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Creativity, strong support system make for thriving city
Preview Las Vegas 2012 speakers offer hope, suggestions for improvement
Richard Florida, author, professor and senior editor at The Atlantic, speaks during Preview Las Vegas 2012 at the Cox Pavilion in Las Vegas Thursday, Feb. 9, 2012.
Friday, Feb. 10, 2012 | 2 a.m.
Record-breaking tourism predicted this year
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KSNV coverage of Preview 2012 and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority showing statistics and making optimistic predictions for this year, Feb. 9, 2012.
J. Patrick Coolican
Sun archives
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I’m generally skeptical of and resistant to pom-pom boosterism. So at the Chamber of Commerce’s Preview Las Vegas 2012 on Thursday, I snickered some at the optimism and good cheer, half expecting Gen. Westmoreland or Donald Rumsfeld to emerge and tell us they see the light at the end of the tunnel.
In truth, though, it feels like the worst of the Great Recession is over, even in Southern Nevada. Rossi Ralenkotter, CEO of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, and Jeremy Aguero of the firm Applied Analysis gave upbeat presentations with data showing things are looking up: Visitation is up for 22 consecutive months; room rates are up 25 percent since hitting bottom; population, employment, incomes are all up slightly.
And although the suffering of the hungry, foreclosed and underwater homeowners goes on, we may be seeing — barely visible, like spring tulips fighting to get out of the ground after a brutal winter — a period of creativity and innovation both in our core industry of tourism and the broader economy.
Robert Lang, director of Brookings Mountain West, imagined the Las Vegas of 2030, looking back at key developments that created a broadly shared and sustainable prosperity: an interstate to Phoenix and rail to Southern California, a link to the electricity grid that allows us to sell solar power to California, improved health care via a UCLA medical school in Las Vegas, technology clusters south of the airport and downtown.
We’ll see.
The featured speaker, Richard Florida, director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto and author of “The Rise of the Creative Class,” encouraged us to build a city that nurtures the creativity of its citizens, which he says is what drives wealth creation these days. We can attract and retain creative people by improving our quality of life, working on basics like good schools and low crime, welcoming diversity, and nurturing the arts and parks and so on.
Creativity can be found among artists, of course, but he also pointed to technology workers, scientists and even hotel workers, who can use their cognitive or emotional intelligence to improve the guest experience. (Here’s a previous column on Florida.)
Florida said his new passion is applying his theories to service industries, which employ 60 million workers nationwide and several hundred thousand in Nevada. Economists say Americans without college degrees or specialized skills could once rely on high-wage manufacturing jobs — or in our case, construction jobs — but are now often stuck in low-wage service jobs, if they find work at all.
Florida said he wants to make service sector jobs what manufacturing jobs once were — like the one his father had in a New Jersey factory that allowed him buy a home and put his children through Catholic school and state college.
How to do this?
Florida said even workers without college degrees can bring creativity to a job, which will in turn make their companies more productive. So, just as smart factory workers can make the manufacturing process more efficient or improve quality control, so, too, can workers in a retail store or a hotel, or so the theory goes.
I’m skeptical that if a big retail giant wins new profits with the help of its more productive workers it will share those profits with workers over whom it has total control. To some degree, we already know how to strengthen living standards for service workers in Las Vegas because we’ve done it. Our room attendants make 30 percent more than the national average. On top of that, they have excellent health benefits. Why? Because we have a powerful labor union, the Culinary Local 226.
The union has given leverage to people such as hotel room attendants — who could shut down the Strip on a moment’s notice — when otherwise they would have none.
So there’s that, too.
Discussion: 7 comments so far…
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Well, Patrick Coolican, thanks for the short ride to nowhere. Kind of similar to the proposed high speed rail from Las Vegas to "no man's land" in Southern California. I had the feeling it wouldn't take you long to rejoin the forces of Brian Greenspun's band of "think-tank" cultivators. All their proposed theories for the future of Las Vegas. Yes, sounds very much akin to former Democratic President Lyndon Baines Johnson in his "Great Society" venture that failed, miserably.
I did not read one sentence in your entire article Patrick that gave any type of hint of who is going to pay for these proposed futuristic "Great Society" developments in Las Vegas? Since you consider the "Great Recession" is over, are you proposing that we overspend once again and create the same bubble that will burst into our faces again? Do you Democratic "DumboDucks" ever learn? Apparently not.
And, to top it all off, Patrick, you attempt to appease the non-college educated sector. Nice try!!! You wave the flag of success in their faces with false hopes that the past strangle hold the Culinary Union had over the hotels, will be the same in the "New World" of Las Vegas?
I got news for you, Patrick, it is all not going to happen here in Las Vegas, ever. This is no more than just "Creative Class" gibberish. However, it does make for a well dressed window that has picturesque scenes of "spring like tulips". And, in your spurious window dressed visions Mr. Coolican, the tulips are plentifully blooming. A world class medical school and hospital here in Vegas? What a laugh!!! I can just imagine the headlines in the year 2030 reading; "Sin City Doctors Are World Renowned". Yes, Patrick, those spring like tulips are so beautiful.
An Interstate to Phoenix, awesome. Count me in.
Brad: Have you ever heard of the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce? Have you ever heard of Richard Florida?
It must be nice to be an uninformed dolt! Why don't you pay attention next time. Richard Florida was the Key Note Speaker at Preview sponsored by the Chamber. This is not a lefty organization! Colonel Mustard is one clue, see if you can open your mind and find more. Do that instead of attacking the messenger.
I guess the "tea party" really has moved the G-O-TEA so far right that even the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce looks "liberal" by comparison! (Jeez, did I really type that?)
What we really need to do is diversify our economy. We've been talking about it for decades, but we finally have to take action soon. We need to invest in better schools and better infrastructure all around to create the kind of community that businesses will want to relocate to and start in.
The messenger here is Patrick Coolican, a true Democratic supporter as well is the Las Vegas Sun. He is promoting the words of these so-called "think-tank" individuals who are recommending that we overbuild and overspend here in Las Vegas, once again. I don't care who the "creative class" is politically affiliated with. This is bad advice.
If you like these ideas Mr. Pratt of this illusory, "garden of tulips", that's your prerogative to absolute futility.
If you don't like my critical words of the messenger, too bad. Put me on complete ignore mode. By the way, the moment this comment is posted, that is exactly where your words shall rest. I refuse to debate with a person who has neither a sphere of influence or financial practicality. Good day to you, Sir!
Really beginning to wonder what Mr. Coolican did to Mr. Chapline, real or imagined, that prompts such vitriol.
Did you kick his dog? Shoot his horse? Date and dump his daughter? Is that why he's ignoring the renown Nevada Cancer Institute and it's staff?
Is Brad unaware of Zappos intent to reinvigorate downtown? Has he ever been to a First Friday?
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2011/mar...
These small-minded folks who think Las Vegas is and will only ever be a place for slot machines are a relic of the 20th century. The visionaries can see the potential. Count me in with the visionaries.
Mr. Sandoval, Patrick Coolican and I understand each other quite well. Our journalist to commentator relationship in this discussion forum can get quite heated at times. He has set me back a few paces on more than a few occasions. Just as well, the same applies to other commentators in these discussion rooms. We may vehemently disagree with each other and even make personal comments about each other. We have no problem in this. The majority of us understands that, per se, we are in the lions den and open to criticisms from those with opposing views right up to the maximum degree that the room moderator allows. Sometimes, we even cross that line. However, one line that 99.99 percent of us never cross is making comments about another persons family member. This is strictly taboo, and well agreed upon from each of us. I respectfully request, that in the future, you live by these boundaries.
Again, as far as Patrick Coolican, I have a Senator McCain and President Barack Obama type of political thing with him. We disagree on almost everything. But, you take all politics and personal opinions aside, and I will strongly defend the principals of this man who is honest, dedicated and hardworking in his chosen field. This is the type of respect that all of us have for each other in these discussion rooms. Just play by the rules Mr. Sandoval and let the political beliefs and personal opinions of issues fly.
Yeah, Chap, you tell him!