Editorial: A sensible plan for zoning

The Las Vegas City Council shouldn't squander a rare chance to bring some order and reasonableness in making changes to its general plan.

As it stands now, homeowners are frustrated by the never-ending changes to the city's general plan, which is supposed to be used as a long-range design for development. The whole point of a general plan is to keep a city from being developed piecemeal, which ultimately results in incompatible uses.

But Clark County and the cities of Las Vegas and Henderson make changes to these general plans at nearly every zoning meeting. Las Vegas changed its general plan 71 times during 1997, frequently at the request of developers.

In an effort to make planning more sensible, and not require neighborhood residents to come in nearly every month to contest changes to the general plan, the city staff and a council subcommittee have recommended that these changes only be permitted twice a year in each ward.

Developers and homebuilders have opposed the measure, suggesting instead that general plan changes be limited to every month. They believe stricter limits would end up adding time to getting homes built, affecting their profits. They also say it might hamper their ability to keep up with the demand for new housing caused by growth.

But the city's plan to limit these changes may be in trouble. A vote on the matter was put off Monday by the City Council so the city staff could determine whether there might be so many general plan change requests that it could be impractical to address them all in just four meetings a year (under the plan, changes would be considered in two of the city's four wards at each meeting).

As the Sun's Ed Koch reported Tuesday, if a vote isn't taken at the Oct. 25 City Council meeting on the general plan proposal, the bill will die for lack of action. That would be terrible.

It's not fair for homeowners to have to constantly come in and fight changes to what is supposed to be a long-range planning guide. This is a situation where half a loaf is better than none.

The City Council should compromise and adopt a plan where the general plan in each ward can only be changed quarterly. Homeowners may not be in complete agreement -- and neither will the builders and developers -- but the city needs to start someplace in getting a handle on its general plan.

If, after time, a quarterly review is found to be insufficient, then the city can always change it to semiannually. A quarterly review can't be worse than the untenable situation homeowners face already.

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