On the night of October 10, 2025, Toney Foote was only doing what he’d done on Fremont Street for the past decade—moonwalking in Michael Jackson garb—when a city of Las Vegas security officer handed him a citation. The charge? Stepping just outside of his designated six-foot performance circle.
According to court filings, Foote wasn’t even caught in the act by the officer who wrote the ticket. Instead, a city surveillance investigator at the Fremont Street Experience spotted him on the security footage and reported it. Foote returned home with a misdemeanor hanging over his head.
He linked up with the ACLU of Nevada, which agreed to defend him on the grounds that a Las Vegas city ordinance—dictating where, when and how performers like Foote can busk in the Fremont Street area—violated his First Amendment rights.
The city relented, officially dropping the charges in early June. Weeks later, it hosted a June 22 town hall event to hear feedback from performers and discuss potential changes to the ordinance. Foote and roughly three dozen others showed up.
Athar Haseebullah, executive director of the ACLU of Nevada, described Foote’s experience to the Weekly as “an insane outcome that should never happen.”
“I don’t know if Foote’s now-dropped case played a role in the [city’s] latest revision efforts,” he added. “But that matter highlights why the circle system is problematic.”
City Attorney Jeff Dorocak opened the town hall by noting that it was still early in the process, with any rule revisions ultimately subject to city council approval.
“We took our medicine right away,” Dorocak said of the early feedback the city has recieved. “We’re here to work together and find a way to come up with ideas that we think will help make that pedestrian mall enjoyable again for everybody.”
THE RULES
Last updated in 2015, the ordinance establishes a daily lottery system that’s used to assign participating independent street performers to one of at least 38 designated six-foot performance circles along Fremont Street. Winners can occupy their chosen circle for two-hour increments between 3 p.m. and 1 a.m.
Outside of the lottery hours, performers are free to use any circle on a first-come, first-served basis without having to register. There’s also a designated “free zone” in the middle of the mall area where no registration is required at any hour. However, most performers say the assigned circles are the best real estate at the perfect times of day.
One issue is that the ordinance’s current enforcement policies leave little room for nuance. As Foote discovered, any violation—including stepping outside a circle—is a misdemeanor.
Nearly every performer at the town hall also cited a “broken” lottery system that has made it difficult for them to win a circle. Unknown individuals or parties have been creating duplicate accounts, they say, effectively rigging it in their favor by registering for multiple daily entries. Some of them will then auction off spots they won to buyers through platforms like CashApp. City officials acknowledged both issues as legitimate.
Kelvin Gordon, a Chicago-born contortionist and tai-chi instructor who’s been fitting himself into a box on Fremont Street since 2012, tells the Weekly the lottery has been “abused by people with computer hacking skills.”
“They get their friends to sign up, or they’ll make bogus emails, and the next thing you know, you have people with like 150 [entry] numbers,” Gordon says.
A sign from the Fremont Street Experience
Justin Wright, a strongman performer and daily lottery candidate, estimates that he wins a circle roughly once a week. And when he does, he says the city inconsistently enforces its own sound ordinance capping the maximum speaker volume in the area.
“You can have a good circle, but then it’s ruined because the person next to you is just blasting music. You can’t even hear yourself talk,” Wright tells the Weekly. “Enforcement needs to be possible, and it needs to be fair.”
POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS
At the town hall, Deputy City Attorney Gillian Segerblom outlined a set of suggested changes, starting with expanding the lottery circle assignment and enforcement period from its current 3 p.m. start time to 1 p.m.
Other revisions would rewrite how violations are penalized. Segerblom outlined a new proposal that she called “civil enforcement alternative to criminal prosecution.”
First-time offenders would receive a warning, followed by a maximum fine of $250 per subsequent violation. Performers with three or more citations could be suspended from entering the lottery for up to 180 days—though a ban wouldn’t include the free space or extend beyond the enforcement hours.
The city would also rework its anonymous registration portal by issuing free physical street performer identification cards that would include only a photo and a lottery identification code.
In addition to drawing a winner, the lottery would also determine an alternate. If neither claims the circle within an hour, it becomes a first-come, first-served zone until that two-hour time slot is up.
The city also floated creating a five-foot buffer zone around each circle to prevent overcrowding, and a “public safety” consideration that would prohibit activities like aerial flips, jumping, vaulting, balancing maneuvers and simulated fighting in the zone.
THE FEEDBACK
Following the city’s presentation, performers spent the next hour asking questions and pitching their own. Most expressed some support for photo ID cards, with some audibly cheering when Wright suggested adding a small registration fee to discourage fraud.
However, Haseebullah says both possibilities are “nonstarters” for the ACLU of Nevada.
“The ID piece raises serious concerns for us... namely because Fremont Street remains a public street, and data security remains a very real issue. We think that’s illegal,” Haseebullah says. “And if they were to charge a single penny in exchange for entering into this lottery system, it would violate the state constitution instantly.”
He’s also concerned with the proposal to expand the city’s enforcement hours, arguing that it would further “preclude the ability for performers to engage in activity without participating in this lottery.” The city’s rationale is that pedestrian traffic peaks far earlier than the current 3 p.m. start time.
Many performers, including magician Victor Cephas, say they simply want to continue making rent money on their own terms.
“Within the last four years, I actually went homeless,” Cephas says. “And Fremont was my escape, where I don’t have to worry about a job or wait for a check. I haven’t looked back.”
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