Take a walk down Fremont Street, and evaluate the level of morality you see.
There's your strip club at First Street. Take a guess which women around Seventh Street are prostitutes, and which are just tourists too oblivious to realize they look like evening game.
Walk down past the Western Casino, and watch the junkies scurry about, day and night, looking for their latest fix or a hooker to pass the time with.
One could even say that Walgreens, an icon of homogenous Corporate America, does little to add to the moral character of Glitter Gulch.
Oh yeah, that neon-graced hulk to your left as you head into the so-called "entertainment district"? Neonopolis is begging to be noticed, despite near-empty movie theaters, a taxpayer-subsidized parking garage that apparently is sinking financially and businesses that can't seem to capture the imagination or interest of locals or tourists.
Neonopolis has had its share of naysayers over time, beginning when its developers promised a South Beach-type atmosphere that would encourage tourists to visit the Downtown area. When that didn't work, Neonopolis tried to bring locals in with concerts, discounted movies and gin with the mayor on Friday afternoons.
It's still the best place to watch a movie on opening weekend. You can stretch your legs, take a nap across a few seats, even chat on your phone during the movie with a reasonable expectation of not bothering anyone else.
So it's puzzling that Neonopolis would turn away any business with a decent chance of survival, particularly one that had the potential to bring in thousands of people to the struggling complex and surrounding neighborhood.
And yet, that's exactly what happened when two businessmen from Ohio tried to rent space in Neonopolis for a nightclub, featuring drag shows and reminiscent of The Birdcage.
A Neonopolis representative contacted this week had no comment on the matter. While it'd be easy to kick Neonopolis while it's down, I'd like to think I can at least recognize Neonopolis' logic. If it can ride out the doldrums of redevelopment as a vanilla shopping complex, there will come a time when the place is teeming with tenants. If they let in a gay nightclub now, it might discourage patronage once Downtown reaches that critical mass of residents that can sustain a complex as bold as Neonopolis. They don't want to be recognized as the gay haven of Downtown Las Vegas when the yuppies and families move in.
Problem is, there's been no indication that the yuppies and families would want to.
For all the apartments and lofts that have recently been built or are going up in the area, what else does our city's center have to offer residents besides ample opportunity to get a bail bond or sell their platelets?
Downtown has no community center, no central park, no public square and only two streets with decent landscaping. There are few community restaurants, no more sidewalk cafes, no basketball courts or jogging tracks.
Ironically enough, Neonopolis bringing in a gay nightclub might be just what Downtown needs to save its soul. Downtown can't expect to go from haven for society's castoffs to hotspot for cultural mavens overnight. A groundwork has to be laid. It needs the artists, the entrepreneurs and yes, the gays to come in and do the dirty work—fix up the homes, paint the murals, plant the trees and develop that sense of community for Downtown's brave new residents.
I recently spoke with a resident of the John S. Park neighborhood who's witnessed the transformation her district has gone through in the past decade. What was once a quaint zone of small cottages and low-income families has become a yuppie fixer-upper paradise in the heart of "old" Las Vegas. One of the key factors has been the influx of gay residents who "meet every stereotype," in that they pay careful attention to the appearance of their neighborhood and home, inside and out.
Those are the same residents Downtown needs, just a half-mile to the north of John S. Park. People to help grow the arts district outward from the one or two blocks it now occupies. People who'll be out at night, so that people like my girlfriend won't be able to use the old I don't feel safe jogging after dark excuse. People who will get Café Enigma to reopen; people who will provide the initial jump-start to business and redevelopment so that the rest of Las Vegas yuppie-dom will take more than a passing glance at Downtown as a place to live.
People who will lay the groundwork so that Neonopolis can achieve that dream of being the commercial center of the new, vibrant Downtown Las Vegas. Art galleries couldn't do it. The Saloon couldn't do it. Jillian's couldn't do it. Movie theaters couldn't do it.
So what's left for Neonopolis? How about thinking out of the box—or out of the closet, as it were—by opening its doors to the drag club.