The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority has disbanded its travel office and changed its ticket-buying system amid investigations into a gift card scandal.
Jeff German
Reporter: Investigations
Email: jgerman@reviewjournal.com
Phone: (702) 380-4564
X: @JGermanRJ
Jeff joined the Review-Journal in 2010 after a lengthy, award-winning career at the Las Vegas Sun, where he was a columnist and reporter who covered courts, politics, labor, government and organized crime. He has a masters degree from Marquette University and is the author of the 2001 true crime book, “Murder in Sin City.”
Prosecutors plan to oppose the Review-Journal’s push to unseal documents supporting a search warrant executed at the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority offices.
Las Vegas police executed the search warrant in March, looking for evidence that LVCVA executives mishandled $90,000 in airline gift cards bought by the tax-funded agency.
The Ethics Commission can move forward with a complaint against the LVCVA’s former chief marketing officer over the use of airline gift cards.
Gov. Steve Sisolak has signed a bill strengthening the law requiring casinos to file emergency response plans in the wake of the Mandalay Bay mass shooting.
Court records shed new light on the criminal case against former City Councilman Ricki Barlow and raise the level of concern about his lobbying at City Hall.
Rossi Ralenkotter also provided the convention authority with little written explanation of what he did for $15,000 a month in consulting fees, records show.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority moved forward Tuesday with a $10 million police substation expansion despite an ongoing police investigation of the tourism agency.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority has included $10 million in pubic funds for the substation expansion in its proposed fiscal 2020 budget.
A judge Tuesday ordered the return of the bail posted by a former top tourism executive after prosecutors said they were not prepared to file a criminal complaint against him in the alleged theft of airline gift cards.
The top marketing officer for the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority resigned under a cloud this week without a financial separation agreement, knowledgeable sources said.
A Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority board member traveled around the world last year at the agency’s expense amid growing scrutiny over inappropriate spending and perks for its board.
Lawrence Weekly, the former board chairman of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, has agreed to pay nearly $2,400 in fines after violating the state ethics law for taking a personal trip with airline gift cards bought by the agency.
Police have obtained records under county grand jury subpoenas in their investigation of $90,000 in Southwest Airlines gift cards secretly purchased by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.
Retired Las Vegas tourism boss Rossi Ralenkotter said he did not intend to cash out his accrued paid time off, but newly released records show his attorney asked for more than $234,000 in untaken leave as part of a nearly $1.2 million severance package.