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Thread: City trying (again) to crack down on degenerate Fremont Street Experience performers

  1. #1
    Do you think the Fremont Street Experience is a private area, owned by a private company? After all, they do things like charge admission to the area on New Year's Eve, which you couldn't see happening on a public street.

    Or, perhaps, do you believe it's considered public space, like any other street or sidewalk?

    It turns out that the answer is "neither".

    The Fremont Street Experience is owned by a private company called.... "Fremont Street Experience", and some of its management are also executives at surrounding casinos. Furthermore, the upkeep and expense of the area is the responsibility of the company, not the city.

    However, at the same time, it is still considered a public space, as it was converted to a pedestrian mall from the iconic Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas. The city put up 2/3 of the money for the expensive conversion, the most costly portion being the famed light-show canopy, which cost $64 million. It opened in 1995.

    This lack of clarity of public-versus-private space has created endless headaches for the city, casino owners, and tourists alike. The First Amendment of the Constitution grants all Americans the right to street performance. This is because street performance is considered a form of speech, and the government cannot restrict free speech in public places.

    Street performers are attracted to the Fremont Street Experience because it is the largest pedestrian mall in the city (by a wide margin), and a high percentage of people there are tourists. This, in turn, leads to a lot of lucrative tips. Fremont Street Experience would prefer these performers -- whose behavior can range from nuisance to obscene at times -- weren't present. However, given that it's technically public land, they can't kick them out.

    From 1995 to 2010, the city actually had some fairly restrictive rules in place regarding unapproved street performers. However, the ACLU got involved, and these rules were abandoned. They were replaced by much more permissive rules in 2011, in part crafted by the ACLU itself.

    However, as you might guess, this led to street performers immediately swarming the area, and often getting into arguments and fistfights over the most coveted performance spaces in the area. Finally, in 2015 the city had enough, and with the ACLU's help, implemented a new system to reserve space for street performers.

    The new system was daily lottery where performers would register, and then get randomly assigned one of the 40 or so 6-foot "circles" drawn on the pavement. These performers would only get a two-hour slot, and then would have to leave.





    As you might guess, this was exploited by opportunistic performers, who simply registered tons of duplicate accounts for "registration", and then would win rights to a large number of spaces each day. Then, with far more spaces than they could use, they would sell their spaces to other performers, who were desperate for a place to take their act!

    Not what the city intended, right?

    Unfortunately, little could be done to stop this, under the current rules. The ACLU insisted that no identification would be required to register for this "lottery", nor would performers have to show ID to claim their space. Obviously this was ripe for abuse, and it's been getting worse each year.

    The city is now proposing that performers would have to show valid ID upon first-time registration for the system, and that the photo from the ID would be included in the granting of the performance space. If the performer does not match the photo, their space isn't valid.

    It is likely there will be a legal challenge to this, again by the ACLU.



    You might wonder why the city didn't simply sell the land to Fremont Street Experience in 1995, and allow them to make it a private area. I can only guess that this was done to save money. Notice that the city does NOT pay for the upkeep of the area, which is a huge savings to them. It probably looked like a great deal at the time. Put up 2/3 of the initial budget for renovation, and then someone else foots the bill to take care of this public land for perpetuity, even though it remains a public space!

    That's great... until you want to induce regulations on how people can behave in that public space, and all of a sudden degenerate "performers" are declaring their rights to free speech.


    These performers, while occasionally interesting to watch, have mostly been a nuisance. They have caused these issues and more:

    - Aggressive tip hustling

    - Scamming

    - Performing dangerous stunts involving viewers which end up causing injury

    - Fights and confrontations with other tourists and each other

    - Drug dealing


    What a mess.
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  2. #2
    Diamond MisterV's Avatar
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    So now it is co-owned, with the city holding 1/3?

    Perhaps a bit of legal sleight of hand could fix the problem: have the city lease their interest to the private entity so that they'd have full control.

    Not sure whether it would allow private rules or not; probably not, plus I have to think somebody would have thought about and implemented this if it would work.
    What, Me Worry?

  3. #3
    Who doesn’t like opiate addict bums and crappy “rappers” threatening tourists for tips? The theft by the bums at that Walgreens down there is completely out of control, last time I was in there the cashier barked at one to
    “ steal some damn soap, you don’t need to be stanking like that.”

  4. #4
    Originally Posted by MisterV View Post
    So now it is co-owned, with the city holding 1/3?

    Perhaps a bit of legal sleight of hand could fix the problem: have the city lease their interest to the private entity so that they'd have full control.

    Not sure whether it would allow private rules or not; probably not, plus I have to think somebody would have thought about and implemented this if it would work.
    No. It's owned by the Fremont Street Experience company, but sitting on public land.

    The city put up 2/3 of the initial money to build it in 1994-95. In return, FSE agreed to pay to maintain it. It remained public land.

    The legal situation there is very murky.
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  5. #5
    I watched this group of young men very similar to those in the top post. I watched it and watched it and they just begged and hustled for more money. I gave up and moved on. It was actually quite obnoxious but if you constantly get a new flow of foot traffic.. Those kids weren't doing their jumping jacks for free.

  6. #6
    Just take all of these verminous, lower lifes-form and toss em into the wooods-chipper, feets first, simple, problems solved, NEXT, hey hey!

  7. #7
    Anyway, I'm with you guys on this one. These street performers are a nuisance, and while not all of them are troublesome, there's enough problems from the performers as a whole to where it's detrimental to surrounding businesses, the city, and tourists.

    I understand these guys are trying to make a living, but there's just too many bad actors, and the situation has to be brought under control. The multiaccounting situation regarding reserving those 6-foot circles, which are then illegally auctioned off, is just one of many examples of the abuses which occur involving these performers.
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  8. #8

  9. #9
    Originally Posted by Dan Druff View Post
    Ammo? That's a first rate show for a busker.

    I really like the buskers and consider it part of the draw downtown.

    Some of them are a nuisance and such, but even the ones I think are shitty often have people gathered around enjoying it.

    It really makes that area more festive and adds to the vibe. Otherwise there is nothing but maybe some lame-ass mall-like kiosk.

  10. #10
    Diamond MisterV's Avatar
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    Originally Posted by accountinquestion View Post

    I really like the buskers and consider it part of the draw downtown. Some of them are a nuisance and such, but even the ones I think are shitty often have people gathered around enjoying it..
    Some adults might enjoy it, but many do not; they find it repugnant, offensive and annoying.

    As for kids ... wholly christ!

    Little Jimmy just flew in from Podunk, Iowa with his god-fearing folks and en route to the zip line he gets an eye-full of lesbian sado-masochism.

    I guess Fremont is not "family friendly."
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  11. #11
    Originally Posted by MisterV View Post
    Originally Posted by accountinquestion View Post

    I really like the buskers and consider it part of the draw downtown. Some of them are a nuisance and such, but even the ones I think are shitty often have people gathered around enjoying it..
    Some adults might enjoy it, but many do not; they find it repugnant, offensive and annoying.

    As for kids ... wholly christ!

    Little Jimmy just flew in from Podunk, Iowa with his god-fearing folks and en route to the zip line he gets an eye-full of lesbian sado-masochism.

    I guess Fremont is not "family friendly."
    Vegas has went to shit anyway. The whole family-friendly direction wasn't that great. Stay at circus-circus. Without Buskers, you get the lame cover-bands.. I forgot about those. lol

  12. #12
    Diamond MisterV's Avatar
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    What about porn slappers on the strip, are those illegals still at it?
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  13. #13
    Downtown is a cesspool. Bring back Benny Binion and bury the buskers in the desert. You know he would

  14. #14
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    Why not just have Metro do a sting operation where buskers intimidating people into payment are arrested?

    Or put out a warning that Metro will be doing these stings, and then start actually doing it?

    That would put a stop to this shit quickly.
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  15. #15
    Not having been to lv in a couple years .. I reread this thread and feel like the buskers are something that lv has going ..

    Was in NO and some little black girl just stood in front of you blocking you with her hand out. It was insane jn the French quarter but has nothing to do with busking. Jackson Square had nothing going on ... too hot. Buskers can add a lot but if you are a woman or prone to being bullied like Kewl or Singer then it can be problematic.

    Just spewing out random thoughts..

  16. #16
    I've spent a lot of time on Fremont and never felt the performers were an issue. I didn't know about the reservation system abuse. The strip was much more annoying with all the promo card flickers impeding foot traffic but that seems to have gone away for the most part. Not long ago I had two "showgirls" grab me and detain me briefly in front of the Cosmo... something like that has never happened downtown.

  17. #17
    If you're the type of person who's intimidated by "buskers" then you're the same type of weakling who's intimidated into tipping cashiers and floor people on handpays. Typically these people go after those that look like losers, and AQ fits that bill.....even though he tries to look like he's in-charge when going up against female blacks.

  18. #18
    I don't care what anyone says.

    When tourists downtown take a picture with the buskers, are hustled for a $100 tip, and then threatened with violence if they don't give it, that's a big problem.

    Might not be a problem for you or me, because we don't engage in these services. But for the tourist from the midwest, this can be a big problem, and it shouldn't be happening.

    As I said, run some undercover officers out there, make some arrests, throw some of the buskers in county jail for 30 days, and watch this all rapidly improve.
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  19. #19
    Diamond MisterV's Avatar
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    I wonder whether the threats of violence have ever been followed through with, leading to an assault?

    How is the threat delivered...by a busker or a pimp / "manager?"

    Me, I'd just laugh in their face but then I'm big enough to get away with it: spoiler...i really am an uncaring lout.
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  20. #20
    Originally Posted by Dan Druff View Post
    I don't care what anyone says.

    When tourists downtown take a picture with the buskers, are hustled for a $100 tip, and then threatened with violence if they don't give it, that's a big problem.

    Might not be a problem for you or me, because we don't engage in these services. But for the tourist from the midwest, this can be a big problem, and it shouldn't be happening.

    As I said, run some undercover officers out there, make some arrests, throw some of the buskers in county jail for 30 days, and watch this all rapidly improve.
    If you fear or don't like what goes on downtown, DONT GO THERE.

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