P.T.’s hotel-casino approved for Henderson

David Strow

Thursday, Nov. 4, 1999 | 10:40 a.m.

A Henderson hotel-casino that's been on the drawing boards for nearly 15 years is finally set to open after receiving approval Wednesday by the Nevada Gaming Control Board.

P.T.'s Mining Company Hotel and Casino at 900 S. Boulder Highway, first proposed in 1986, received a license Wednesday to operate up to 200 slot machines. The property must still receive final approval from the Nevada Gaming Commission later this month.

"There's a time for everything," said Bill Rutsey, president and chief executive of Toronto-based RPC Gaming, 50 percent owner of P.T.'s, after the meeting. "In 1986, this was nothing but barren dirt out here. Now the population has moved. There's a market area now. Now is the time to develop the property."

The casino will open Jan. 11, company officials told the board, and will start with 164 machines. That will increase to about 250, depending on the reception the casino receives. Construction began about six months ago.

Once opened, the property will be the largest operated by P.T.'s, which owns 20 pubs throughout the Las Vegas Valley, as well as a slot route operation. P.T.'s plans to coordinate marketing for the property with its pubs, using a player rewards program similar to that used by Station Casinos Inc.

"Bill Rutsey has been the driving force behind this," said Scott Torman, controller of P.T.'s. "We've funded the majority of it out of our daily operations, but they have provided some funding."

About $4.5 million has been spent on the casino project, Rutsey said. That does not include the costs of building the hotel.

The casino, which Rutsey describes as having a "rustic" feel, will have 71 hotel rooms, and could potentially expand to 200 rooms in the future. It will initially span 50,000 square feet, with 15,000 square feet of casino space. The only other gaming other than slots will be keno, though the company plans to add on a sports book in the future.

Plans for the casino ran into flak in March 1998, when the Henderson Planning Commission delayed hearings on its approval. Residential development sprung up in the 12-year hiatus following the initial proposal, and some Henderson officials expressed concerns about establishing a hotel-casino in what had become a residential area.

The city decided to permit the project two weeks later, however, after officials scaled down the hotel from 200 rooms to 71.

"I think, like any other gaming company, we believe in growth," Rutsey said. "We will be on the lookout for additional opportunities. There's no large project on the boards, but we do want to develop larger properties than bars."

In other actions Wednesday, the board:

* Denied the suitability application of Delorges Sada Albano, who was working as a junket representative for the Bellagio hotel-casino in Brazil.

Albano, a Brazilian resident, has represented Las Vegas casinos in Brazil since 1992. But after an hour-long hearing, the board voted unanimously to reject his Nevada application after investigations turned up a history of misleading regulators in Nevada, New Jersey and Brazil.

Investigators found that Albano was fired from Caesars Palace in 1995 for lying about discounts on markers used by junket participants. Nevada law requires discount checks to be signed in person by participants. After an internal investigation, Caesars Palace found that Albano had signed two of these checks himself, then told company officials he had seen the participants sign them. In one case, Albano deposited several hundred thousand dollars in his personal banking account from one such check, then gave the funds to the junket participant. Albano's attorney argued he had been fired because of a corporate battle within Caesars.

The board was also informed by New Jersey investigators that Albano had lied about his ownership of a $5 million bank account in Switzerland and a house in Las Vegas. He initially denied owning either, but later admitted to owning both. Albano did not reveal either asset on his Nevada application.

The board also found that Albano's Brazilian tax returns did not report income from outside of Brazil, when in fact he had been bringing in significant amounts of money from his junket business with American casinos.

Board Chairman Steve DuCharme expressed frustration over Albano's "lack of candor."

"He does not even come close to the standard of meeting suitability in this state," DuCharme said. "In direct response to an investigation at Caesars Palace, he lied. I don't have any appetite to allow reconsideration or withdrawal."

* Approved the deregistration of Rio Hotel & Casino as a separate, publicly traded company. Harrah's Entertainment acquired the hotel-casino earlier this year.

During the hearing on this application, the board received a quick briefing on Harrah's operations from Phil Satre, chairman and CEO.

Top on everyone's minds was Harrah's new casino in New Orleans, which features 2,900 slots, 117 tables, 2,500 employees -- and no hotel rooms.

"We're quite pleased with how things went," Satre said. "We've had very high head count levels."

When the board inquired about Harrah's pending acquisition of Players International, Satre said the company expects to receive a decision from Louisiana gaming authorities by Dec. 1. Players is under intense scrutiny in Louisiana, following charges of improper involvement with the former speaker of the Louisiana house.

"It's still in progress in Missouri and Illinois, but it really hinges on the decision in Louisiana," Satre said.

Harrah's is also having success in Australia and Arizona, Satre said. In Australia, Satre said the company hopes to close on the sale of its casino in Sydney in January, raising more than $250 million. In Arizona, the company received a five-year contract renewal from the Ak-Chin tribe to operate a casino near Phoenix. That deal made Harrah's the first "major public company" to receive such a renewal on an Indian casino, Satre said.

Meanwhile, Harrah's corporate move from Memphis to Las Vegas is well under way, and the company expects to soon announce the location of its permanent headquarters, Satre said. The only hang-up: many corporate transferees are having difficulty tracking down homes in a red-hot real estate market.

"The optimistic outlook that you'll be in a house by mid-September has quickly turned into November, at least as far as I'm concerned," Satre joked.

* Approved, with conditions, an application by International Sports Wagering Inc. of New Jersey to operate an inter-casino linked system in Nevada.

First approved in Nevada in 1997, ISW operates a computerized system that allows players to place propositions on every play of a sporting event. The company has installed terminals allowing these bets to be places at Bally's Las Vegas and Union Plaza downtown. Participating casinos receive one-third of the hold on bets placed through the system.

Since then, company officials told the board, ISW's system has also begun accepting straight bets on sporting events. The software system ISW developed allows bets to be placed either over the telephone or by computer. The system allows lines to be adjusted automatically to account for betting activity, and ensures that all bets are coming from within Nevada.

The benefit of the system, ISW officials said, was that casinos could establish an off-property betting system without having to invest millions of dollars in building their own system.

"This brings in a customer base we wouldn't have," said Jerry Subject, race and sports book manager at Union Plaza. "It's a new technology that's never been there before."

But since the system automatically adjusts lines -- and accepts activity from casinos across Nevada -- lines on the system often don't match the lines offered by the host casino.

That raised red flags among board members, since Nevada regulations state that all sports book patrons must be given access to the same betting lines.

"It looks like you're giving odds at different rates," DuCharme said. "You're leveraging something that was not approved in 1997."

But ISW officials argued that it was impossible to keep the system's lines coordinated with a casino's lines. Patrons could access the system by leaving the property if a line on the system was more favorable, they argued.

"In the 1970s (when sports book regulations were drafted), they never even contemplated anything of this nature," said Bernard Mindes, chairman of ISW. By posting the system's lines in a casino side-by-side with a casino's lines, Mindes said, the company would be competing with its own customers.

The board granted a license to the company, but asked the attorney general to determine whether or not straight bets would conflict with Nevada regulations. The attorney general's office will present its findings at the Nevada Gaming Commission meeting later this month.