The proposal was approved by the state Gaming Commission places the firm under the guidance of a new board and Tropicana Chief Executive Scott Butera, and excludes owner William Yung III.
"We don't take any advice or direction from him," Butera told regulators who asked about Yung's involvement. "He's anxious to get this resolved and move on."
An affiliate of Yung's hotel company Columbia Sussex Corp., Tropicana, had been under his direct control. The changes follow Tropicana Entertainment's restructuring filing.
Upgrades to the company's Tropicana hotel-casino on the Strip in Las Vegas and other properties would be done "prudently," Butera said. Positive employee-management relations are vital now, and a big factor in ensuring that will be ratification of a new contract with Tropicana employees.
Butera reached a tentative deal on a contract with the powerful culinary and bartenders unions covering 750 Trop employees, who have been laboring through a contract extension since May 2007.
Commission Chairman Peter Bernhard said oversight by regulators will provide "several layers and tiers of control." He also said the company's new management plans should prevent a "brain drain" of key staffers needed to carry out those plans.
The new managing board is headed by restructuring banker Thomas Benninger.
Tropicana Entertainment has been trying to restructure part of a nearly $3 billion debt load, which stems largely from its $2.1 billion buyout of Aztar Corp. in 2007.
There are offices for the firm stretching across the U.S., from Crestview Hills, Ky., to Las Vegas. The company's other Nevada properties include the Horizon and MontBleu hotel-casinos on Lake Tahoe's south shore; and the River Palms and Tropicana Express resorts in Laughlin, on the Colorado River.
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