Opinion/Streetalk............ 5 News

Vetting veterans

On Sept. 12, U.S. Sen. Dean Heller announced he had introduced S. 3530, a measure to compensate Philippine veterans who fought in World War II.

That same day the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported that Heller was being “endorsed by a Filipino-American veterans group … a new political action committee” called the Filipino-American Families of America in Politics (FAFAP) and that the endorsement was a “blow” to Heller’s election opponent, U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley.

Then commentator Jon Ralston reported that FAFAP was not a vet group and that it was essentially invented for the purposes of the campaign: “It’s a new organization, yet to be formed, and not a veterans group, that is endorsing him, supposedly started by a couple of guys who are well known in the Asian community. But there is no PAC yet, and who knows how much money there might be?”

As previously reported here (“Veterans: Berkley over Heller,” RN&R, May 10), Heller has not done well with veterans groups.

Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, founded by vets from those wars, has consistently found Democrat Berkley stronger on veteran issues than Republican Heller. In “report cards” issued in 2008 and 2010 representing their votes as members of the U.S. House, IAVA found Berkley more supportive of veterans than Heller.

Other vet groups do not have congressional rankings.

Asian-American voters are a significant bloc in Nevada.

Romney on health care

Faced with competing for a general election electorate, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has embraced most of the Democratic health care program, rejecting only the individual mandate and its accompanying enforcement mechanism—the latest permutation in his evolving position on health care.

Last month Kaiser Health News, to help voters navigate Romney’s twists and turns on the issue, posted a page that provides a lot of information on his record and public statements. It goes beyond the Democratic program and his corresponding Massachusetts program he pushed through the legislature as governor. It also has information on his stances on Medicare, Medicaid, health care as commerce, and his philosophy of health care—so far as it can be determined—as well as video clips on all these topics. In addition, there are a number of comments from people who have analyzed Romney’s health care positions.

The page can be found at http://tinyurl.com/d87ev53.

Champs

Amid the celebration over the Reno Aces’ first championship, more mundane matters still intrude. A reader pointed out to us that according to the Washoe County Treasurer’s office, taxes on the land on which the Aces ballpark site—250 Evans Ave.—have not been paid for two years. The arrears for 2001 ($410,884.43) and 2012 ($354,888.23) come to more than three-quarters of a million dollars.

Elko elk pampered

What is reportedly Nevada’s first “conservation easement” has been granted in Elko County. In an agreement with the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, property owner Gardner Davis has set aside 645 acres of prime elk habitat near Wells.

Foundation spokesperson Les Smith said, “A conservation easement is an agreement between a landowner and an agency or organization ... It sets aside the property for conservation purposes, while allowing the landowner to continue to use the land in ways that won’t conflict with the conservation purposes. So, a rancher could continue to graze the land, but would have to modify grazing practices to be compatible with wildlife conservation. Obviously, subdividing and selling the land for summer homes would not work. That’s why Gardner Davis connected up with us on this conservation easement. ... Do a lay-over of elk habitat with sage grouse habitat and it’s an almost perfect match. So, what’s good for elk is good for sage grouse—and visa-versa.”

Legendary problem

Whether Sparks development project is really working goes unexamined

Andrew Barbano was distressed. There was lots of news happening locally and,by Dennis Myers he believed, reporters were either missing it or sugar-coating it with an upbeat spin. So the Sparks Tribune columnist and labor activist sent out a mass mailing last week to newsrooms all over the valley. One line in the message read, “This week, you totally missed that T.J. Maxx and Old Navy will be closing tax-producing stores to score legendary chunks of corporate welfare at the Sparks Marina. Walmart is next in line.”

“How many Californians are saying, ‘Let’s drive to Scheels in east Sparks?’ ”

Glen Atkinson Economist

Eleven months earlier, Barbano had reported in his column that Lowe’s Hardware, after it moved to the Marina, would “close an existing store.” That’s what subsequently happened. So this new message from Barbano prompted some concern, particularly in the case of Walmart, which has a history of shedding its old stores. Locally, Walmart closed its North McCarran store after building stores in Spanish Springs and on Glendale Road.

“I was told that T.J. Maxx and Old Navy are each closing a store [in the Truckee Meadows],” said state legislator Debbie Smith. “And I was told that by a source close to the project.”

Linda Smith, manager of the Reno T.J. Maxx said she has heard nothing about any closing and referred other inquiries to the corporate office. Reno Old Navy manager Leslie Crossley could not be reached for comment.

Outlets at Legends, the commercial name of the Sparks Marina shopping project, was developed by RED Development LLC, based in Kansas and Arizona. Old Navy and T.J. Maxx already have stores at the Marina. Walmart is constructing one.

Legends was developed under Nevada’s Sales Tax Anticipated Revenue (STAR) bonds law. The law, enacted by the 2005 Nevada Legislature, allow the creation of special STAR tax districts in which companies that lure tourists can be subsidized for to the tune of 75 percent of the sales taxes they generate.

At the time the Nevada Legislature enacted the law, the bonds were relatively untried—only one other state, Kansas—home of RED Development—was issuing them, and so the technique was fairly uncooked. The Nevada law did not provide for independent substantiation of corporate claims of ability to draw tourists, nor did it provide a remedy if the tourists failed to come—no way to withdraw the subsidy if they failed. Without having a lot of evidence of how it worked elsewhere, the Nevada Legislature decided to try it and see

Lowe’s opened a store at the Sparks Marina, then closed this store on Oddie Boulevard, leaving behind this empty hulk.

what happened. In addition, without having more versions of other state legislation, Nevada lawmakers did not anticipate everything that might be needed in the Nevada version.

Once qualified for Nevada STAR bonds, a business cannot then be denied if its predictions of out-ofstate customers fail to materialize. And license plate counts in parking lots provide little evidence that STAR bonds projects work, except to injure local firms in the same product lines.

The STAR bonds law was enacted two years before the recession got underway. Nevada is very dependent on sales taxes, which become much more important when times are hard and people turn to government for help. The sales tax revenue normally is divided among cities, counties, school districts and state government.

In the case of Legends, which qualified for STAR bonds, a promised hotel/casino was never built, sharply undercutting its ability to draw tourists.

The intent of STAR bonds was to bring in new tourist-oriented business, not shift existing businesses from current locations to tax sheltered Legends.

Not all stores that move into the Marina project benefit directly from STAR bonds. Specifically, they don’t get sales taxes for their bond financing. But 75 percent of the sales tax they collect still is used to repay the Legends bond debt. And they benefit indirectly by the very existence of Legends, which was created by STAR bonds.

None of the dominant anchor stores at Legends are locally based, which means they ship capital out of state, making local benefits far from certain. Names like Target, Scheels and Best Buy provide much of the draw, which means that Minnesota (Target and Best Buy) and North Dakota (Scheels) will be getting more benefit from Legends than Nevada.

Three months ago, RED Development negotiated new loan terms for Legends. The new financing arrangement lets RED make more than $30 million in new investment in the project. RED said the new funds would be used to construct more than 300,000 square feet of new retail space. But if that results in more outof-state firms that further drain the valley of capital and injure locally based merchants, it could hurt rather than help the local economy.

“It’s highly unlikely that this would be a good deal for local governments,” said economist Glen Atkinson.

“That’s the whole issue around this and that’s why last session we