Housing project for residents of sunken North Las Vegas neighborhood gets city approval

The North Las Vegas City Council approved a new housing tract that would be built for residents of a sunken neighborhood.

Council members on Wednesday unanimously approved plans for a 93-lot subdivision along Carey Avenue just west of Martin Luther King Boulevard. The publicly funded development would provide new houses for residents of Windsor Park, a historically Black community nearby that for decades has grappled with widespread structural damage.

Developer Frank Hawkins said in an interview that he hopes to break ground this month.

“We just want a decent community built for us that we deserve,” Nancy Johnson, a longtime Windsor Park resident, told the City Council.

Johnson was one of several people who voiced support for the project at the meeting and talked about the neighborhood’s condition.

Windsor Park was built in the 1960s over geological faults, and its homes, roads and utilities started sinking decades ago after groundwater was pumped from an aquifer.

Van Collins told the council that he grew up in the neighborhood and that he wants to cry when he drives through it today.

“It’s very emotional,” he said.

‘Every low-down action that you took’

State Sen. Dina Neal, D-North Las Vegas, who introduced a bill in 2023 that finances the project, told the council that she wanted to thank the residents for maintaining their hope and perseverance.

She also voiced political grievances.

Neal told the council that she wanted to thank city officials for using city emails last year to talk about how they were going to “conspire, collude and plan against me during my campaign,” saying it made her believe deeper in her purpose.

She added that she wanted to thank them for digging into the refinancing of her home, as it created a deeper bond within the neighborhood.

“I want to thank you for every low-down action that you took,” Neal said, adding she found deeper courage to stand up for what she believed in and to keep fighting for the families.

The council members did not respond to her allegations.

Neal’s bill, called the Windsor Park Environmental Justice Act, allocated funding for the project and allows Windsor Park homeowners to exchange their houses for new ones in the nearby subdivision.

The Nevada Housing Division last year awarded the $37 million contract to Hawkins’ nonprofit affordable-housing firm, Community Development Programs Center of Nevada.

His firm acquired the project site in April for $9.9 million, property records show. The purchase included a nearly 1-acre parcel on Carey that was not part of the proposed subdivision, which spans about 18 acres.

The North Las Vegas Planning Commission gave the green light to the project last month.

Spending deadlines

Hawkins faces deadlines to spend money for the development.

The bulk of the project funding, at $25 million, was allocated from federal COVID relief funds that must be spent by the end of 2026 under the terms of his contract with the Housing Division.

But the remaining $12 million from the state had to be committed for expenditure before June 30 and spent by Sept. 15. Otherwise, any unspent funds from that pot of money will go back to Nevada’s general fund, state records show.

Under the terms of its contract, Hawkins’ firm has the right to secure additional funding from other sources.

Christine Hess, chief financial officer of the Housing Division, told lawmakers in May that more than $11 million had been spent on the project, all of which had been drawn from the COVID relief funds.

She indicated the spending total mostly consisted of the developer’s land purchase.

In this year’s legislative session, Neal tried to extend the state-money deadlines for the project and secure an additional $26 million from the state, but the measure fizzled out.

Contact Eli Segall at esegall@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0342.