are talking about including strong anti-gambling language in the GOP's platform in 2000.

Casino lobbyists, it seems, have discovered there's a lot more happening in the industry outside the confines of the Nevada Legislature.

The decision by Mary Boetsch to step down in June is a chance to put someone with a more even temperament at the helm of the six-member state Ethics Commission.

The logical choice to serve as new chairman is Bill Bible, who's steady hand guided the state Gaming Control Board for a decade.

No one understands state government better than Bible.

Though we don't know what the Ethics Commission will look like when the Legislature gets through with it this year, Bible would bring instant integrity and credibility as chairman to the much-maligned agency.

Steve Wark made a name for himself organizing the grass-roots campaign that helped Gov. Kenny Guinn sweep into office.

He's become a hot property of sorts.

One of his new clients is Associated Builders and Contractors, a group of local businesses that fancies itself as adversaries of the construction and trade unions.

Some find Wark's association with ABC a bit odd considering how strongly Guinn wooed organized labor last year.