Flap over diversity luncheons settled

RENO -- The chancellor of Nevada's higher education system and leaders of Las Vegas minority groups have settled a flap that had threatened the future of monthly luncheons designed to promote diversity in the system.

Jim Rogers told the minority leaders on Tuesday that he no longer would sponsor Diversity Forum luncheons he started in 2005 because they would not purchase tickets for a fundraising dinner for his pet project, the Nevada Health Sciences System.

But Rogers said he reversed his decision a short time later after minority leaders agreed to support the fundraiser.

Rogers said he was upset because he has been a strong supporter of minorities in Las Vegas, but representatives of local minority chambers of commerce and other groups weren't supporting him by buying $500-a-seat tickets to a dinner to benefit the health sciences project.

"It's especially important because health care in this state is at the bottom of the barrel, and minorities are the least insured population," he told the Reno Gazette-Journal.

Rogers said he has personally spent about $40,000 to $50,000 on the diversity luncheons, which are held alternately in Las Vegas and Reno.

"So I said, 'I have supported you, but it's apparently a one-way street, and I'm not going to do it anymore,'" Rogers said. "Then they told me they didn't realize how important the Health Sciences System was to me, and they became responsive, so I said I would continue to sponsor the luncheons."

Rogers also is the owner of Sunbelt Communications, which operates a number of NBC affiliate TV stations, including KVBC-TV, Channel 3.