Editorial: Zoning pact may still fizzle

The lack of consistency in zoning has created headaches for valley residents, especially for those in the booming northwest. This frustration often is caused by local governments' inability to stick to their master plans. There also have been a number of instances where local governments rezone land for commercial development that isn't compatible with adjoining neighborhoods, but do so anyway because the residential areas sit just across the city-county border in a different political jurisdiction.

City and county officials believe, however, that these zoning loopholes may be eliminated following a tentative agreement reached between Las Vegas and Clark County last week. The County Commission approved a plan, which the Las Vegas City Council will vote on later, that proponents say will offer sensible zoning. Under the agreement that covers the northwest, the city and county will amend their master plans so there will be a single "seamless" plan that will encourage compatible zoning, whether you live in the city or the county. The plan also attempts to make it more difficult to change the land use guide, requiring a supermajority vote of the commission -- three-fourths -- before it can be undone.

This proposal was touted by elected officials as a breakthrough, but there still were skeptics. Louise Ruskamp, a resident of the Tule Springs development, said it will be "business as usual" under this pact. And as the Sun's Adrienne Packer pointed out in a story about the plan, in the last six months the County Commission has approved 43 of 44 nonconforming zone change requests. No matter what structure you put in place, if the officials themselves don't carry out its intent, it will have no teeth.

The fact is that the Las Vegas City Council and the Clark County Commission already could have brought about seamless zoning -- and could have precluded the need for new rules -- if in the past they would have just taken into consideration the impact their decisions would have on residents of other municipalities. For that matter, if someone genuinely wanted airtight consistency in zoning, the answer is relatively simple: government consolidation. After all, if we have a city-county police department and valleywide services for water, flood control and mass transportation, why shouldn't there be just a single city-county government body dealing with zoning? Indeed, if this latest plan doesn't produce common sense zoning decisions, expect a renewed call for government consolidation in this area, too.

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