Developer goes to court to seek info on college

Valerie Miller

Monday, Oct. 4, 1999 | 11:44 a.m.

As a committee studied the possibility of a four-year state college in Henderson over the weekend, the developer of a movie studio that was denied permission to build in the Wagon Wheel Industrial Park has filed court papers to force city officials to say whether the industrial park is the site they have in mind for a college.

Studio Enterprises, Inc., which earlier this year dropped plans to build Black Mountain Studios on the approximately 80-acre site near U.S. 95 and Wagon Wheel Drive, sought the disclosure as part of a lawsuit against the city to obtain portions of the site.

Doris Keating withdrew her application for the first phase of the studio -- a planned-unit development on 20 acres in the southwest corner of the park -- in June after a tentative map was denied. Neighbors had fought the project, citing traffic and crowd concerns.

Keating's company still owns the 20 acres and has sued the city to purchase the remaining 60-plus acres.

Henderson Mayor Jim Gibson said the Wagon Wheel Industrial Park is not being considered for the college. The site, he said, "has never been looked at by me, ever." The site wouldn't have been feasible, he said, because of its size.

"It's too small. We would need 200-plus acres for this (college)."