Misrepresenting Vegas is a sign of the Times

Friday, June 4, 2004 | 5:26 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION

June 5 - 6, 2004

Like anxious children hovering over frogs in a high school laboratory, it has become customary for reporters for national publications to bring their magnifying glasses and biology kits to Las Vegas to dissect Sin City.

And for good reason.

When the fastest-growing community in America also happens to be the world's gaming capital -- with an "anything goes" reputation for sex-oriented entertainment and a colorful history filled with wise guys -- it is a no-brainer for an assignment editor to come up with the Las Vegas angle. It sure beats a couple of weeks in Cleveland.

The problem with the six-day series on Las Vegas published this week in The New York Times is that it cherry-picked the city's easiest targets without putting the stories in proper context. It was shopworn journalism, about as fresh as an open can of paint exposed for a year to the desert sun.

The Times gave us the "Grapes of Wrath" treatment in part one, with the saga of newcomer families stuck in a Budget Suites of America motel. They represent the "dreamers, pioneers and strivers" of Las Vegas, or so readers were told. The only thing missing was Henry Fonda as Tom Joad. Are we to assume that when downtrodden families trek to New York City, they stay at the Waldorf Astoria, get free balcony tickets to their favorite musical and eventually become the toast of Manhattan?

I've got breaking news for the Times: There are budget motels in all 50 states that job seekers, dreamers and central casting regulars call home. If they're lucky, they can even find one without the help of motel pitchman Tom Bodett.

It would have made for more compelling journalism had the Times sent reporters to other towns and cities across America to find out why many of their residents were moving to Las Vegas -- and in many cases bringing their social and financial problems with them. Novelist John Steinbeck did not simply write about the Joads when they arrived in California. He richly described the Oklahoma dust bowl and why it drove families away.

Do people move to Las Vegas because the jobs they had in Ohio were outsourced to folks in New Delhi? Do you think the influx to Southern Nevada might have something to do with high personal income and business taxes in other states? Or a desire to get away from polar bear weather? The Times didn't tell us.

If life is so swell in Peoria, why do people keep flocking here?

The fact is that people move to Las Vegas for a variety of reasons. No one size fits all. If job seekers, dreamers and the like come here without jobs and don't have relatives in town, where are they supposed to stay? Pahrump?

Part two was essentially about the negative aspect of population growth, encapsulated in the tale of a newly relocated school teacher at a new elementary school that is already overcrowded. As reflected by the Times, it is the sad truth that many young school children are forced to change schools annually because of rapidly changing school zones. And with students coming and going because of the transient nature of our community, it is particularly difficult for young children to forge long-term friendships.

The problem here is that the Times' focus on growth was as narrow as Nevada's ethics laws for politicians. If you believe that all growth is bad, part two was for you. If a growing city is not your bag, you can move to Podunk, N.D., where ribbon-cutting ceremonies are reserved for Dairy Queens. Or you can move to the Rust Belt and scrape more rust.

Growth has positives as well as negatives, a fact the Times largely ignored. The Times let us off the hook by giving us a pass on our air pollution and traffic problems, both negative byproducts of growth. But the newspaper underplayed the positives of our vibrant local economy, which continues to lead the nation in job growth and which has given residents a variety of entertainment, restaurants and retail stores the likes of which can be found only in the nation's largest cities.

For part three, the Times reported on the tragedy of the Hardcastle family and their disconnected teenage daughter. It is easy to feel sorry for the patriarch, Clark County Family Court Judge Gerald Hardcastle. He has been one of the community's leading advocates for a strong, evenhanded family court and an equally competent foster care system.

But let's be frank: the Times blew it here. The newspaper could have sent a blindfolded reporter anywhere outside of 229 West 43rd St. in New York City -- their home office -- and run into the same wretched tale. There is no getting around the fact that Las Vegas ranks among the nation's leaders in teen pregnancies, dropout rates and access to illicit drugs. But there was nothing uniquely Vegas about the Hardcastle story or about the problems confronting their daughter.

What you have are two prominent parents -- including Clark County Chief District Judge Kathy Hardcastle -- both with day jobs. Families all across America with two working parents always run the risk of behavioral problems with children due to lack of parental supervision. That is as true in Las Vegas, N.M., as it is in our city.

The Times' readers would have been much better served by a story focusing on a single mother working a night shift or by a family with two working parents whose odd hours are the result of our 24-hour town. A family struggling to cope with its children because of the 24-hour nature of Las Vegas would have been the better story to tell if the goal was to inform readers about what makes this place unique.

And for the sake of journalistic balance, where was the story about a family that has successfully raised children in Las Vegas? By omission, the Times left one with the impression that such families do not live here. So if you think you know a local family with good kids, the newspaper of record has news for you: It's all a desert mirage.

We had to wait until part four to get to the obligatory exotic dancer story. It was a good thing, because I was beginning to think Las Vegas was filled with Budget Suites, overcrowded elementary schools, dysfunctional teenagers and little else.

Like it or not, Las Vegas makes no pretense about its sex industry, whose growth mirrors that of the Strip. Thanks largely to the way Las Vegas projects itself to outsiders, many tourists still believe prostitution is legal here, even though the valley's last brothel closed down during the Eisenhower administration.

So, yes, go ahead and blame Las Vegas if you need to blow off steam. Go climb the ladders and punch out the racy billboards, if you will. But if you think the Times couldn't have scored a similar exotic dancer interview in Atlanta, San Francisco or Denver, you've got your head below the water intake valves in Lake Mead.

The Times waited until part five to give Las Vegas a pat on the back. It was a good thing, too, because I was beginning to think there was little to this city besides Budget Suites, overcrowded elementary schools, dysfunctional teenagers and exotic dancers.

Hooray for Culinary Union Local 226 and for working stiffs such as waitresses, housekeepers and dishwashers, all of whom got a plug from the Times for the ability of Las Vegas to provide a middle class lifestyle for individuals who are treated like dirt most everywhere else. It's too bad that these stories didn't appear until four days after the Times led off its series with the flattering headline: "Seekers, Drawn to Las Vegas, Find a Broken Promised Land." Well, it ain't broken for the folks mentioned in part five.

But not so fast. The first four days of the series all began prominently on Page One. Part five was buried on Page 22. Now, that's what I call fair and balanced journalism.

Day six, the final installment, was littered with thumbnail profiles, including attorney Dominic Gentile, whose clients include the Las Vegas Sun. The centerpiece, though, focused on veteran ad man and political adviser Billy Vassiliadis, who has been as responsible as anyone in recent years for shaping the Las Vegas image. It was his company, R&R Partners, which came up with the advertising slogan, "What happens here, stays here."

Of the six parts, the profile of Vassiliadis and his considerable behind-the-scenes influence arguably was the most relevant piece in the Times series since it came closest to describing the power structure that drives the city.

A companion story on the gaming industry's dominance and our relatively weak government institutions also was on target, though it reported erroneously that three Clark County commissioners were indicted last year on bribery charges. It was actually one current commissioner and three former commissioners.

Also, the story reported that state legislators raise up to $300,000 to run for $7,800-a-year legislative positions "perhaps hoping for a spot in the revolving door between government and the state's chief industry." In reality, few state lawmakers have any ties to gaming beyond the large sums of campaign contributions they receive from the industry. Now if the Times had reported that some of our state lawmakers have received nice government jobs, they would have been more on point.

Taking the six-day series as a whole, the Times, with its vast journalistic resources, wasted them mostly on cliche-riddled slices of Las Vegas that didn't add up to the full pie.

So here's pie in your face, Times, and shame on you for abandoning your time-honored slogan: "All the News That's Fit to Print."

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