Friday a big day for Las Vegas soccer stadium opponents

Las Vegas City Councilman Bob Beers and dozens of soccer stadium subsidy opponents plan to make their last stand in front of City Hall today.

Beers, a staunch opponent of using some $56 million in taxpayer dollars to help pay for a planned 24,000-seat, $200 million downtown soccer stadium, has spent more than a week collecting signatures aimed at putting a stadium funding question on the June 2 municipal election ballot.

Lobbyist and fellow stadium subsidy foe Lisa Mayo put out a press release Thursday morning accusing City Hall of moving back the filing deadline for collecting those signatures, costing she and others 24 hours of valuable signature-gathering time.

Mayo later said City Attorney Brad Jerbic didn’t tell Beers about the deadline change until “after 6 p.m., maybe even 7:30 p.m.” on Wednesday.

Jerbic remembers it differently.

“I spoke to the councilman personally at 12:30 p.m., between (City Council) sessions,” Jerbic said. “He didn’t protest. … I told him there was a spreadsheet there at the city clerk’s office to explain, because you don’t count (the petition) deadline date by statute.”

Reached for comment Thursday, Beers didn’t dispute that timeline, but reiterated that he still felt robbed of valuable signature-gathering time.

The Ward 2 councilman, who first announced the date change in a “breaking news” update posted to his blog late Wednesday night, concedes that he should have taken a closer look at the matter.

“If you consider 48 hours ample warning, then sure, I was given ample warning,” Beers said.

“I should’ve counted up the days (until the deadline) myself, and sooner, but I left it up to the city.”

Jerbic earlier this week rebuffed Beers’ request for more time to file the anti-stadium subsidy ballot initiative after it was announced that an error in the city clerk’s office would require initiative supporters to collect nearly four times the number of signatures originally needed to land the issue on the June ballot.

Mayo said Beers and others had collected more than 5,000 signatures as of Wednesday afternoon, some 3,200 shy of the new city-mandated amount needed to put the stadium up for a vote. Stadium ballot initiative supporters plan to continue collecting signatures outside City Hall, 495 S. Main St., starting at 6:30 a.m. today.

They will have until midnight to submit notarized copies of those autographs to interim City Clerk Luann Holmes, who did not return phone calls seeking comment Thursday afternoon.

Contact James DeHaven at jdehaven@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3839. Find him on Twitter: @JamesDeHaven.