IN BRIEF
Las Vegas getting three more Kohl's stores
Kohl's said Wednesday that it plans to hold grand openings for three Las Vegas stores on Sept. 30.
The department stores will open at 1316 W. Sunset Road, 1300 S. Nellis Blvd. and 4265 S. Grand Canyon Drive. The openings will create 450 jobs and bring the number of Kohl's stores in Nevada to 11.
Kohl's will roll out 34 other stores nationwide on Sept. 30, for more than 5,200 jobs across the country.
Of the 37 stores Kohl's will unveil at the end of the month, 35 used to be Mervyns stores, including the Grand Canyon Drive location.
In all, Menomonee Falls, Wis.-based Kohl's will operate 1,059 stores in 49 states following the newest wave of openings.
Cox Communications high in phone survey
Residential telephone service from Cox Communications has ranked No. 1 in overall customer satisfaction in the West, according to J.D. Power and Associates' 2009 Residential Telephone Customer Satisfaction Study.
Cox Digital Telephone service placed especially high in factors that measure overall satisfaction, including performance and reliability, customer service, billing and cost of service. The phone service scored 32 points more than the West's major-provider average.
The J.D. Power survey was based on responses from nearly 21,500 customers nationwide who receive their local and long-distance phone service from one provider.
Major local phone utility Embarq ranked No. 5 in the survey. Other providers in the top five were Qwest, Verizon and AT&T.
NV Energy rates to dip in Northern Nevada
NV Energy customers in Northern Nevada will see a dip in their power and natural-gas rates starting Oct. 1.
The state Public Utilities Commission voted Wednesday to approve a 7.6 percent drop in rates for customers of NV Energy's Sierra Pacific Power Co. The rate cut amounts to a decrease of $7.21 a month in the typical residential power bill, from $105.43 to $98.22. For NV Energy's Reno-Sparks natural-gas customers, the drop will be 8 percent, or $5.84 a month. That will take the average bill from $76.25 to $70.41 a month.
Both decreases come from falling prices that NV Energy has been paying for fuel and purchased power. Fuel costs pass through directly to ratepayers, because the utility is barred by law from profiting on such expenses.
A similar fuel-cost case involving NV Energy's Southern Nevada operation, Nevada Power Co., will come before the commission Tuesday at 1 p.m. inside the agency's headquarters at 101 Convention Center Drive, Suite 250.
Pinnacle pushes to build Baton Rouge, La., casino
Pinnacle Entertainment wants to start building a $250 million casino in Baton Rouge, La., after March 31. State gaming regulators want a little more information in regards to the length of the delay.
The Louisiana Gaming Control Board gave Las Vegas-based Pinnacle until Nov. 5 to give authorities more definitive information on the proposed project on 576 acres that might eventually include a golf course, park, equestrian center, retail and office space and residential housing, along with a 100-room land-based hotel and riverboat casino.
Pinnacle is proceeding with Sugarcane Bay, a $407 million hotel-casino in Lake Charles, adjacent to the company's L'Auberge du Lac resort.
Gaming regulators will consider Pinnacle's request for the extension to March 31 at a meeting next month.
