Goodman getting good feedback on the phone

Sito Negron

Thursday, Feb. 26, 2004 | 11:26 a.m.

The calls coming in to Mayor Oscar Goodman's office after a phone campaign excoriating him for following a "gay agenda" are running about 80 percent in favor of the mayor, according to a city spokeswoman.

The mayor said that he's taken some of the calls, including a few he termed "hateful."

"They (said they) don't like gays ... they don't like lesbians. I said, 'I feel sorry for you,' " Goodman said. Asked if he was surprised to hear such sentiments in Las Vegas, he said, "I'm disappointed more than I'm surprised."

The phone calls were spurred by a campaign orchestrated by Tony Dane, a political consultant who says the mayor had no business sending a letter to the operators of downtown's Neonopolis informing them they were in default of a contract with the city.

Goodman sent the letter, in part, because Neonopolis did not lease space to Donald Troxel, an Ohio businessman who planned to open a cabaret style nightclub modeled after his successful venture in Dayton.

According to Goodman, that places Neonopolis in default of an "obligation to refrain from discrimination," which is part of the contract with the city.

The letter gives the operators of Neonopolis 30 days to deliver an audited statement of net operating income for the mall's first year, to explain the discrimination against potential tenants, and to explain its and failure to develop an urban entertainment center at the Fremont Street complex.

Dane says the mayor has no business telling Neonopolis what type of business to allow, and said the nightclub wouldn't be appropriate for the family-themed downtown mall.

"Goodman does not have the right to tell a private owner what to do with it, and I don't care how much money the city put in," said Dane, who called the club "sexually explicit" and compared it to topless clubs, while continually referring to customers who would arrive "in drag."

However, when told the concept was a cabaret style club -- similar to the shows portrayed in the movie "The Bird Cage" -- he admitted he didn't know exactly who the clientele would be or what type of entertainment would be featured.

Later, Dane said the type of club didn't matter, and that he would oppose putting any nightclub in Neonopolis, because the complex contains a movie theater and game room. It also includes several bars.

Dane's telephone campaign links the Neonopolis issue with the issue of gay marriage, saying that "the next thing you can expect is for Goodman to allow same sex marriage within the city limits."

Goodman, in dismissing Dane's effort as that of a misguided "hate-monger," pointed out that the county, not the city, issues marriage licenses.

Goodman said he opposes gay marriage on religious grounds but said he also opposes the anti-gay point of view represented by Dane.

"As long as I'm the mayor we're not going to tolerate that kind of intolerance, bigotry, and hatred," Goodman said.

Dane said his attack was not meant to tie into President Bush's national stand against gay marriage. Tuesday, Bush said he would support a constitutional amendment limiting marriage to heterosexuals.

"It's totally coincidental to what the president did," Dane said.

Dane said that he is not anti-gay.

"I have homosexual friends. They don't agree with me a lot of the time and sometimes they do," Dane said.

He also said his attack is not a reflection of whether or not Las Vegas is a tolerant city.

"I don't believe Las Vegas is a homophobic city. To say someone who doesn't agree with the gay agenda is a homophobe is a stretch," Dane said.

Joe Lamarca, owner of Euphoria Salons, agreed partially with Dane. Las Vegas is not an intolerant city, although the gay community here does not have a cultural center in the same sense as San Francisco or West Hollywood, Lamarca said.

"The gay people I've discovered pretty much live in any part of town, and that's why you don't see the concentration of gay culture in one part of town," Lamarca said. "I've pretty much lived across the country. ... It amazes me Tony Dane can get an audience for his kind of talk because I've found Las Vegas to be a very tolerant community.

"Las Vegas is a city of live and let live, that's why this seems so out of place."