Stadium vote a victory for Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority

Overshadowed by the attention generated by the football stadium debate, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority also scored a victory with the passage of Senate Bill 1.

In addition to providing money for stadium construction, the legislation raises the county’s hotel room tax by 0.5 percentage points to generate revenue to secure bonds to pay for part of the authority’s $1.4 billion expansion and improvements.

“Our destination thrives on evolution and reinvention, and we commend the bold decision by the Nevada Legislature and Gov. (Brian) Sandoval to approve these two monumental projects that position our destination to remain a leading tourism destination for decades to come,” convention authority President and CEO Rossi Ralenkotter said in a statement issued after the bill’s passage.

Legislators were supportive of the authority’s plan, which will add a 600,000-square-foot hall, modernize existing facilities and make existing space more accessible.

With the stadium part of the package, Las Vegas marketers see more opportunities to attract people to the city. The authority has estimated that the two projects will draw an additional 1 million people a year.

“Large-scale events that we would like to have are going to Dallas, L.A. and Santa Clara, (California) because they have largeseat event venues,” said Billy Vassiliadis, whose R&R Partners serves as the marketing and advertising contractor for the authority.

“I’m thrilled about the NFL, but I look at it as a Las Vegas marketer as a greater opportunity for Las Vegas to have a 65,000seat venue,” he said. “The guiding mission is the same: filling (hotels) midweek as much as possible.”

He said weekend football would likely drive a higher-paying customer to the hotels. But as far as midweek, there are other positives.

“If we got Barcelona and Manchester United (two top-ranked professional soccer teams) on a Wednesday night, that 65,000seat stadium would be sold out. That’s 65,000 people that would produce a high (average daily room rate). That’s people coming to Las Vegas from London that would probably stay and enjoy the city for a week.”

But the Convention Center improvements were sold as a means to keep the city’s top conventions from going to rival cities. Legislators were on board with doing that because there have been indications some shows would look elsewhere.

Now that the legislation is passed, authority project managers will begin planning, designing and engineering the new hall, which is planned for the gold parking lot on the northwest corner of Paradise Road and Convention Center Drive.

The strategy is to build the new hall first to enable shows to occupy it while improvements are made to the existing facilities. Scheduling is meticulously planned so that large shows won’t have to move during construction.