Hearing delayed again on Station Casinos site

By Mike Trask

Monday, March 16, 2009 | 2 a.m.

Plans for casinos north of the Las Vegas Beltway in North Las Vegas continue to be stalled.

A North Las Vegas Planning Commission hearing on the proposed Losee Station Casino was continued Wednesday for the fourth time.

It was originally on the agenda eight months ago.

The commission is now scheduled to make its recommendations June 24 on establishing a gaming enterprise district and granting permits.

The 58-acre Station Casinos parcel is adjacent to another possible casino site owned by Boyd Gaming.

The city is considering allowing Boyd to transfer a previously approved gaming district in downtown North Las Vegas to the new site.

But the gaming districts may be moot for the moment.

Both would be in Park Highlands, a planned 15,000-home community. Its construction has been delayed because of the recession.

Additionally, Station Casinos is struggling and Boyd has offered to buy some of the company’s assets for about $950 million.

Both companies cater to the locals market, although Boyd also owns properties elsewhere in the country.

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Boulder City resident Richard McHale has been holding meetings at the city library for a group he calls BC Facts.

He said it is an effort to get more people talking about important issues in the city.

The meetings are coming during a nine-candidate race for a pair of City Council seats.

Last week he held a meeting to grimly discuss the Boulder City Bypass, a project that has been discussed for more than 40 years with close to zero progress.

The bypass is again in the forefront with the Hoover Dam Bridge scheduled to open in 2011, allowing tractor-trailers to return to U.S. 93 in Boulder City for the first time since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

The bridge will make the the drive between Nevada and Arizona easier because motorists will not have to pass through security checkpoints near the dam.

But many are predicting mass traffic jams and dangerous conditions as travelers come through Boulder City.

Traffic would be exacerbated if and when a large housing development is built in Mohave County, Ariz. Developers have advertised land there as being a 50-minute commute to Las Vegas.

McHale urged residents to write to state, federal and local elected officials demanding a bypass around the city of 15,000.

“If we are not proactive, there’s a chance people in this room are going to die on the highway,” McHale told a group of roughly 30 mostly elderly people.

“I don’t have a dog in the fight,” said McHale, who is a development consultant. “I don’t have any way of making money off this. I’m a concerned private citizen.”

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Former North Las Vegas Police Chief Mark Paresi had been one of four finalists for the chief position at the Tucson, Ariz., police department.

He didn’t get the job.

But neither did his competition.

The Arizona Daily Star reported the City Council could not reach a decision.

It will start its search again, but this time keep it to local candidates.

It’s not the first time Paresi has been shunned in favor of a local.

Paresi reportedly didn’t fit in at the North Las Vegas department after being hired in 2002 from the Portland Police Bureau in Oregon.

He was removed from the post in October 2007, remaining on the city payroll for two months until a severance package was negotiated.

The city never gave an officials reason for booting him.

In March 2008, the city named Joseph Forti, former deputy chief in command of detention and corrections, as chief.