Still, the fact that the issue of the LVCVA selling the rights to that trademark to R&R Partners, the LVCVA's advertising consultant, for $1 wasn't completely resolved Tuesday means that public interest in the matter lives on.

Like the slogan itself, the issue isn't going away quietly.

By turning an investigation into the matter over to the San Francisco law firm of Morrison & Foerster, lawyers effectively put a muzzle on everybody associated with the case. Mayor Oscar Goodman, who chairs the LVCVA board, even shut down comments by LVCVA Chief Executive Rossi Ralenkotter and R&R Chief Executive Billy Vassiliadis who wanted to explain themselves.

They, of course, already have said that the reason rights to the trademark were virtually given away was so that R&R would have legal standing in defending ownership of the phrase in court.

My guess is that if the LVCVA and R&R would have wanted to make T-shirts and souvenirs proclaiming "What happens here, stays here," they would have had them manufactured a long time ago when the phrase was catching fire. I'm wondering if they shouldn't just auction rights to the phrase on e-Bay and see how much they could get for it since they have said they don't have any plans to market the phrase commercially.

Knowing that the WHHSH muzzle was firmly in place, I still decided to ask Luke Puschnig, the LVCVA's legal counsel, why the LVCVA didn't just go to him instead of hiring Morrison & Foerster for what is likely to be a huge retainer fee.

Puschnig said there aren't very many attorneys in Las Vegas who specialize in trademark law. When I asked him if it was over his head, he said he wouldn't answer.

Little matter. Morrison & Foerster are trademark law experts, and the LVCVA board seems destined to get the answers it wants on whether turning WHHSH over to R&R was the right thing to do. And, in the meantime, the lawyers can move toward preventing others from lessening the value of the trademark by altering its form and substance.

From the beginning, even R&R never realized what a huge cultural phenomenon "What happens here, stays here" was going to be. If anybody had, they probably would have done a lot of things differently, including seeking out expert legal advice long before it came down to chasing topless bars and underwear manufacturers who didn't think it would be a problem to use a form of the phrase.

So, now that the LVCVA board is in an introspective mood, I'm wondering if it's time for members to look at the question that Bill Weidner of Las Vegas Sands Inc. brought up in Singapore a few weeks ago: Is it fair to use the revenue from room taxes to operate a convention center that competes in the Las Vegas market?

When the Las Vegas Convention Center was the only game in town, it was easy to see the wisdom of using tax dollars to build, maintain and operate a massive trade-show floor that could accommodate the world's largest exhibitions.

But now that the Sands Expo Center, the Mandalay Bay Convention Center and even the MGM Grand Conference Center and the new facility at the Rio are in place, is it time for the LVCVA board to step back and look at how fair it is to the resorts that invest millions of dollars in infrastructure to have their own customers subsidizing competition?

It was surprising that Weidner took on the LVCVA in Singapore, where his company is in the thick of the competition to develop one of two integrated resorts approved in that city. What did the Singaporean government officials in attendance think of his bashing their quasi-government "partners" who market the city of Las Vegas?

Weidner, of course, ranted about the LVCVA's marketing strategies as well and doesn't care for the LVCVA partnership.

As long as the LVCVA is clearing the air about its slogan, it may as include everything that is on the public's mind.

In other tourism news:

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported last week that Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport has begun a new tactic in the new Battle of Texas, the fight over the Wright Amendment.

The Wright Amendment prevents McCarran International Airport market leader Southwest Airlines from offering nonstop flights from its Dallas Love Field home base to Las Vegas and several other destinations that aren't in states adjacent to or in Texas.

The newspaper reported that three busloads of DFW staffers stood outside Love Field over the Fourth of July weekend and proclaimed that the airport wants Southwest to offer flights from its facility. They encouraged passengers to lobby Southwest to adopt the idea.

The strategy isn't likely to work, since Southwest says it keeps its prices down by using airports that aren't as expensive to use, but are still close by. That's why they fly into Midway Airport instead of Chicago's O'Hare, an airport on Long Island instead of New York City and Providence, R.I., and Manchester, N.H., instead of Boston.

Richard N. Velotta covers tourism for In Business Las Vegas and its sister publication, the Las Vegas Sun. He can be reached at (702) 259-4061 or by e-mail at velotta@lasvegassun.com.