Thursday, August 28, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Neonopolis tenant faces ouster

Disabled owner of Art Works calls eviction unfair

Beverly Arellano, manager of Art Works for Everyone, organizes the shop Wednesday. Arellano is a volunteer at the store, which relocated to Neonopolis in downtown Las Vegas from near Spring Mountain Road and Valley View Boulevard. Photo by John Locher. Laurel Morehouse has operated Art Works for Everyone, an art gallery/store on Neonopolis' first level, for 3-1/2 months. Photo by John Locher.

A disabled businesswoman could soon be out on the street in part because members of Neonopolis' management team claim she has allowed homeless people to sleep inside her downtown art gallery.

Problems arose earlier this month when Neonopolis' then-general manager sent an eviction notice to Laurel Morehouse, founder and director of Art Works for Everyone, a state-registered nonprofit corporation.

For 3 1/2 months, Morehouse has operated an approximately 3,800-square-foot art gallery/store on Neonopolis' first level. The business regularly enlists up to 10 homeless volunteers, and Morehouse alleges their presence has worried Neonopolis management enough that the center is threatening to throw Morehouse and her belongings out if she fails to pack up by 5 p.m. Sunday.

Neonopolis is seeking more than $26,400 in back rent for space Morehouse claims she was promised would cost her just a fraction of the store's monthly sales.

"There's no doubt this is because I'm trying to help the homeless," Morehouse said Wednesday. "I'm devastated. I don't even have words for this."

Morehouse denied ever allowing anyone to sleep within her store, a claim challenged by Chardell Steves, Neonopolis' director of leasing, marketing and operations.

"We have reason to believe she's been allowing people to sleep in her space," Steves said. "That's simply against all codes."

Steves said the eviction also stems from Morehouse's delays in obtaining a valid business license, as well as her failure to secure a lease agreement contract with Neonopolis, which is owned by World Entertainment Centers of Newark, N.J.

Morehouse also alleges mall management violated the Americans with Disabilities Act when its personnel told her to remove her poodle Goliath, a registered service animal, from the center because the animal's urine posed a "biohazard."

"I told them that issue was resolved by the ADA years ago," said Morehouse, who has hired an attorney to fight the center's claims. "It's just one more way they've tried to make things difficult for me."

Morehouse has avascular necrosis, which limits a person's ability to move by restricting blood supplies to the bones. She founded Art Works to give something back to the community using her passion for art. Backed by a grant from the Nevada Department of Employment, Training & Rehabilitation, she incorporated in September 2000.

Her saga at Neonopolis began earlier this year when she was contacted by Frank Wheat, the center's general manager until his Aug. 18 resignation.

Hoping to boost Neonopolis' visitor traffic and cultural amenities, Morehouse said Wheat asked her to leave Art Works' former home near Spring Mountain Road and Valley View Boulevard and relocate to Neonopolis. To sweeten the deal, Morehouse said, Wheat offered to lease her space at no base charge, expecting only 10 percent of the store's sales in return.

After meeting with her board of directors, Morehouse agreed to Wheat's verbal offer and paid approximately $7,000 to cover the move.

Once she arrived at Neonopolis, Morehouse said Wheat did not require her to sign a lease agreement and asked for no up-front deposits. He also allowed Morehouse to open her store without a valid business license from the city of Las Vegas -- her former license was for Clark County -- and even promised to install kilns used for ceramics "at Neonopolis' expenses," Morehouse said.

Though she questioned Wheat's unusual business practices, she said he reassured her that her business was important to the center's development.

"Frank was telling me that there is a lot of disillusionment down here; there were a lot of problems, financial difficulties, and we're here helping them," Morehouse said. "And so I felt very positive."

The relationship soured in early August when a pair of artists were challenged by Neonopolis security guards as they attempted to load equipment into the store well after the shopping center had closed for the night. Shortly thereafter, Morehouse on Aug. 8 received a letter from Wheat that instructed her to vacate the center by this Sunday.

Morehouse later thought she had settled the eviction issue with Wheat but said she was rebuffed in her efforts to nail down a solid lease agreement with Neonopolis. Any hopes of staying in the center were dashed Monday when she received another letter, this one from attorney Jason Kerr, that said World Entertainment Centers still expected her to be out of Neonopolis by the end of this month.

Beverly Arellano, who was unemployed and homeless before Morehouse helped place her in the home of a friend, has volunteered as Art Works' store manager since mid-June. Like her benefactor, she believes Neonopolis management is persecuting Morehouse because of her efforts to help the area's homeless and disadvantaged.

"The more she tried to help people, the more they have fought her," said Arellano, who claims she has seen mall security guards direct customers away from the store, among other efforts to harass Morehouse.

Shutting down Art Works also would hurt the downtown art scene, said Kelly Garni, a founding member of the rock band Quiet Riot who now works as an artistic photographer. He said the center has been a boon to beginning artists unable to display their works in more-established galleries.

"I feel like I've been in a very good place," Garni said of Art Works, which on Wednesday displayed about 30 of Garni's photographs, primarily nude women posed in desert landscapes. Morehouse "is trying to help out the homeless and is trying to make a go of the downtown art scene."