Private LV growth solutions promoted

Brian Seals

Thursday, Oct. 22, 1998 | 12:41 p.m.

The controversial "ring around the Valley" proposal is no longer on the Legislature's agenda, but the question of how to manage the Las Vegas Valley's growth remains.

That was the message Wednesday at the third-quarter home building Market Perspectives seminar sponsored by Marketing Solutions.

State Sen. Dina Titus and local real estate veteran Mark Doppe both agreed there is now a ring of sorts around the Valley thanks to a new federal land law sponsored by Rep. John Ensign and Sen. Richard Bryan.

The legislation calls for the Bureau of Land Management, whose land virtually encircles the Valley, to sell property at auction rather than dispose of it through land swaps. More importantly, it gives local governments authority to approve the sales.

While Titus and Doppe have sparred about the ring concept in the past, both agreed Wednesday it will take more than the BLM's boundary around the Valley to manage growth.

After all, problems still exist like deficient roads and a shortage of schools.

"This ring will not do anything to address that," Doppe said.

Doppe said the area needs to create a vision for itself and decide whether residents want more growth.

"We have opportunity now to say 'we want it to look like this,"' Doppe said.

That kind of push will have to come from the private sector, he said.

"I think it's going to have to come from private enterprise rather than local government," Doppe said.

Private enterprise would have the chore of selling growth management to the public.

The public has to be won over because elected officials tend to vote the wishes of the outraged neighbor rather than the infill developer, panelists said.

And infill development -- development of vacant property surrounded by urban development -- will be critical to managing growth. If there is a ring around the Valley, residents will to accept higher population density developments near their homes and higher land prices.

But there are elements of the federal lands bill Doppe said were preferable to the "ring" measure proposed during the last legislative session by Titus. For starters, it doesn't lock in a boundary at 20 years and places expansion in the hands of local, rather than state, governments.

While Titus's bill failed, she said she achieved her goal of getting land planning on the public agenda.

"I believe what we have to do now is talk about some of the good things we can do inside the boundary to improve our quality of life," Titus said.

Though she won't be carrying the ring bill to the Legislature next session, there will be growth-related bills considered.

"I think we need to look at regional planning in the valley," Titus said.

She said various localities are often at odds in their plans.

Titus will also sponsor a "smart growth" bill to provide state money to communities in compliance with the state land plans.

She also plans to introduce a bill to provide relief from litigation to developers who unknowingly begin projects on urban lands and then find a need for toxic cleanup.