Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: Mining claims holding land hostage not new in Nevada

Friday, May 1, 1998 | 10:45 a.m.

YOU HAVE HEARD that some things in life change so much they remain the same. Today, let's take a look a something in Nevada that never changes: the use of mining claims to demand high prices for land that other people hope to build on and develop.

Recent court action by the Del Webb builders shows that there are mining claims and local lands with questionable mineral assets being used to put pressure on people who have purchased the land for building. In the Webb case, the land in Henderson appears to have had mining claims made for the purpose of speculating that the area would sometime become valuable for the building of homes. This is exactly what the Arizona-based corporation intends to do, but those mining claims of no real value on this land are holding up their building project. Those mining-claim holders are now moving to make a profit before allowing Webb to build on the land the corporation owns.

Is this kind of extortion new to Clark County or Nevada? No, 44 years ago, SUN publisher Hank Greenspun, in this column, wrote: "At least 90 percent of the land around here, upon which filings for homesites have been made, contains as much valuable mineral deposits as you can put into an eyetooth. By the same token, the commercial value of the gravel on much of this land is, for all purposes, worthless and useless.

"Why, then, is every one of the 147 sections in nine townships of Clark County plastered with mining claims? Elementary, my dear Watson. Land in the county is becoming more valuable with each succeeding day. Our population is expanding. The Chamber of Commerce tells us we are 'America's fastest growing city,' and I for one believe them. Homes can't go up fast enough.

"It is fairly obvious, then, that many of the mining claims have been entered not only for their nuisance value, but because a mining claimant may make application to purchase his 20-acre claim after he has done yearly assessment work ($100 a year) for five years.

"Under this arrangement with Uncle, the 'miner' need not prove up the land with an expensive habitable dwelling. He need but sit tight while the land around him doubles and redoubles in value. His take is 20 acres, while the homesiter is limited to five acres and, in many cases where the land is 'close in,' to an acre and a quarter."

That was more than four decades in the past when a large number of people were having their homesites challenged by others holding mining claims. Hank, and one of his favorite writers, Lee Fisher, took up their cause. The SUN publisher had the foresight and vision to see the Clark County of today.

A young attorney, Mort Galane, stepped forward to take the case of the homesiters at no cost. At that time, it was referred to as Homesiters vs. Crocus, and Fisher today recalls in his "Live -- From Las Vegas" that "In the Crocus case, as with all the controversial land claims, it made no difference who had filed first -- the mining claimant or the homesiter. According to Galane, the test of validity of a mining claim was solidly grounded in the tenet of 'discovery.' He argued that it was necessary a miner not only discover a valuable mineral deposit on the public lands, but prove that it would pay a prudent man to mine his discovery.

"Galane also pointed out that it would be extremely difficult to prove that sand and gravel could be 'discovered' on the Mojave Desert, any more than salt water could reasonably be said to have been 'discovered' in the Pacific Ocean.

"It was this premise that he hammered home in the pleadings before the various courts. If the premise was found to be valid by the judges, the Crocus mining claim to the Spruners' public land was ab initio -- invalid. ..."

Homesiters vs. Crocus was to become Everett Foster, et al., appellants vs. Fred A. Seaton, Secretary of the Interior, appellee, and was decided for the homesiters in the U.S. Court of Appeals, District of Columbia, Oct. 22, 1959.

Much has changed in Nevada since 1954, but the use of mining claims to make a profit from anything but mining continues even today.