Ruling expected today in Rio golf dispute

District Judge Mark Gibbons is expected to rule today whether homeowners around the Seven Hills Golf Course in Henderson will get to dig out their golf clubs and walk around the corner to tee off.

Frustrated and irate homeowners, who envisioned that life in their golf-course community would include access to the course, along with several developers, who built and sold homes based on access to the course, are suing the Rio hotel-casino, which now owns the course.

At stake in the trial could be millions of dollars, including the Rio's admitted $33 million investment.

The Rio wants to restrict the course's use to casino high-rollers and other hotel guests.

Gibbons already had ordered that the course stay open to the public pending this week's trial. While the Rio complied with the judge's order, homeowners claimed access was limited and virtually closed to the public because the resort charged $300 greens fees. They contend that any reduced access to the course diminishes the value of their homes.

Mitch Stallard, who was in charge of marketing parcels of the Seven Hills development to homebuilders from 1995 through 1997, admitted Thursday he routinely told the builders that the course would be a high-end, daily-fee public facility.

He also testified, however, that when pressed by homebuilders for guarantees that residents would get access, he told them the master developer, Silver Canyon Partners, could give no such guarantees in writing.

Stallard, who now lives in Tucson, Ariz., said that while he believed the course would be open to the public, he also believed the owners of the course could do whatever they wanted, including making it a private facility.

Lynde Selden, attorney for a group of homeowners, complained that his clients bought houses after being given "disclosure statements" listing the golf course -- yet to be completed at that point -- as a public facility.

Developers complained that they bought parcels within the master-planned community and built projects that they sold to people looking for a "golfing lifestyle."

When the original golf-course developer ran out of money in 1995, the Rio stepped in to salvage the project and eventually assumed full ownership.

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