Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Congregation banned from casino theater

A Henderson church is claiming religious discrimination after its members were refused entry Sunday morning to Regal Cinemas at the Green Valley Ranch Station Casino.

The 60-member Masterpiece Church had been meeting in one of the theaters since Feb. 1, the Rev. John Paul Warren, 45, said, and has a two-year lease with Regal to use the facilities.

But armed casino security guards stopped members of the nondenominational church from entering the theater Sunday morning and told them they had to leave, Warren said.

The lease the church had with Regal violated the lease Regal had with Station Casinos, which prohibits renting any of the theaters for religious services, Station guards and casino officials said.

"It's really being discriminatory based on religion, and that's not right," said Warren, who noted that the group would be welcome if it were a social club.

The news and the way it was delivered came as a shock to Warren, who said he had heard rumors that there was a problem with the lease, but had been told by theater management on Friday night that the church could still meet Sunday at the Green Valley Ranch Regal Cinemas.

"Why would they be afraid of a little church that is just starting?" Warren said Monday, adding that members of his 6-month-old church were asked not to speak with any casino patrons when entering and exiting the theater services. "What have we done? We have never said anything negative against the casino. We are just trying to teach people how to live better lives."

The problem apparently stems from interpretation of the 1997 state law that defines where neighborhood casinos can be built. The law says new casinos must be at least 1,500 feet from schools and places of worship. The casino also faults the cinema company for violating its lease and for not communicating better with the church.

Stations Casinos' lease with Regal bans renting the theaters for religious services because of that law, Station Casinos spokeswoman Lesley Pittman said.

The law does not prohibit religious organizations from using the facilities in a casino, Pittman said, but the company does interpret the law as establishing boundaries between casinos and churches.

"The spirit of the policy was to separate churches from casino operations, and this is in the spirit of that," Pittman said, adding that the policy affects all religious organizations and not any particular faith group.

The policy does not prohibit religious groups from renting convention rooms or ballrooms at one of the Station Casinos, but specifically restricts a church or other organization from regularly meeting at any one casino.

"It's the weekly church services that we don't think are appropriate for our businesses," Pittman said.

Station Casinos also believed allowing religious services in the casino violated the company's no solicitation policy because of the practice of taking a monetary collection from parishioners.

Warren said the company is misinterpreting the law, which was designed to protect schools and places of worship from the infringement of neighborhood casinos, and said the company is using the law as an excuse to discriminate against religious groups.

"Why not just stop and tell us the truth of why they don't want us there?" he said. "It comes down to money," -- fear that the church would siphon off money from the casino, he said.

Lorne Malkiewich, director of the Legislative Counsel Bureau, the legal arm of the Legislature, agreed that the law was meant to protect churches from casinos, not casinos from churches.

"If someone wanted to put a church within a block of a casino, this provision does not prevent that," Malkiewich said.

It also does not prevent a religious group from meeting in a casino, though a casino "can certainly argue" that the intent is to separate the two, Malkiewich said.

Clark County Commissioner Mark James, who sponsored the law when he served in the state Senate, was out of town and not available for comment Monday.

Both Edythe Katz Yarchever of the Jewish Federation and Tommy Starkes of the Southern Nevada Baptist Association said they were surprised by the Station Casinos' interpretation, which they believe is incorrect.

Both are longtime members of the community who remember when religious services were regularly conducted in local casinos. Local Jewish temples and synagogues regularly used the Last Frontier and the Sands for major religious meetings and still rent ballrooms for major events today at other hotels, said Yarchever.

"Hotels have been very, very generous when it came to all religions and offering space and money whenever they could," Yarchever said.

Starkes spent 18 years of his ministry hosting backstage Bible studies in between shows at Bally's, the Tropicana and the Flamingo.

Warren says his church was not given any clear instructions that they were no longer able to use the Green Valley Ranch theaters, and on Sunday church members were not even allowed to enter the building or use the restrooms while they waited in vain for a manager to explain the situation.

Warren moved services to a nearby park but about half of his congregants left, he said.

Lauren Leff, vice president of communications for RegalMedia, said the church was informed of the lease problem two weeks ago, immediately after Station Casinos informed Regal Cinemas it was in violation of the lease, Leff said.

Leff said her company had offered to move the church to the Green Valley 8 on Sunset Road near Green Valley Parkway. Leff said her events manager for the Green Valley Ranch Regal Cinemas believed the Masterpiece Church was meeting this past Sunday only to redirect members to the other location and that there must have been some miscommunication.

Warren, however, said he was told they still could meet at the Green Valley Ranch that Sunday and that the other location was still being negotiated.

Pittman said Station Casinos had no prior contact with the church because it was Regal Cinemas' responsibility to inform the organization.

"It's unfortunate that these folks were inconvenienced," Pittman said.

Leff said Monday that Regal Cinemas was trying to work "with everybody to try to find a solution that works for all involved."

Regal Cinemas rents space to about 60 churches in 39 different states, Leff said, and Masterpiece Church had been one of three churches meeting locally at the Regal Colonnade 14 at Pebble Road and Eastern Avenue.

Because of the overcrowding, Warren said he asked if there were other spaces available and jumped at the chance to meet in one of the neighborhood casinos.

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