Political wrangling ends in victory for Republican adviser Sig Rogich

Erin Neff

Thursday, April 6, 2000 | 10:38 a.m.

City spending

Here is how the Las Vegas City Council voted Wednesday to spend taxpayer money:

To Haworth Inc. for furniture.

To E.B. Eames Co. Inc. for the Dula Center gymnasium floor.

To McCandless Trucks Inc. for an aerial lift truck.

To four suppliers for miscellaneous locks for use by the Department of Detention and Enforcement.

To Alcade & Fay to lobby against possible storage of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain.

Weeks of lobbying, measuring and spinning ended Wednesday when a nationally known and respected Republican adviser won a contested tavern license over objections of high-ranking city staff members.

Sig Rogich walked away from Las Vegas City Hall with permission to convert his old offices in an industrial area just off Interstate 15 and Sahara Avenue into a bar.

Councilman Gary Reese repeatedly stated his objections to the proposed license because the offices on Westwood Drive are within 1,500 feet of two bars over the county border and another tavern location just 555 feet away.

But Reese's motion to strike Rogich's request failed 5-1. His later motion to deny failed 4-2. Mayor Oscar Goodman and council members Larry Brown, Michael Mack and Lynette Boggs McDonald then voted to approve the license, with Reese and Councilman Lawrence Weekly in opposition.

Councilman Michael McDonald, who was in the awkward position of having to side either with his political adviser or his good friend Rick Rizzolo, owner of a topless nightclub, left the meeting citing a prior engagement just before the item was called.

Critics argued Rogich wanted the license to turn the offices not just into a bar but into a topless nightclub. Rogich says that he will never operate an adult club at the site. However, he does plan to sell the building.

If the bar is later converted into an adult business, it would compete with Rizzolo's Crazy Horse Too.

An anti-Rogich mailer sent to select homes in the city this week also relied heavily on the adult club possibilities.

But Wednesday's two-hour debate paid no attention to that issue, instead focusing on legal wrangling that made the council chambers feel more like a courtroom.

City Attorney Brad Jerbic told the council it had no jurisdiction to consider Rogich's request because the application violated city code on several fronts.

But Rogich's attorney, Mark Fiorentino, successfully argued that the city's practices and precedent created such confusion that the council should have to decide the merits of the case.

City Manager Virginia Valentine seemed to agree. At the start of the hearing, she publicly apologized to Rogich and the council.

"The staff could have handled better the application," she said. After the meeting she promised amendments to the city code to help alleviate the confusion.

"I think that our process was ambiguous," Valentine said.

A visibly pleased Rogich agreed.

"I'm very happy that the council supported me," he said after the vote. "The code needs to be looked at. If that would have been the case previously, I wouldn't be here."

When Rogich first came before the council March 15, a last-minute city survey determined his offices were 16 inches too close to a school. Subsequently, Rogich's surveyor showed the offices to be 17 inches farther than the required 1,500-foot distance.

Although that issue was resolved, city planners still argued the offices were too close to a tavern site at the former Camilio's Bar and to two bars on the south side of Sahara Avenue in the county.

Fiorentino said a change in city code in 1993 took out any specific mention of sites outside the city boundaries. Although the city had denied licenses since then due to the distance to bars in the county, Fiorentino argued there was no clear precedent.

Jerbic said the city staff simply missed the two county bars because there is no database to check property in the county.

"They weren't dropped in by helicopter in the last two weeks," Jerbic said. "They weren't dropped in by staff in the last two weeks ... And now that we know about them, we can't ignore them."

Jerbic then interviewed city planner Robert Genzer as if in a court proceeding to establish the difficulty staff members have in finding all bars in the county.

"I didn't intend to take Mr. Genzer's deposition today," Fiorentino said, when Goodman offered him the chance to cross-examine.

As for Camilio's, Fiorentino argued that the bar is not currently licensed, and therefore does not apply to the separation requirement.

The city code states: "Establishments licensed as taverns for comparable establishments shall not be located within 1,500 feet of each other."

But since Camilio's owner died in October 1998, the bar has not had a valid tavern license.

Fiorentino also supplied the council with letters of support from both the owner and attorney of Barry's Boxing Gym, which is located next to Rogich's old offices.

"You can get a dozen letters from the owners of Barry's Boxing Gym," Reese said in motioning for denial. "But children are going to use it, and it's right next door."

Erin Neff covers Las Vegas government for the Sun. She can be reached at (702) 259-4062 or by e-mail at erin@lasvegassun.com