Pedestrians walk Friday in front of the historic former post office and federal courthouse on Stewart Avenue in Las Vegas. A survey found many locals are squeamish about using the mob's role in Las Vegas' past as a theme when the building is transformed into a museum. However, tourists said that's what would most interest them. Photo by John Gurzinski. Al Capone Lucky Luciano Bugsy Siegel Tony Spilotro

Mayor Oscar Goodman might not be on retainer, but he finds himself once again defending the mob -- or at least the concept of a museum dedicated to organized crime.

Though many locals were squeamish about chronicling the mob's role in Las Vegas' past, according to a recent survey conducted for the city, tourists say they would be most likely to visit a museum dedicated to the subject.

It's an idea that Goodman, who defended organized crime figures before taking office in 1999, has long championed.

At issue is what to install inside the historic former post office and federal courthouse on Stewart Avenue, which the city is in the process of refurbishing.

At $30 million, the POST Modern building will be the largest historic preservation project in the city's history. Part of the building, erected in 1932 and listed on the National Registry of Historic Places, will become a museum with permanent and revolving exhibits.

To gauge what the public would like to see, pollsters asked 600 locals and 300 tourists in Las Vegas, which of five themes they preferred for museum exhibits. They include an illusionist theme, a behind-the-scenes look at gambling, "vintage Vegas," a Mafia museum or a museum dedicated to stars such as Elvis Presley, Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra.

The largest share of Las Vegans told pollsters they would most like to see the museum chronicle "vintage Vegas," described as the architecture, music and figures that dominated the city's landscape from the 1930s to the 1950s.

However, more than 70 percent of visitors ranked a mob museum among their top three museum concepts, showing it has the broadest appeal, according to pollsters.

"This confirms my gut feeling that the museum will be most successful looking at our colorful history," Goodman said on Friday.

He predicted the museum would be a draw for downtown and so successful that it will "pay for itself." The mayor envisions selling merchandise bearing patrons' mug shots and booking numbers, as if they had been arrested.

"We'll sell more sweatshirts and hats than at the World Series," he said. "I think it will be a huge moneymaker."

But locals weren't as bullish about trading on the city's shady past.

Only 17 percent marked the mob museum tops. Nearly 32 percent of residents had the "vintage Vegas" museum as their top choice.

Las Vegans again proved more conservative than tourists when asked whether a mob museum -- were it indeed the choice for the facility -- should focus on the criminals or the crime fighters. Locals slightly preferred, 34 percent to 31 percent, focusing on the good guys. About 52 percent of visitors said they were more interested in the criminals.

What eventually emerges at the POST Modern building, west of City Hall, could be a combination of the "vintage Vegas" and mob concepts, said Jason Gray, director of research and development for Strategic Surveys, which did the study.

He said that he wasn't surprised that locals didn't embrace the mob museum concept as much as tourists.

"People are living here, working here, raising the kids in the community -- there's more understanding of our history," Gray said. "People living here are more uncomfortable revealing aspects of our criminal history than not. They're as interested in the crime fighting."

Such is the city's contrasting self-image. It markets itself as a place of kept secrets, where visitors take up new identities in pursuit of carnal pleasure. At the same time it's a suburban city of homeowners raising children and earning a living.

The idea of a mob museum stirred debate in 2002, when Goodman first floated the concept. Staff members at the time worried the federal government might pause at handing over the building to the city if it were to be used to glorify those it had fought to prosecute. Tourism officials said that they had worked hard to turn public perception of gambling into the corporate, and sanitized, "gaming industry."

Goodman, who once famously denied the mob's existence, briefly backed off, joking that he had said he wanted a "mop museum." He acknowledged that there are still those who would rather move past that part of the city's history.

"They don't like it to be called Sin City and the like. It offends them," he said on Friday. "But from the poll, people would come down, bring their kids there, see what makes us different from El Paso."

To critics of the idea, Goodman said, "Don't come."

He also discounted derogatory characterizations of Las Vegas' history: "It's not an 'allegedly shady past.' It's a wonderful, colorful history."

But the legend of the mob's influence might now be viewed as larger than its impact at the time, according to a leading gaming historian.

"It's one aspect," said David G. Schwartz, director for the Center for Gaming Research at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. "If you look carefully at most cities in the United States -- every city in the U.S. -- organized crime is involved in one way or the other."

The mob's influence, he said, gets played up more than it should. "It's probably more interesting than talking about real estate developers, business people who built a lot of the city."

Not that it shouldn't be included in a museum's broader look at the region's past, he said.

Goodman tried his first case inside the courthouse. But he dismissed any speculation that the museum might include an exhibit on his career.

"Twenty years from now, I hope some mayor puts up a little bronze plaque that says I parked here before the trial," he said.