Attorney awaits council revote on car dealership

Diana Sahagun

Friday, June 29, 2001 | 11:25 a.m.

A local attorney who is taking the city of Las Vegas to court says he won't consider dropping the suit until next week's revote on a controversial car dealership.

The City Council will reconsider a vote it took June 6 relating to a Nissan car dealership being proposed by businessman John Staluppi. The members will also revote on whether to issue a 60-day moratorium on all new-car dealerships in the northwest.

City Councilman Michael Mack asked for the item to be reconsidered after being attacked with a lawsuit and ethics complaint after the council voted to deny the dealership's routine site plan review. Mayor Oscar Goodman and Councilman Michael McDonald abstained.

Mack led the vote, saying the dealership was inconsistent with the Town Center concept, which groups all commercial uses into one area near U.S. 95 and Centennial Parkway. Staluppi was proposing a dealership on Rancho Drive near the Santa Fe Station.

Mack said he asked for the item to be reconsidered after he was told that a $60,000 loan he had taken from Joseph Scala -- who owns property at U.S. 95 and Centennial being proposed as the northwest's auto mall -- was still outstanding. He will recuse himself from the vote.

With Mack, Goodman, and McDonald abstaining, each of the remaining council members has the ability to change the outcome of the decision. Based on a new state law that takes effect July 1, a majority of the council must vote in favor for the revotes to pass. With three of the seven members abstaining, this means all four remaining members must vote yes for the measures to pass.

Attorney Anthony Sgro said he's still planning on filing a lawsuit against Mack and Brown for monetary damages relating to their original vote, but is waiting to see how next week's vote turns out.

Sgro has already asked a District Court judge to overturn the decision by the council, saying Mack and City Councilman Larry Brown were working behind the scenes to broker a deal between Scala and Staluppi. The suit also alleges Mack and Brown guaranteed Scala that all new dealerships would be built on his property.

Sgro said of Mack's original vote: "It demonstrates the influence a private individual can wield over an elected officer. Frankly it's not something that should be accepted."

Staluppi's partner has also filed an ethics complaint against Mack and Brown to the Las Vegas Ethics Board and state Ethics Commission, alleging conflicts of interest.

Sgro, whose firm once represented McDonald in similar ethics complaints, said the council should hold Mack to the same standard. When there were allegations last year made against McDonald for trying to broker a deal between the city and an ailing sportspark, the council asked Metro Police to investigate.

"I think it would only be fair for an inquiry to be made by the council itself as to what Michael Mack did," Sgro said.

Mack said he received the $60,000 loan last year, for his First Class Pawn and Jewelry Superstore, from Peoples Investments, a limited liability company owned by Scala.

During his council run this spring, in which he raised $500,000, Mack said he left the financial business of his pawn shop to a bookkeeper. He assumed the loan had been paid off, he said, and believed a conflict no longer existed when the vote came before the council.