This article originally published March 13, 2009.
On March 2, 2004, more than 14,000 Hesperians turned out to vote on Measure X, which had been promoted as a referendum on a proposed casino to be built at Main Street and Interstate 15 by the Timbisha Shoshone tribe of Death Valley. Fifty-eight percent of voters approved the measure — which would have had the city accepting revenue from the casino in exchange for providing municipal services — after a divisive campaign that split the city in two.
But five years later, the only construction on the site is done by field mice.