NBA expansion, federal science cuts and Super Bowl 63 eyed for Las Vegas

The Daily Rundown – March 26, 2026

🔬 A new tally of last year’s cuts to federal agencies is in. Between 11% and 21% of scientific and other specialized positions were eliminated in states across our region.

Prospect Partners, a consulting group made up of former federal employees, reviewed Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, data. They tracked the exodus of federal workers through 2025, including experts who specialize in areas ranging from plant physiology to microbiology.

Andrea Delgado is co-author of the report and a partner with the firm. She said the work of these specialists can be underappreciated. Entomologists, a branch of zoology that focuses on insects, for example, are needed after unseasonably warm winter spells ahead of what could be an intense wildfire season. Hear the full story by the Mountain West News Bureau’s Yvette Fernandez here.

🏀 The NBA’s board of governors voted unanimously Wednesday to accept bids for expansion teams in Las Vegas and Seattle. Offers are expected to range from $7 billion to $10 billion, with the teams starting play in the 2028-29 season. The league will review the bids over the next several months. A potential vote by the board of governors to approve them could come toward the end of the year. Approval would expand the league to 32 teams. The last NBA expansion was in 2004, when a team was added in Charlotte, North Carolina.

⚖️ Equal Pay Day has come around again. The annual observance marks how far into the new year women must work to make what men earned in the previous year. This year, it’s March 26, a day later than it was in 2025. That’s because, for the second year in a row, the gender pay gap in the U.S. has widened.

According to the most recent data from the Census Bureau, women working full time, year-round now earn 81 cents for every dollar men earn. That’s down from 83 cents a year ago and 84 cents the year prior. It’s the first consecutive widening of the wage gap since the 1960s, says Deborah Vagins, director of Equal Pay Today, a national coalition that organizes not just one, but nine annual observances marking equal pay days for different groups of women. Hear the full story by NPR’s Andrea Hsu here.

🧪 One Nevada company might benefit from the global fertilizer supply shortage. According to estimates, as much as a quarter to a third of the world’s nitrogen fertilizer exports normally transit through the Strait of Hormuz. The strait has been blocked since the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran. Exports of sulfur, used in fertilizer production, have also been severely restricted.

However, Nevada Organic Phosphate says the fertilizer it produces in Nevada does not use sulfur. The company’s Murdock Mountain project in eastern Elko County is the only large-scale organic sedimentary phosphate extraction site in North America.

💡 Clark County is fighting the theft of copper wire from streetlight poles by replacing it with aluminum wire, KVVU-TV reports. Poles where the copper wire had been stolen now bear a sign reading, “Notice: Aluminum Wire Only.” Thieves take the copper wire and sell it to scrap yards, leaving entire streets without lights. The county has passed laws limiting those sales. Clark County Commission Chairman Michael Naft says the county is also making it more difficult to get into the poles. Repairs and replacements have cost the county millions of dollars.

David Becker

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FR170737 AP

🏈 Las Vegas is now expected to host Super Bowl 63 in 2029. According to The New York Times, the NFL is slated to make it official with a vote at league meetings in Arizona next week. Super Bowl 58 boosted Las Vegas Strip revenue in 2024. A 2029 return would likely similarly boost tourism activity and the local economy.

Record visitor spending benefited major resort companies significantly. Las Vegas hosted approximately 330,000 guests for the game. Net visitor spending reached about $606 million during that time, and the total economic impact for the city hit $1 billion.

Part of these stories are taken from KNPR’s daily newscast segment. To hear more daily updates like these, tune in to 88.9 KNPR FM.