Your name goes here, for a cool $500,000

By Emily Richmond

Thursday, Sept. 14, 2006 | 7:23 a.m.

How much are you willing to pay to have a school bookstore named after you?

The Clark County School District thinks the distinction is worth $500,000.

Too pricey? How about paying $250,000 to put your name on a media library? Or on a computer room for the bargain price of $100,000?

For the first time, the School District is offering naming rights to donors willing to shell out hard cash in exchange for a little recognition. The bookstore, media library and computer room are part of the new Virtual High School campus, soon to be built.

The names of elementary, middle and comprehensive high schools, and certain campus facilities such as theaters and athletic fields, are not for sale. But other opportunities abound for savvy shoppers.

"It's a great way for us to promote some of our specialized programs and help them find the funding they need," Clark County School Board member Susan Brager said. "Colleges and universities do this all the time. It's a smart way to go."

School districts nationwide are turning to naming rights to generate badly needed revenue. Districts in Nashua, N.H., Trenton, N.J., and Oak Lawn, Ill., are among the ones considering adopting such policies. Others, such as the one serving Sheboygan, Wis., have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars annually by selling naming rights to campus facilities.

Under a revised regulation, approved by the Clark County School Board earlier this year, naming rights can be offered for non-school district facilities that are at least 30 percent paid for with private donations. Once that threshold is met, individual donors can pay to play the naming game.

The naming policy extends to the interior facilities of the district's career and technical education high schools, as well as alternative schools and magnet schools. School laboratories and portions of buildings may also be named for individuals, foundations, corporations or associations in exchange for 30 percent of the necessary funding.

The new $64.7 million Educational Technology Campus to house the district's television station is the first test of the new regulation and will offer a number of opportunities for naming rights.

The license for the public television station, which is changing its name from KLVX to Vegas PBS, is held by the School District. The new campus will include seven studios, production facilities and offices, as well as the district's Virtual High School. Construction begins in the spring.

For the donor feeling particularly generous, naming rights for the entire package - Vegas PBS and the technology campus - are available for $10 million. If you're in a slightly less philanthropic mood, the Vegas PBS portion of the facilities carries a $5 million price tag. And the Virtual High School, which serves about 10,000 students a year with online classes, will bear your name for $3 million.

Donors are stepping up. MGM Mirage kicked in $250,000 for a studio green room and reception area, while Wells Fargo donated $100,000 for an instructional television conference room. An instructional television studio comes courtesy of the Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors, for $75,000, and the Simms Family Foundation chipped in $75,000 for a kitchen. Solar panels and monitoring equipment, estimated at $300,000, will come courtesy of Nevada Power Co.

The public's response to the naming rights campaign has been enthusiastically positive, said Tom Axtell, general manager of Vegas PBS.

"Across the country, districts are beginning to look for innovative sources of funding," Axtell said. "This is an example of our School Board's broad-minded thinking, assessing the reality and how to deal with it."

There's nothing wrong with a public entity using naming rights as a fundraising opportunity, provided certain parameters are set, said Carole Vilardo, president of the Nevada Taxpayers Association.

"It's not an uncommon practice among nonprofits," Vilardo said. "It's a way to maximize your revenues, provided there's someone willing to commit that type of money."

However, Vilardo said, that doesn't mean the opportunity should be extended to every individual, corporation or foundation that wants to donate.

"I would like to think we wouldn't have a strip club that would ask for naming rights," Vilardo said. "I would hope there would be some vetting of the types of businesses allowed."

Vilardo shouldn't worry, said Bill Hoffman, senior counsel for the School District.

"The board applies its concepts of common sense," Hoffman said.