Wednesday, May 07, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

RHODES' PROPERTY: County pursues land

Commission seeks to use federal money

Mary Walker and Dennis Olson take in the view of the Las Vegas Valley during a tour of Jim Rhodes' land near Red Rock Canyon. Photo by John Gurzinski. Click above for enlarged image. Graphic by Mike Johnson.

All eyes are on developer Jim Rhodes after the Clark County Commission on Tuesday supported a plan to acquire 2,400 acres Rhodes owns next to Red Rock Canyon by using tens of millions of dollars in federal money.

The proposal is supported by the state's U.S. senators, the Sierra Club, residents in the Red Rock community of Blue Diamond and a state lawmaker, but the deal is off unless Rhodes agrees to sell the land he bought in March for $53.8 million.

Rhodes could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Dean Walker, director of land development for Rhodes Homes, said Rhodes wants to develop "affordable housing" on the site but is willing to listen to the county's offer.

But earlier in the day, while giving a tour of the land, Walker said the company bought the land to develop, and that is still the intent.

If necessary, Rhodes is willing to comply with current zoning requirements that allow one home for every two acres, Walker said. He said the likely result would be multimillion dollar homes on the acreage.

The county is prohibited by federal law from offering more than market value for Rhodes' land as determined by an appraiser.

"Jim's first choice is to build a community. It's his first choice, and that's why he bought the land," Walker said. "Jim wants to be able to build affordable housing for teachers, firefighters ... He wants to build homes so that the average valley resident could afford it."

The 1998 Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act allows local government agencies to use federal money from government land sales to acquire environmentally sensitive land from a willing seller.

Though the county in December could not persuade the federal Bureau of Land Management to acquire the land Rhodes later bought, the latest proposal is more viable because it is backed by Sens. John Ensign, R-Nev., and Harry Reid, D-Nev., county officials said.

"I am really happy we are doing this. It is long overdue," Commission Chairwoman Mary Kincaid-Chauncey said. "I am glad our senators are getting involved at the federal level."

Rhodes' property, much of which has been ripped up by mining operations that date to the 1920s, is worthy of nomination as environmentally sensitive land under the Lands Management Act, county administrators said.

The area is the home of the Blue Cholla, an endangered cactus that lives only on Rhodes' property atop Blue Diamond Hill.

Also, the land is on a ridge between Red Rock Canyon and the Las Vegas Valley, and development there would interrupt scenic views of Red Rock from most parts of the valley, according to a report from county staff.

The appraisal process the BLM requires the county to use to determine the value of Rhodes' land can take as long as 18 months.

Walker declined to say whether Rhodes would hold up development plans while an appraisal is under way.

The nearly $22,500 per acre that Rhodes paid is slightly more than the per-acre value placed on land that the Howard Hughes Corp. owns next to Red Rock and is proposing to swap with the BLM.

An appraisal in June on the Hughes land put the value of its 1,082 acres at $24.1 million, $22,273 per acre, according to the appraisal.

Review-Journal writer Adrienne Packer contributed to this report.