Billy V.

Sunday, Oct. 9, 2005 | 10:11 a.m.

One of the 10 most powerful individuals in Nevada is also one of its most anonymous.

In fact, if average Nevadans know Billy Vassiliadis at all, they know him for his deeds, not his name.

His R&R Partners Inc. of Las Vegas, the state's largest advertising agency, promotes the city's tourism industry worldwide. In so doing, it devised a popular slogan -- "What happens here, stays here" -- that has become a national catch phrase.

He represents gaming, the state's most powerful industry, as a lobbyist before the Nevada Legislature, and also is a pitchman for utilities, liquor suppliers, transportation systems, health care providers, homebuilders, mining companies and Clark County.

Consistently ranked in media polls as one of the state's 10 most powerful leaders, he has been a key figure in numerous high-profile political campaigns and ballot measures, including the last four winning gubernatorial contests and the last four successful school bond issues.

And he has been an adviser to governors, a player in the recruitment and financing of political candidates and a middleman in disputes over growth, taxation, race relations, medical malpractice reform and other issues involving competing special-interest groups.

So while Billy V, as he is often called, flies under the radar as far as public recognition is concerned, his clout is so pervasive and so widely recognized within the state's corridors of power that he has been called Nevada's "shadow governor."

One of the few to question the extent of his clout is Billy V himself.

"It's absurd to think I'm that powerful," Vassiliadis said in an interview. "If I have influence, it's all derived. It's not direct. If I have any influence, it's because I represent a certain industry, an industry that is very strong, that is very important to this community. But what do I do to have power?

"I didn't run for office. I'm not a governor. I don't have institutional power. I don't run a large company. I don't have economic power. I don't have people power. I don't employ tens of thousands of people.

"I'm not trying to be obtuse. I can see where perceptions get built because I do have good relationships with people who do have real power."

Vassiliadis presides over one of the broadest networks of political and business contacts in the state, something he built through smarts, hustle and being in the right places at the right times.

"He's got one of the strongest strategic minds of anyone I have ever worked with," Scott Craigie, a former R&R executive, said.

"He finds real solutions to complex problems. With the kinds of egos and personalities involved in these complex situations, you can't push these people away from their goals ... He's able to find common ground among people so that everyone comes out with a win."

Vassiliadis has detractors as well, although most fear speaking out because of his clout. One of the few high-profile individuals in Nevada to challenge Vassiliadis and other lobbyists publicly is former Sen. Joe Neal, D-North Las Vegas, who once stood on the Senate floor and argued that the gaming lobby was corrupting the state's political process.

"He gets his power by being able to manipulate public opinion through his advertising agency," Neal said. "He can get people elected or put other people down. He kind of has a shield at the ad agency that he can hide behind. He can act like a good guy or come around and kick you in the butt."

That Vassiliadis can wield so much clout without holding an elected office owes much to several factors:

* Nevada's Republican and Democratic parties lack influence when it comes to candidate selection. Many political observers commonly refer to the state as being run by the "gaming party" because casinos are Nevada's largest campaign donors and most candidates must support the industry to succeed.

* The Legislature relies heavily on lobbyists such as Vassiliadis for information and help with drafting bills because the lawmakers serve part time and have limited staff assistance.

* In Nevada, it is not unusual for political consultants such as Vassiliadis, a lifelong Democrat, to cross party lines to support a candidate. Such was the case when he helped Republican Kenny Guinn win gubernatorial contests in 1998 and 2002. In many other states, consultants usually align with only one party.

* Nevada advertising agencies such as R&R Partners have engaged both in political campaigns and in lobbying -- a practice uncommon elsewhere, according to Eric Herzik, a political science professor at UNR.

"Here in Nevada, the political process is largely conducted through individual power brokers," Herzik said.

Paul Brown, Southern Nevada director of the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada, which represents organized labor and minority groups, also said Vassiliadis is able to retain clout because Las Vegas -- despite being one of the nation's most rapidly growing major cities -- is still a small town in many respects.

"There are relatively few movers and shakers, a small group of people who make the decisions," Brown said.

Vassiliadis and R&R have not been paid for any political campaigns since the 1994 election, but he has remained a nonpaid consultant to many politicians he considers friends. He is such a respected political guru that when President Bush's top adviser, Karl Rove, came to a private luncheon in Las Vegas in May to discuss Nevada affairs, Vassiliadis was among the guests.

NO RETIREMENT YET

Although he can afford to retire, the 49-year-old Vassiliadis figures he has five to seven years of work left in him and still logs more than 50 hours a week. That is down, friends say, from the 70- to 80-hour workweeks that used to be his norm.

"He's a demon for work," said Don Williams, a veteran Las Vegas political consultant.

"He knows what everybody in town is thinking and doing. He spends so much time amongst them."

And by mixing with the board members of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, R&R's biggest advertising client, Vassiliadis "knows what all the wealthy people are up to," Williams said.

"He's one of the best political networkers that I've ever seen," Williams said. "Billy can talk directly to the money people."

As for his own politics, Vassiliadis is left of center.

He strongly backs public education -- he is a past recipient of the Clark County Public Education Foundation Hero Award and has run the ad campaigns for all county school bond issues since 1988.

He is an ardent foe of efforts to ship the nation's high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

And he has been outspoken in support of hospital visitations and other rights for gay couples.

A well-dressed but rarely flashy man with collar-length gray hair and a dark moustache, Vassiliadis has a Mediterranean complexion befitting his Greek heritage -- and a middle-age bulge.

He can be prickly and deliver blunt one-liners when confronted with questions he doesn't like. But his humor is self-deprecating, he is modest and he is generally mild-mannered -- at least as mild-mannered as a die-hard fan of baseball's Chicago Cubs and football's Chicago Bears can be.

He and his wife, Rosemary, deputy aviation director at McCarran International Airport, have two teenage children. They live in a five-bedroom, $1.4 million Summerlin home and own a Lake Tahoe retreat. Boating on the lake is one of his passions.

So is golf -- he shoots in the low 90s -- and reading.

Studies early American history

His favorite period of American history is the early 20th century "because it was a tremendous period of evolution, everything from automobiles to manufacturing to the telephone to television to air travel."

He also is quite charitable: A Vassiliadis Family Scholarship is awarded to county high school graduates interested in pursuing degrees in communications, public relations or advertising. He also has lent his name to causes such as the March of Dimes Birth Defects Foundation, Opportunity Village and National Kidney Foundation of Nevada.

Born in Athens, Greece, Vassiliadis grew up on Chicago's North Side as an only child amid modest circumstances, typified by the fact that he spent his first 14 years sleeping in the dining room.

His father, who passed away 15 years ago, was a church caretaker and Greek teacher in an after-school program. His mother, who now lives in Las Vegas, sold jewelry.

His parents were fervent anti-Communists. After World War II, Vassiliadis' father met his mother in Romania and then smuggled her out of that Soviet-occupied country using false passports.

"I would say my passion for and my interest in politics came primarily from my parents," Vassiliadis said. "My mother to this day could probably name 30 prime ministers from around the world."

A teenaged Vassiliadis ended up in Las Vegas after his father introduced his son to an old Greek friend, then-UNLV professor Ernest Searles, who convinced the youngster in 1974 to attend college here.

At UNLV, Vassiliadis rose rapidly through the ranks of the Young Democrats club and developed an insider's knack for Nevada politics. His instructor was professor Dina Titus, now the state Senate minority leader and a 2006 Democratic gubernatorial candidate.

"He came out of Chicago, so he had a natural bent for politics," Titus said. "He was brash and bold. He was energetic and wanted to get involved. I'm not surprised where he is today."

While pursuing a bachelor's degree in political science, Vassiliadis set up campaign signs for 1978 Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bob Rose -- a future Nevada Supreme Court justice. Many of Vassiliadis' most important political contacts -- including Williams, Craigie, Kent Oram and the late Jim Joyce -- were made during that race.

Vassiliadis insists he is not "conscious" of his considerable networking abilities.

"There's not a skill to it," he said. "It's more: I don't lie, I don't cheat, I'm loyal, I do what I say I'm going to do and I work hard."

John Moran first victory

His first major political victory occurred in 1982 when he guided the late John Moran to the Clark County sheriff's post despite the fact that Moran started as a 30-percentage point underdog. It was that race that brought him to the attention of Nevada power broker and R&R Advertising founder Sig Rogich, who hired him to work at the agency shortly after that election.

"I always told him that it is not difficult to get business," Rogich said. "The real key was keeping it, and he understood that."

As Rogich increased his role in national Republican politics, Vassiliadis quickly moved up at R&R, becoming its president in the late 1980s.

Vassiliadis' emergence as a power broker began when he ran the ad campaign for Bob Miller's successful 1990 gubernatorial election and became a salaried member of Miller's Kitchen Cabinet over the next eight years.

"If there was a political question, I would ask what he thought of it, who would be opposed or supportive, and what their arguments would be," Miller said. "I can't think of an instance when I thought he was wrong."

Vassiliadis was recruited by Rogich in 1998 to serve as a nonpaid consultant to Miller's successor, Gov. Kenny Guinn. Vassiliadis accepted because he was a longtime friend of Guinn's, who had been the chairman of successful school bond issue drives that R&R promoted and also was the chief executive officer of PriMerit Bank, an R&R client.

"He will always tell you how it is, and he won't sugar coat it," Guinn said of Vassiliadis. "He will be blunt and to the point. He will tell you when you are going wrong and when you are doing right."

Vassiliadis says of his consulting skills: "One of my strengths is I've kind of got a blue-collar feeling. I'm not detached from what people are probably thinking and that goes back to my Chicago roots and what really matters.

Jim Joyce's mantle

"I also think that they feel like I'm giving them my most honest possible read. I'm not blowing smoke up their butts. I don't tell them what they want to hear."

As a megalobbyist, Vassiliadis has risen to the top of the ladder of the nonelected movers and shakers in the hallways of the Legislature, inheriting a mantle once worn by Joyce.

"The most important lesson Jim Joyce taught me: You better know the last issue of your career," Vassiliadis said. "You better know the one that's worth burning the house down for. What he meant by that is you don't have your friends walk the plank. You don't treat every bill as if it's your last one and go and stomp and storm over it.

"You approach the legislative process as a long-term effort. And you build relationships by taking people off the hook."

His most powerful client is the Nevada Resort Association, an affiliation that has led Vassiliadis to fight for a broader state tax base that does not lean too heavily on gaming. He has bristled at proposals that Nevada's tax on gross gaming receipts -- by far the lowest in the nation -- should be increased to help pay for growth.

And while he has fought successfully for bills limiting casinos' liability for wrongdoing on their property and for drunken driving accidents caused by their customers, he doesn't always get his way on gaming legislation.

That was the case earlier this year when he advocated unsuccessfully on behalf of Station Casinos, Boyd Gaming and developer Focus Property Group for legislation that would have made it harder for residents to prevent casinos from encroaching into neighborhoods.

More often than not, though, he comes through for his clients.

Vassiliadis is considered such a vital cog in Nevada's political process that he is frequently asked by elected officials to mediate disputes among warring special interests.

"People trust him, and they recognize he's a great facilitator so they use him in that capacity," Nevada Resort Association President Bill Bible said.

A noteworthy example occurred in 1998 when Vassiliadis hosted a meeting of organized labor, gaming and Rogich to reaffirm then-gubernatorial candidate Guinn's opposition to a Republican initiative that would have banned unions from making campaign donations without membership approval.

Vassiliadis helped to convince the Republicans to drop their proposed ballot initiative while convincing the unions to drop a competing petition drive.

"Probably the most overstated thing about me, other than my being a 'juice man,' is how many problems I've resolved because I really don't," Vassiliadis said.

"I hope I bring some calm to it. I hope I bring some focus. I hope I'm good at reminding everybody what needs to happen, what the deadline is and what the end game is and what the goal is and that there's enough in common here to keep going."

Growing R&R's business

Since agreeing to purchase R&R from Rogich in 1992, Vassiliadis, as partner and chief executive officer, has more than tripled its staff -- to 250 employees from 80 -- and nearly tripled its annual billings -- to $225 million from $80 million. And he changed its name to R&R Partners.

Last year, R&R was the nation's 61st largest ad agency, with estimated revenue of $27.2 million, according to Adweek magazine.

It has grown from a Las Vegas-centric ad shop under Rogich to a regional shop under Vassiliadis, who believes R&R will become one of the nation's top 50 ad agencies within three years based on annual revenue. While it is best known as the ad agency for the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, a partnership that began in 1980, R&R also represents numerous casinos.

Adweek in recent years has graded R&R in the B minus, C plus range, praising the firm for its tourism ads while downgrading it for generating a low amount of revenue per employee compared to other agencies.

And the LVCVA board is considering major revisions to its trademark policies and internal operations after the Las Vegas Sun reported earlier this year on a secret agreement in which the authority transferred the rights to the "What happens here" slogan to R&R. A law firm hired by the authority has recommended that the LVCVA retain its own trademark rights.

But Vassiliadis has been lavishly praised for R&R's promotion of Las Vegas and its ability to measure the nation's pulse, as was evident after the 9/11 terrorist attacks when the agency devised an ad campaign focused on Las Vegas as a good escape.

As he looks to the future, Vassiliadis has given himself -- through his four-for-four run in recent gubernatorial races and the enormously successful Las Vegas tourism ad campaign -- a high standard against which he inevitably will be measured.

North Las Vegas Mayor and LVCVA board member Mike Montandon said that the campaign has another year or two to go.

"But that next campaign has to be better," he said. "That's the way marketing is."

Steve Kanigher can be reached at 259-4075 or at steve@lasvegassun.com.

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