Regent Las Vegas may lay off 300 workers

LAS VEGAS - The Regent Las Vegas could lay off as many as 300 workers over the next five months, company officials said.

The layoffs would be an effort to help the struggling off-Strip hotel-casino's finances.

No firm layoff plans or timetable has been developed for The Regent, formerly the Resort at Summerlin. The Regent employs 1,700 workers.

Company officials are blaming the proposed layoffs on slow table-game play and a weak breakfast and lunch buffet business.

''We have a real business problem with respect to our capital structure,'' Regent Chief Executive Officer and President Paul Hanley told lasvegas.com and the Las Vegas Review-Journal in Wednesday's editions. ''We have portions of our operating units that are not doing as well as we hoped, but 80 percent of our operating units are doing wonderfully.''

The companies that own and operate the 14-month-old Regent have defaulted on a $3.9 million interest payment to bondholders.

Regent owner Swiss Casinos of America representatives said they are attempting to negotiate a new debt repayment plan.

Regent executives have blamed the upscale resort's problems on construction delays that postponed its opening from April 1999, severely cutting in to the cash flow needed to repay creditors.

Swiss Casinos of America has pumped $100 million into the business to keep it operating, bringing the project's estimated price tag to $365 million.

In February, the Resort at Summerlin Limited Partnership filed suit in U.S. District Court seeking damages of more than $200 million from construction manager J.A. Jones Construction Co. in connection with the delays.

Critics have said the developers of the golf- and spa-driven getaway misread the demand for their 541-room hotel and erred by initially declining to market the Regent to local residents.