Tuesday, May 13, 2003
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

COLUMN: Steve Sebelius

You've got to give developer Jim Rhodes -- or, more properly, one of his public-relations consultants -- credit for coming up with a good line in the controversy over turning that gypsum mine atop Blue Diamond Hill into a mini-Summerlin: "A mine is a terrible thing to waste."

The slogan was hanging from one of the RVs that Rhodes used to serve up breakfast for the scores of people who were bused in for Saturday's hearing in Las Vegas before the Assembly Government Affairs Committee. The hearing was held to consider Senate Bill 358, state Sen. Dina Titus' bill that would limit zoning on the parcel overlooking Red Rock Canyon to one home per two acres. Many Rhodes supporters wore T-shirts emblazoned with the slogan as they filled the main hearing room and an overflow room to capacity, a tactic clearly designed to crowd out Titus' supporters.

You've got to give them credit, because outside of a couple salient points made by Rhodes' erudite attorney, Steve Morris, it was Team Rhodes' only good line.

Morris did yeoman's work poking holes in the "save Red Rock" mantra by showing photos of the pristine canyon and contrasting them with the scarred gypsum mine site. "This is the Red Rock that we want to preserve," Morris said, gesturing to the photos of the canyon. "This is the Red Rock that Dina Titus and SB358 want to preserve. This is the mine site." Left unsaid by Morris, of course, is the fact that the project would be visible from those pristine vistas on the other side of the canyon.

And Morris scored some points when he read a letter Titus had sent to the Clark County Commission, saying she wanted to limit zoning on the Rhodes parcel in order to keep the value of the land low, thus making Rhodes more of a "willing seller" when the county and federal government come calling with an offer to buy. "As a lawyer, that says to me, 'This is how we put pressure on this guy to sell,' " Morris said. It looks that way to us non-lawyers, too.

Then again, Titus could have urged the commission or the state to seize the blighted land via eminent domain, and fight out the price in court. She didn't do that, and neither did the county.

Aside from those points, however, Saturday belonged to Titus and her supporters, no matter how many ringers Rhodes managed to pack into the Grant Sawyer State Office Building.

SB358 takes land-use planning authority away from the Clark County Commission, Morris argued. It short-circuits Rhodes' ability to go before commissioners (or at least those commissioners whose employers Rhodes has yet to hire) and ask for a zoning change to build 5,500 homes, or 2.5 per acre. (That's still far lower than the eight homes per acre that Clark County defines as "low density," Morris noted.)

But that argument had been undercut before it was made. After Titus testified in favor of her bill with a flourish, she introduced Clark County Commissioner Myrna Williams, who said the county officially favors SB 358. The bill, said Williams, "is consistent with long-established policies of Clark County with respect to Red Rock Canyon."

So even if SB358 is a state intrusion into local zoning matters (which it clearly is), the county doesn't seem to mind. And who should have more standing to object -- Rhodes, who wants something from the deal, or the officials elected to lead the county? Commissioners have been known to jealously guard their authority in the past. This time around, they're standing shoulder to shoulder with Titus.

Moreover, Commissioner Mark James is working on a local ordinance that would mirror the zoning restrictions in Titus' bill. That means that even if Rhodes did come before the commission to make his case for denser zoning, he'd be told no, an answer that's perfectly within the county's discretion. The argument that Rhodes should still be able to make his case is thus moot, since the county is in the process of making its preferences known.

In fact, it was when James decided to sponsor the zoning-limitation ordinance that Rhodes sued, charging that the new commissioner had served as Rhodes' attorney and was creating a conflict of interest by coming out against the Rhodes project. The conflict didn't seem to bother Rhodes when James -- by Rhodes' own testimony -- was allegedly working behind the scenes to advance a rezoning proposal. Is it possible that by "fair hearing" Rhodes really means "a hearing at which only those who support the project are allowed to vote, all others having been forced by conflicts to abstain"?

The members of the government affairs panel seemed receptive to the Titus message: "It has taken Mother Nature 600 million years to create Red Rock. It only takes one developer to destroy it, and one vote to save it. Please cast that vote." It appears they will do just that.

Steve Sebelius is a Review-Journal political columnist. His column runs Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. Reach him at 383-0283 or by e-mail at ssebelius@reviewjournal.com.