Nugget Project discussed at NBC breakfast
Carson Nugget president Steve Neighbors was on hand to discuss some of the details of the Carson City Center aka Nugget Project at the Nevada Business Connections breakfast this morning at the Gold Dust West.
(You can read all the background materials on the project here. )
One of the details that came out of the questions from the audience (and a follow-up discussion afterward) was that a potential lease-to-own deal for the property where they want a new city library and discovery center built is not viable, according to Neighbors. City officials have said they were pursing such an agreement to allay fears of the city being saddled with an ongoing lease payment on the property in perpetuity.
Neighbors said that the Hop & Mae Adams Foundation cannot simply dispose of an asset like this property, even if they were to give it to the library. He said they are donating the use of the property to the library for as long as they want it, but that the city would be making lease payments to the foundation for its cost.
However, Neighbors said all the money collected from these lease payments — minus any taxes and fees — would be given back to the library's non-profit arm. He also said there would be provisions to prevent the money from being used in a way that would allow the city to cut that amount out of the library's budget. He said that Mae Adams was "anti-government," and her trust forbade giving anything directly to the government.
Neighbors was also asked about the parking situation, and plans for a parking garage. He said that the city's plans to narrow Carson Street and add parking there causes him to question what parking will need to be added as part of the Nugget Project.
"We don't want to pay $15,000 a space if the city is going to be putting more parking places on the street," Neighbors said.
Neighbors did confirm that it is their intention to make any added parking free to the public.
When asked about the state office portion of the project and if this was still viable, Neighbors inferred that they were still working on this.
He said the 1/8 cent sales tax the city is willing to commit to the project is not enough to pay for the cost of the library, and that it would be up to P3 Development to make up that difference through the private parts of the project, which includes easing space to three state agencies. The smaller the size of the private section, the less they would have to contribute to to the public section, he said.
Neighbors said they were working hard to get plans ready to present to the citizen's advisory committee at the end of the month, and that they would be bringing in some digital media companies who are committing to taking part in the media lab portion of the project.
In another part of his talk, Neighbors said he didn't have any plans to increase the size of the Carson Nugget Casino. Admitting it might be considered blasphemy for a casino person to say, "we don't need any more slot machines."
You can read the Nevada Appeal story on the meeting here.
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