The return to private equity

On this long weekend, here are a few things from my “just wondering” folder …

I wonder if anyone besides me is thinking about the gaming control ramifications of publicly traded casinos returning to the world of private ownership.

It seems to me that federal regulations, Wall Street scrutiny and the overall high degree of transparency required of publicly traded companies offered a handy tool to state investigators charged with making sure Nevada casinos and those employed by, or partnered with, Nevada casinos are on the up and up. With those safeguards gone, won’t Nevada’s gaming regulators need more resources?

I hate to sound like a worry wart, but 30 years ago Nevada was rightly very concerned about secret ownership and control of casinos by organized crime figures. In its heyday, I guess you could say that the mob was the ultimate private equity firm.

Don’t get ahead of me, I’m not saying that current private equity firms are mobbed up. I’m just saying … well, I think you know what I’m saying.

I hope somebody is paying attention to the state’s ability to keep pace with the marketplace from a suitability standpoint. Otherwise, we’ll all be very sorry.

Road funding

Everyone’s all atwitter about Gov. Jim Gibbons’ idea to fund Southern Nevada road projects mostly with growth in room tax revenues, which are now earmarked for the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.

I hope no one will try to seriously argue that the authority needs every last dime of the room tax. The truth is that room tax receipts have grown faster than anyone ever imagined. Even the visitors authority struggles to find ways to spend it.

Now no one can argue with the success of the convention and visitor gurus. That overspending has helped make Las Vegas the absolute uncontested No. 1 city on the planet for tourism.

The question is: Could the same result be achieved with less money? If you injected the visitors authority board members with a truth serum, I promise you each one would answer “yes … we … have … too … much … money.”

But here’s the rub: Without careful study, can state government, in the heat of a waning legislative session, be trusted to know exactly where the point of diminished return is?

That’s like squeezing the neck of the goose ever harder to get it to lay a few extra golden eggs. Am I wrong on this?

Diversity backsliding

I wonder what’s in the water on Maryland Parkway that makes much of what goes on at UNLV seem so counterintuitive.

Let me see if I have this straight: To create a structure that might bring more diversity to UNLV’s faculty, we pushed out Carol Harter, a woman president, hired a middle-aged white guy from a lesser school to replace her, then created a “vice president of diversity and inclusion” underneath him.

In other words, we ditched real diversity — a woman president — and replaced it with an executive office with the word “diversity” on the door.

Isn’t that like throwing away a chocolate cake baked by Emeril Lagasse, replacing it with a pan of Easy-Bake brownies and calling it better?

Sherman Frederick is publisher of the Las Vegas Review-Journal and president of Stephens Media. Readers may write him at sfrederick@ reviewjournal.com.