Sprint, the cellular telephone company that branded the Las Vegas Monorail’s centerpiece station at the Las Vegas Convention Center, is ending the partnership, according to a source with knowledge of the situation.

The source reported Sprint gave the monorail notice months ago that it would be pulling out of the arrangement, apparently because of low foot traffic through the station.

Ingrid Reisman, vice president of corporate communications for the monorail, told us she’d need to get “more information” about the matter, but couldn’t be reached for comment later Friday.

The monorail has suffered from poor ridership ever since it opened but was quickly forced to close due to mechanical problems. Even after those problems were fixed, the monorail has never met its ambitious ridership expectations, and has never carried enough riders to break even. Construction bonds are being repaid with “cash reserves” left over from the original borrowing. (Those bonds are now deep in junk status.)

The Sprint station was more than just a logo and a place to purchase telephones. The center also featured meeting rooms and innovative suggestions for using Sprint equipment and services in various businesses. While some monorail cars and stations have been “branded,” by different products or services, like Energy Star soft drinks or the travel website Vegas.com, the Sprint station was a cut above, designed to integrate marketing with an overall customer experience.
It’s unclear how much the monorail will lose in revenue as a result of Sprint’s decision to leave, which will be completed by June 1. the end of June. However, the monorail has been trying to make up in marketing dollars what it lacked in farebox revenue.

And, the move couldn’t come at a worse time for the monorail, which is trying to build support (and financial backing) to construct a leg to McCarran International Airport, so passengers can get to hotels without the use of taxicabs or rental cars.

Let’s just say we had our suspicions that state Sen. Dina Titus was going to abandon her safe seat in the state’s upper house and make a bid for Congress against U.S. Rep. Jon Porter when the state Democratic Party sent out its 12th news release, hinting at a “major announcement” on Thursday. But all doubt was erased when we showed up at her news conference and spied a sign on the lectern: “Dina Titus — U.S. Congress District 3.”

Way to give away the secret, people!

Anyway, we spotted plenty of Democratic dignitaries at the event, everybody from our favorite state senator of all time, Joe Neal, to Titus’s senate colleagues Steven Horsford, Terry Care, Mike Schneider, Maggie Carlton, Joyce Woodhouse and Valerie Weiner. Andrew Martin, the man who was running for Congress as a Democrat, showed up (he’s now going to challenge Chad Christensen for the Assembly) and David Parks, the assemblyman who today announced he’s running to replace Titus, came, too. Tessa Hafen, who challenged Porter in the district two years ago and came so very close to winning, was there, and Richard Perkins, the Henderson police chief and ex-Assembly speaker courted for the seat early on, sent telephone good wishes. (He was traveling.)

As always, however, you could tell more about who didn’t show up than who did. For example, we didn’t see U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley, or anybody connected to her, at the announcement. (See update below.) Henderson Mayor Jim Gibson, who works at City Hall within a nine-iron shot of the place Titus held her announcement, didn’t find time to make his way to the gathering, although a council colleague — Andy Hafen, Tessa Hafen’s father and a mayoral candidate himself — was there to lend support.

U.S. Sen. Harry Reid wasn’t there, but county commissioner son Rory Reid helped introduce Titus. Reid will no doubt be watching the race much more closely than usual this year, since Porter has for years been rumored to be a candidate against Reid in 2010. And since Titus blames Reid for denying her the chance to run for the county commission (the seat now held by Rory Reid, in fact), that’s delicious.

Titus covered all her demographic bases in her announcement — veterans (disabled Air Force vet Valerie Smith kicked things off), families (mom and activist Liz Carrasco spoke next), the Democratic establishment (Reid the Younger) and African-Americans (Horsford). And only Horsford really strained credulity when he said “The Nevada Democrats have always been a family.” (Somehow, we didn’t totally feel the love, nor did we notice tears on the faces of any returning state senator, any of whom is eligible for Titus’s old job.)

For her part, Titus slammed Bush, and Porter, by extension, saying he’s been a slave to the Bush agenda. (Porter, especially in the last two years, has been trying to find areas where he can put daylight between himself and an unpopular president, even avoiding showing up when Bush came to visit back in February.)

After saying she’s going to hold Porter accountable, Titus inexplicably said she didn’t want to make the race personal, even adding, “I like Jon Porter.” Not enough to not run against him, of course, or keep quiet about his affection for the Republican agenda. Hmmm, we wonder if that will be a campaign theme?

If we had to guess, we’d say that Titus will hammer Porter’s voting record on the war in Iraq, the minimum wage, reimportation of Canadian prescription drugs, student loan rates, the child-care tax credit, tax cuts for rich people, tax breaks for big oil companies and, oh, let’s say, veterans’ benefits. That’s just a guess, of course, based loosely on the fact that Titus mentioned all of that in her speech.

Titus mentioned her very first campaign slogan ever — “She thinks for herself and nobody owns her.” (Remember, that was back in 1989, and “unbought and unbossed” had already been used in 1972 by the groundbreaking Shirley Chisholm.) The same slogan applies this time around, Titus said. Right along with this one: “Jon Porter, George Bush: Brothers from Another Mother, Yo!”

(No, that wasn’t Titus’s idea. We came up with that one ourselves!)

UPDATE: Our deepest apologies: Someone far more observant than we wrote to correct us to say that Renee Aschoff was present at Titus’s kickoff, so we retract what we said about nobody associated with U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley being at the event.

Now with naked muchachas in bath tubs!