Caesars’ plan will become community cornerstone

Caesars Entertainment takes seriously our commitment to this city, this state and the more than 30,000 Caesars Entertainment employees who live and raise their families in Nevada, and we are concerned about the future of Las Vegas.

When we saw a serious shortfall in education funding in 2009, we led the fight for an initiative seeking a 3 percent room tax increase to help support public education. We did this to meet a compelling need of the community because we believe a strong education system is absolutely vital in making our communities vibrant places in which to live and work.

Now our community is facing more serious challenges. Southern Nevada's construction trades are experiencing unemployment at rates of 50 to 80 percent. The overall unemployment rate in Clark County remains among the highest in the nation.

The housing market continues to struggle, and prospects for near-term recovery are dim.

There are also troubling systemic issues that cast a pall over prospects for future growth. Among the most worrisome are the absence of new capital investment, the obsolescence of many older entertainment facilities and the associated threat to Las Vegas' competitiveness with other destinations.

In an effort to address some of these issues, we have proposed the development of a modern arena on land our company will make available at no cost to the project.

The Las Vegas Arena would be administered by a non-casino third party and available to all users. We believe the arena would attract important new types of entertainment, including professional sports, and help retain major events such as the National Finals Rodeo and Country Music Awards, which generate tens of millions of dollars in revenues for the entire community.

The arena would also boost employment in Southern Nevada, generating more than 2,000 construction jobs and 3,000 additional positions when it opens. Another 1,000 jobs are expected to be created throughout the local economy.

Once completed, the arena would also generate tax revenues of more than $20 million annually, money that could be used to support our struggling education system.

A major issue to new arena development, however, is financing, which is why the Las Vegas Arena is seeking voter approval of a 0.9 percent sales tax in an area frequented primarily by tourists to help finance the cost of construction. On a $20 purchase, the tax would be 18 cents and would have little or no impact on Southern Nevada residents.

The "tax on tourist" approach is consistent with previous measures imposing hotel room taxes and rental car taxes that helped fund important community projects in Nevada, including The Smith Center for the Performing Arts and the Las Vegas Convention Center. By design, it would not impose a significant additional tax burden on our fellow Nevadans, nor divert precious resources from vital programs such as our education system.

Initiative Petition 1 merely seeks permission from voters to allow Nevada to follow its long tradition of benefiting from tourism to enrich its communities, this time to provide a source of funding for an arena.

Because of the importance of this project to jobs, revenues and vibrancy of the destination, more than 200,000 Nevada residents signed the petitions that will put this before the voters in 2012.

We are proud of Las Vegas. We want to express that pride by delivering a state-of-the-art facility that will become a cornerstone of the future of our great community.

Together, we can accomplish this goal.

Jan L. Jones, former mayor of Las Vegas, is senior vice president of Caesars Entertainment Corp.