Well, a lot sure happened last night:
- In a two-hour special session, the Nevada legislature approved its final budget bill after Republican state senator Scott Hammond changed his vote to support it, and Gov. Joe Lombardo signed it.
- Lombardo called for the legislature to reconvene today at 10 am Pacific time to consider the bill to help fund a Las Vegas stadium for the Oakland A’s, which stalled on Monday during the end of the regular session as legislators refused to act on it unless the budget was done.
This is, as they say, a developing story, so I’ll do my best to keep this post updated as the day progresses. Stay tuned.
UPDATE (sort of) 9:45 am ET:
Today (technically yesterday) was special. Tomorrow (technically today) will also be special. #NVLegLife
— Steve Yeager (@SteveYeagerNV) June 7, 2023
Yeager is the state assembly speaker who previously said a stadium vote in a special session would happen over his dead body. Apparently he also likes being coy.
UPDATE 11:10 am ET: The Nevada legislature website calendar doesn’t seem to know yet about the special session:
UPDATE 12:59 pm ET: The entire Nevada legislature looks to have crashed:
UPDATE 1:43 pm ET: Delayed until 3 pm, looks like? Not sure if that’s local (Pacific) time or Eastern time where my browser is.
UPDATE 1:51 pm ET: It’s set for noon local (Pacific) time, but apparently it’s not clear if the legislature will actually show up then:
https://twitter.com/jfkooAN/status/1666496047076765697
Tune in here if and when the festivities begin.
UPDATE 3:15 pm ET: And we’re off!
UPDATE 3:38 pm ET: Both the Nevada state house and senate went into simultaneous session, read off a bunch of pro forma bureaucratic gobbledegook, announced that there were sandwiches available for members, then both went into recess.
And now the senate is back in session! This is some next-level performance art.
UPDATE 3:41 pm ET: Senate is back in recess!
UPDATE 4:30 pm ET: Recap of the day so far: The Nevada legislature has convened to say “Check, check” into a microphone multiple times.
UPDATE 4:50 pm ET:
New link for the Senate hearing. Now looks like it's scheduled to start for 2:30 PM (keeps getting pushed back).https://t.co/DZycxVHqrU
Stadium bill text for special session is also out and can be viewed here: https://t.co/FRWcm3hEqO https://t.co/XhlAflHl31
— Brett Forrest (@brettforrestTV) June 7, 2023
So another 40 minutes, maybe, before the senate starts its debate. Video will start here, then, or not!
UPDATE 5:33 pm ET: Or maybe another couple of hours. Check, check.
UPDATE 5:39 pm ET:
Since this is a Senate "Committee of the Whole" as they call it, public testimony will be part of it, to my understanding.
CALL IN by dialing 1-888-475-4499. When prompted, provide Meeting ID 876 4526 7078 and then press #. When prompted for a Participant ID, press #.
— Brett Forrest (@brettforrestTV) June 7, 2023
UPDATE, 6:20 pm ET: Holy crap, the meeting has actually started!
UPDATE, 9:30 pm ET: I apparently wasn’t kidding when I said that baby will be in college by the time this meeting ends: We’re over three hours in and the senate has taken a recess (to go get more sandwiches, presumably) and we haven’t even gotten to public testimony. Senators so far have been a mix of those with softball questions and those with very-much-not-softball ones; stadium authority head Steve Hill and A’s hired gun Jeremy Aguero have been sticking to their Powerpoint slides, but have seemed to sweat a bit at times. None of which matters if it doesn’t impact how legislators actually vote — and remember that if and when the senate finally wraps up, the assembly still needs to hold its own marathon meeting and vote. It doesn’t seem possible this will be resolved tonight, but we’ll see. (Well, I may see in the morning if it goes much past midnight Eastern time.)
UPDATE, 9:44 pm ET: We already knew that the waterfall fund from the stadium tax district would contribute to future Vegas stadium upgrades, but still this is fun:
Jesus Christ, no wonder they tried to ram this through. Even light examination reveals the grift. NV is not only on the hook for shortfalls but updates/maintenence. John Fisher isn’t commuting anything to you people. He takes. He does not give. #NVleg https://t.co/ZEXqucYgTp
— Thischarmingham (@Thischarminham) June 8, 2023
UPDATE, 12:52 am ET: They’re still in the middle of public testimony, I’m going to sleep. Maybe we’ll have more of a resolution by morning, but I wouldn’t put money on it.
Unrelated but Jags have a video out for their concept of a new stadium:
https://twitter.com/jaguars/status/1666446423015972867?
Yeah, that’ll have to wait for a full report tomorrow. There’s a public price tag on the Jaguars thing as well, which is $1B+: https://floridapolitics.com/archives/616416-jags-stadium-cost/
I liked one Twitter reply was it for stadium that they play half their home games in.
Who is paying for it? Thought Florida governor man said no money for stadiums?
The city, sounds like.
Thanks Neil!
So…. is Yeager officially dying today then or ???
It hardly matters I guess as it seems just a matter of time before all professional sports everywhere are owned (or just controlled) by the Saudi Royal family…
I’m hoping that fans have a greater moral compass than the sports leagues and owners, but perhaps I will be disappointed on that front.
Does anyone else remember the 1980s John Ritter movie “Americathon”???
No-one would call it a high point in film making, but I think about that picture a lot these days…
Looks like things will start soon, and it might be a much more drawn out purpose then anyone wants
https://twitter.com/s_golonka/status/1666515532047347713?s=20
Process
I’m fairly impressed with the NV legislature in the few weeks I’ve come to know them. Along with The Nevada Independent – this is a good recap of the day:
https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/nevada-lawmakers-question-why-public-funds-needed-to-lure-as-to-vegas-strip
Now on the record: Team Fisher and Vegas have been negotiating since February – weeks after Oakland got a new mayor. By bumping this to special session, it’s costing NV taxpayers $250K per day.
No decision was reached yesterday evening. This is not a done deal. Purportedly they will reconvene today at 11:30AM PST.
https://www.youtube.com/@NVLeg/videos