Residents’ fight with industrial area will go to arbitration

Lisa Snedeker

Thursday, Oct. 29, 1998 | 12:09 p.m.

Calico Ridge home owners and industrial property owners are being sent to the arbitration table to resolve their differences over the area's future development.

That's what some 60 residents who attended Wednesday's Henderson Citizens Advisory Committee meeting discovered.

Committee Chairman Manny Gomez said the arbitration decision came after residents' land use proposal that was presented earlier this month was forwarded to the city attorney's office and the Department of Public Works.

"I was advised by the city attorney ... that her office is going to conduct some arbitration meetings between the Calico Ridge residential interests and the Calico Ridge industrial ownership interests," he said. "That area is out of our hands for the time being."

Following the arbitration meetings, Gomez said the plan would come back before the advisory committee and will be included in its final report to the City Council.

"If that (arbitration) goes as we hope it does, we will be a lot closer to resolving some of the difficulties that we have been discussing," Gomez said.

That includes the Calico Ridge Owners Association's plan for 61 acres of land currently zoned for industrial use, which borders the custom homes in Calico Ridge as closely as 20 feet in some areas.

The residents' plan strongly rejects any further industrial development in the Calico Ridge area, located between Lake Mead Drive and Olsen Street.

Instead the plan calls for the formation of a local improvement district, or LID, for the 61 acres in question to be developed into a natural desert habitat and recreational area to compensate for the lack of parks in Calico Ridge.

The concerns of Calico Ridge and surrounding residents aren't limited to aesthetics.

One of the potential developers of the land, Atlas Cold Storage, is proposing a 150,000-square-foot facility on 7 1/2 acres that would use large amounts of ammonia.