Voters more familiar with mayoral candidate Chaltiel

Of all the characters in the Las Vegas mayor's race, Victor Chaltiel might cut the most distinctive figure to Southern Nevadans, with his double-breasted suits, the proper bow when shaking hands and the thick French accent.

"I was worried about my accent," Chaltiel said, and so he asked a friend about it.

"He said, 'Victor, let me ask you a question: Did your accent, in the last 38 years, prevent you from being successful in America?'

"I said, 'Never.' And he said, 'You have your answer. People are not going to vote for you or not vote for you because of your accent.' "

Chaltiel entered the race largely unknown in the public arena, although he has had a long career as a business executive and venture capitalist.

It's a type not unknown in politics, and campaign trails across the country bear witness to the failed candidacies of wealthy business people who jumped into the political arena.

Still, Chaltiel (pronounced shal-tee-EL) is getting results from the time and money he is putting into the campaign.

Television advertising popularized his "Victor for Las Vegas" rotating "V" hand sign that people now use to greet him, and he has gone from almost zero name recognition to 4.8 percent in the last Las Vegas Review-Journal/8 NewsNow poll.

There have been plenty of ads and televised candidate forums since then, which means his initial goal is complete.

In a field of 18 candidates, some of whom have been in the public eye for decades, having people actually know who you are is no mean feat.

Getting from there to being one of the top two finishers in the primary is an even bigger challenge. While Chaltiel has a long way to go, if he makes it, Las Vegas will have a character on its hands, said Andrea Benko, who has worked with Chaltiel on and off for more than 20 years.

"People sometimes don't know how to take him. He's so exuberant. He's so going to go his own path," Benko said of Chaltiel. "I think he's perfect for Vegas. We're coming off of Oscar Goodman, and we need someone who has personality."

LONG ROAD

Like many Las Vegans, Chaltiel arrived from somewhere else, although he traveled a lot farther than most.

He was born in Tunis, the capital of Tunisia, when it was still under French control.

Chaltiel said he grew up poor and, after finishing his initial schooling, took a job as the equivalent of a teacher's aide, which barely paid anything.

"After one year, I decided that this wasn't going to be my life," Chaltiel said.

When he was younger, he heard of the Harvard Business School through a friend whose father was a manager at an oil company, and that possibility stuck with him.

"He was a manager, and he was rich," Chaltiel said. "That was for me -- rich."

First, though, he attended school in France, then applied for and was accepted to business schools at Stanford and Harvard universities.

He chose Harvard, finishing in 1967, and then took a job with Baxter International, a medical products and service company.

He spent 18 years in various positions in the United States and abroad before moving to head Salick Health Care, which developed outpatient cancer and dialysis treatment centers.

Salick was acquired by another company, Zeneca, and subsequent companies charted similar courses.

Chaltiel headed Total Pharmaceutical Care, which was snapped up by what now is known as Apria Healthcare Group, and Total Renal Care Holdings, now known as the publicly traded Davita.

Chaltiel now runs a venture capital fund and a company that searches for health care fraud and waste.

He and his wife, Toni, have lived in Las Vegas for more than 14 years and have three children.

He has high-profile backing in billionaire casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and is chairman of the board for the Adelson Educational Campus, a private school.

All business

Chaltiel's campaign has focused exclusively on business and jobs, and he set a goal of reducing Southern Nevada's unemployment rate to 3 percent, substantially lower than the current 14.2 percent.

One way to do that is to not be California. That's where he lived for a time before moving to Las Vegas, which, at the time, was simply a practical step.

"That's the power of a good business climate," he said of Nevada. "You come here just for business or tax reasons or whatever, and then you say, 'My God, quality of life here is not bad. Weather is nice, everything is nice. I like it here.'

"California is a perfect example that very high taxes do not mean a balanced budget for the state. The more money you get, the more money you spend. It works for individuals, it works for states, it works for countries."

Southern Nevada has many ingredients for recruiting businesses, including low taxes, low-cost housing and commercial space, lots of sunshine and mild winters.

But roadblocks arise when trying to navigate jurisdictional boundaries, and dealing with local government bureaucracies is difficult, Chaltiel said.

"To tell a CEO that the right side of Charleston (Boulevard) is city but the left side is Clark County and you have to deal with someone else is a joke," Chaltiel said. "It's a joke. You cannot deal this way with senior executives.

"Las Vegas is the brand name. Nobody cares about the name Nevada, or the name Henderson, or the name Clark County."

Of the most visible candidates, Chaltiel is one of only two Republicans, and the Las Vegas City Council, while nominally nonpartisan, is solidly Democratic now.

Mayor Oscar Goodman is registered as an independent.

Like all of the other candidates in the race, Chaltiel talks about "red tape" and being "business friendly," saying Las Vegas, as a young city, is better able to adjust its work force and its policies.

"They get their paychecks from taxpayers," he said. "They are there to service taxpayers.

"It's amazing to me to see everybody who has been, like, 15 years in the council or 15 years in the County Commission complain about the bureaucracy and red tape," Chaltiel said.

He applies that remark to candidates ahead of him in the race, including Clark County Commissioners Larry Brown and Chris Giunchigliani, and Las Vegas Councilman Steve Ross.

"Who wrote the law?" said Chaltiel. "It was people on the City Council, I guess, or the County Commission who decided. So now they're all against it. That's good."

Chaltiel has not taken positions on other city issues, such as downtown development and public employee compensation, although he said he is aware of the city's four bargaining units and that they recently made concessions to avoid layoffs.

He is against the idea of a red light district for legalized prostitution.

He is vague about how businesses can actually be recruited here, sticking to touting his business experience around the world and his record of building and expanding companies.

As specific as he would get is the idea of selling Southern Nevada to wealthy visiting business travelers with a pitch that says, "We will be there for you to make sure we do everything we can in our power until you make money."

"But we need a businessman for this, not a politician," Chaltiel said, echoing his campaign slogan. "Not somebody who is going to talk in platitudes and generalities and BS. It will not work with these executives."

Contact reporter Alan Choate at achoate@reviewjournal.com or 702-229-6435.