Rodeo offer from Las Vegas to get answer within 30 days, official says
The Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association, which stages the popular National Finals Rodeo, will let Las Vegas know within 30 days whether it will accept a 10-year deal to stay in the city beyond the 2014 NFR event, PRCA Commissioner Karl Stressman said Tuesday.
Stressman acknowledged that the Colorado Springs, Colo.-based PRCA has received an offer from Las Vegas Events, the nonprofit funded by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority to recruit, market and promote sports and entertainment events. A seven-year extension deal between the rodeo association and Las Vegas Events expires after 2014.
Las Vegas Events President Pat Christenson said Monday that his group offered a $15 million annual commitment to the PRCA covering a wide variety of marketing, promotional, hospitality, transportation and FanFest services.
Stressman said his group has received offers from other cities, but he declined to identify them.
Talk around the NFR has Oklahoma City and Dallas being interested in hosting the NFR, which has attendance of 175,000 over 10 days at a sold-out Thomas &Mack Center. Several hundred thousand visitors without NFR event tickets come to Las Vegas to partake in watch parties and related activities.
Before Stressman talked with the Review-Journal about the Las Vegas deal, the PRCA commissioner spoke in general terms about the situation during his annual NFR news conference.
During the news conference, he responded to a reporter’s question about the NFR’s future in Las Vegas by saying that the rodeo organization is “trying diligently to make it work” and that both sides are “still banging heads.”
Stressman then ended his comments on the Las Vegas question by quipping, “Did I beat around the bush good enough for you?”
Alan Snel can be contacted at asnel@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5273. Follow @BicycleManSnel on Twitter.
