Activist sends out message about mayor’s ‘gay agenda’

Kirsten Searer and Sito Negron

Wednesday, Feb. 25, 2004 | 11:02 a.m.

About 100,000 Las Vegas voters are getting calls this week from an activist who says Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman is pushing a "homosexual agenda."

"Why are we called Sin City?" the recorded message says. "It is because of actions done by our mayor, Oscar Goodman."

Activist and political consultant Tony Dane said today he is spending about $1,000 of his own money to put out the messages because Goodman defended a gay nightclub proposed for the downtown project Neonopolis.

Owners of Neonopolis had rejected the gay-themed club. The businessman who proposed the club said it was because of the club's theme. Goodman wrote a letter to Neonopolis officials demanding they explain the discrimination allegation and the failure to develop Neonopolis.

Goodman today called the phone bank "deceitful" and "treacherous," saying he defended the club's right to settle in Neonopolis because he thinks all business owners should have equal rights to operate in Nevada, regardless of their sexual orientation.

Goodman said his attitude about gays is "very simple -- that they're going to be treated as fairly as anybody else in the community, that anybody who lives here will live here on a level playing field, and the city of Las Vegas, as long as I am the mayor, will not tolerate bigotry."

The message encourages people to call Goodman's office and tell him to "keep his homosexual agenda to himself."

About 30,000 calls went out on Tuesday and the rest will go out today, Dane said. Already on Tuesday morning, Goodman's office had received about 100 calls, city spokeswoman Diana Paul said.

"The majority of the calls are in support of the mayor, that he does not believe the city should discriminate," Paul said.

Dane consults for political campaigns around the country and said he had the resources through his business to easily record the message and play it to a list of Las Vegas voters who have voted in recent elections.

He said he is concerned that Neonopolis is already struggling for business, and that by allowing the gay nightclub, the downtown project would hurt even more.

"What's going to happen is Neonopolis is going to turn into a haven for sexually oriented businesses, and that's not what's best for the city," Dane said. "There are sections of town that have that."

The message states that Goodman is pushing his own agenda on his constituents.

"Next thing you can expect is for Goodman to allow same-sex marriage within city limits," the message states.

Dane said it's not too big of a leap to assume that because Goodman is defending the gay nightclub, he might allow gay marriages in the city. He pointed out that Goodman was a recent grand marshal at a gay parade in Las Vegas as further proof of Goodman's "homosexual agenda."

"It all happens in baby steps," Dane said. "If you get away with one thing, it moves on to the next thing. I can see him pushing an agenda and trying to get the national publicity that the mayor of San Francisco is getting."

Goodman responded that he is a devout Jew and said he has consistently opposed gay marriage "my whole life."

"Religiously, I can't condone same-sex marriages," he said. "But at the same time, I will not condone discrimination and prejudice toward the folks of that persuasion."

Part of the issue is the city's $15 million investment into the parking garage at Neonopolis. City officials last month said they will have to take about $400,000 from the city's general fund to cover the debt the city incurred in helping to pay for the 600-space facility.

Donald Troxel, the Ohio businessman who planned the gay-themed club, said his business would have brought in about 1,000 customers an evening.

Gary Peck, the executive director of the ACLU of Nevada, said the Nevada Legislature passed a nondiscrimination clause that protects employees from being discriminated against because of their ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation.

The clause, however, wouldn't force Neonopolis to accept the gay nightclub, Peck said. He said he thinks that activists are trying to meld this issues with the ongoing national debate over gay marriage.

"This is precisely the kind of homophobic furor that we don't need stirred up," Peck said.

Steve Wark, a consultant for U.S. Senate hopeful Richard Ziser, who led the successful initiative campaign in Nevada to define marriage as between a man and a woman, said he doesn't think the issue of gay marriage will mix with the conflict at Neonopolis.

"Tony Dane has his own agenda," Wark said. "It's not necessarily coordinating with what anyone else is trying to do in their campaign."