Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Vote looms on zoning bill for Red Rock

A bill that would freeze zoning on land surrounding Red Rock Canyon, including a gypsum mine where 2,400 homes have been proposed, could reach the Assembly floor for a final vote this week, its primary backer says.

Senate Bill 358, introduced by Sen. Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, would prohibit the County Commission from changing the zoning to allow more than the current one home on 2 acres. Titus said she expected the bill, which passed the Senate unanimously, to reach the Democratic-controlled Assembly floor this week.

Assemblyman Mark Manendo, D-Las Vegas, said the bill would be voted on by his Government Affairs Committee today, and he expected it to pass. It would then move to the floor.

More than 1,000 people packed the Sawyer State Office Building on Saturday to give legislators an earful on the Red Rock bill.

Developer Jim Rhodes, who hopes to turn the James Hardie Gypsum Mine on Blue Diamond Hill southwest of Las Vegas into a residential development, brought six chartered busloads of supporters to the hearing.

"Some of the people volunteered to come here, some are being paid," Rhodes said at the special meeting of the Assembly Government Affairs Committee.

Before the hearing began, shouting matches broke out in the meeting room, in the halls and on the elevator. Opponents of the development proposal say the area should remain free of houses.

"This bill is not about a choice between a mine and a development, it's about saving Southern Nevada's crown jewel," Titus said.

Rhodes has advertised in the two Las Vegas daily newspapers and on television offering tours of the 80-year-old gypsum mine site.

Titus was critical of the tours, saying they reminded her of Energy Department-sponsored tours of Yucca Mountain, the proposed high-level nuclear waste repository.

"You see what they want you to see, you hear what they want you to hear, like Yucca tours," she said.

Attorney Steve Morris, representing Rhodes, said the bill would usurp local authority of the Clark County Commission, which should have the final say in what happens to the land.

"We acquired the property because we thought that we could vary the density," Morris said. "This bill deprives us of making that argument to the county commission."

Rhodes contends the area's natural beauty has already been marred by the mining operation and that a housing development would be an improvement. The project is under fire because it would be bordered on three sides by the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area.

Last year the commission included Blue Diamond Hill on its list of sensitive lands that should be purchased by funds raised when the Bureau of Land Management auctions federal parcels.

On Dec. 3, 2002 the commission added 15 areas to its list for purchase, including the gypsum mine. The vote was 6-0, with Commissioner Yvonne Atkinson-Gates absent. Those voting in favor were Chip Maxfield, Bruce Woodbury, Dario Herrera, Myrna Williams, Erin Kenny and Mary Kincaid Chauncey.

Although Rhodes said escrow closed on the land on March 21, 2003, he told the committee Saturday that he had not paid attention to the earlier commission meetings, read commission or county planning agendas or tracked the discussion of sensitive lands process at all.

Jeff van Ee, a 30-year Las Vegas resident, said it would be best if Clark County purchased the hill and used it for recreation purposes.

In addition, he said the slope of the hill is steep and the gypsum in the soils could cause houses to crumble.

Other old mines in the Grand Canyon and Death Valley were not developed, van Ee said.

"Can you imagine the public outcry if a developer went into the south rim of the Grand Canyon to build homes?" he said.

University of Nevada, Las Vegas biologist Brett Riddle said a community on top of the hill with homes, shopping centers, gas stations and utilities would disrupt the ecological integrity of the area.

"I know, because I work in the Mojave Desert for a living," Riddle said. "Mr. Rhodes has proposed a significant urban development into this ecological neighborhood, an irreversible violation of its integrity, stability and beauty."

Karen Hunt, a certified accountant and a member of the Sierra Club's Southern Nevada Group, said that based on an old proposal by developer John Laing, which was withdrawn, it would take seven miles of water pipeline at $1 million a mile to bring drinking supplies to any development on the hill.

For at least two pumping stations, the total cost of the water supply system was estimated at $25 million, she said.

"Who's going to pay for all of this?" she asked.

After the meeting, Rhodes said he had not completed the design of water and sewer lines and had not estimated how much it would cost to bring water and sewer lines to hilltop homes.

Jeanne Sharp Howerton, who said she was Rhodes' sixth grade math teacher at West Charleston Elementary School (now Howard Wasden), scolded the man she said is her former pupil.

"When I was teaching you to add, subtract, multiply and divide, I never expected that 30 years later you would use those skills to divide the land on Blue Diamond Hill, multiply the number of houses that could be built there, add to Red Rock Canyon visual pollution, noise pollution, light pollution, traffic pollution and garbage pollution, thus subtracting from the beauty and magic of the entire area," said Howerton, a member of the Las Vegas Astronomical Society.

Howerton went on to explain that 5,400 homes with roughly 14,310 people living in them would be a few hundred less than Boulder City.

"These 14,310 people would make this housing development the 10th biggest city in the state of Nevada, ranking behind greater Las Vegas, Reno, Henderson, North Las Vegas, Sparks, Carson City, Pahrump, Elko and Boulder City," Howerton said.

Rhodes disputed Howerton's contention that she taught him math.

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