Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2005 | 8:07 a.m.
A dozen years ago the Las Vegas Jaycees service club opened a mobile home park to provide affordable housing for valley seniors.
What started with good intentions has ended in a battle that went to the Legislature and District Court, which ousted the nonprofit group in late September.
"I was in shock, and I still am," said Jeff Margolin, former president of the park's governing board.
The struggle at the Las Vegas Jaycees Senior Citizens Mobile Home Community, 5805 W. Harmon Ave., is unique -- it's the only nonprofit mobile home park in the valley, and the case has generated so much controversy it could discourage similar efforts.
The Jaycees opened the 88-acre park near West Harmon and Jones Boulevard in 1993 but ran into problems in 2003, when complaints from the residents went to the Legislature, which passed a bill diluting the group's control of the park. The Jaycees sued and ultimately lost.
On Sept. 22 District Judge Stewart Bell ordered the Jaycees to relinquish all control after efforts to find a compromise failed.
The biggest disappointment, Margolin said, is that the Jaycees were poised to open up other low-rent mobile home parks, which could have helped alleviate the area's affordable-housing crisis.
"The real shame is that there are not going to be any other parks built, and no more help to seniors," Margolin said.
Assemblywoman Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas, championed an amendment to state law in 2003 for nonprofit mobile home parks. The law calls for a governing board comprised of three representatives of the nonprofit group, three elected residents and three members appointed by the County Commission.
Buckley said she submitted the bill after receiving hundreds of complaints from residents of the seniors-only park, which is believed to be the only one in the state owned by a nonprofit group.
"In those 11 years, I received more complaints about the Jaycees mobile home park than from all my other constituents combined," she said.
The Jaycees fought the new law, saying it was unconstitutional. Bell didn't agree and not only upheld the law but kicked the Jaycees off the governing board.
Margolin said Buckley was influenced by a vocal minority that simply thought it could run the community better.
"The only criticism was that they were not in charge," he said.
Margolin said in 13 years the Jaycees had kept the park in healthy financial shape while raising rent and utility costs only slightly, from the original $167 per month to the current $217 a month, which includes cable television.
The effort to build the Jaycees mobile home park, which is home to nearly 700 residents living in 466 homes, began in 1978 when a small trailer park called Kelly's Camp was condemned, leaving residents with nowhere to go.
Park founder Deecie Shelley led a 15-year campaign with the Jaycees to create a community for seniors that would be nonprofit to keep rents low, and situated on Bureau of Land Management acreage with a 99-year lease to ensure residents would not be forced to leave.
Although the Jaycees still own the park's assets, including its infrastructure and a reserve fund containing more than $100,000, the new governing board controls how that money is spent.
The mobile home park's new governing board president, Spring Valley Town Board Member George Kuck, said it was the Jaycees' unwillingness to cooperate with the new law that got the group ousted from the park it founded.
Kuck, who was appointed by the Clark County Commission, said it is appropriate for the county to have representatives on the park's governing board because it sits on public land.
One fear residents had was that the Jaycees would use reserves from their community's coffers to help finance other parks, Kuck said.
There is nothing stopping Margolin from opening another nonprofit park, he added, but it will have to be separate from the Jaycees park.
"He wanted to open it on the backs of the residents of this park," Kuck said.
Not all residents agree.
Jean Glore and Gene Lidgett -- both of whom were involved with the original governing board -- said Margolin was doing an excellent job, and that Buckley exaggerated the park's problems to get her amendment passed.
"This park has run beautifully," Glore said. "It has had no financial problems."
The Jaycees sued the state, and Bell was at first hesitant to rule for or against them.
Kuck said Bell gave both parties several months to work out a compromise. There were two boards during that time -- the Jaycees and the board created by the new law. The boards operated independently, with the Jaycees having the final say on decisions.
But Bell also decided that if the new board was unhappy with the working relationship, he would reverse his ruling and oust the Jaycees, which he did in September.
During the trial period, Margolin and Kuck jockeyed for leverage of the park, alternately filing resident agent change documents with the secretary of state's office.
"That was almost a game that was going on," Margolin said. "It was ridiculous."
Despite their differences, both sides agreed that the county needs more affordable housing, and that nonprofit mobile home parks are a good way to meet that need.
Gerald Ernst, a resident of Tropicana Palms mobile home park who is trying to work with the county to open a second nonprofit community, said he will take a lesson from the Jaycees park situation and avoid ownership disputes by giving residents more input.
"We are a second generation from what the Jaycees park is," Ernst said.
J. Craig Anderson can be reached at 259-2320 or at [email protected].
archive
