Thursday, July 27, 2000 | 9:27 a.m.
She equates the eminent domain taking of the Carol Pappas land downtown with the plight of the Desert Inn homeowners. While "Big Business" is indeed involved, the methods employed are far different. This difference is based on choice, and should be explained.
In the Pappas case the city took her land without her consent -- wrongfully say the courts -- to turn it over to private business. Pappas did not have a choice. It could be said, however, that the city did have a choice, did not need to take her land, and could have accomplished its goal of building an adequate parking garage (today still sitting half empty) on land it properly acquired through good-faith bargaining.
But the city had this brand new power to take private property for other private use -- and as has been determined by trial -- used it recklessly. Just too much power in inexperienced hands.
In the Desert Inn cases, these homeowners on the golf course do have a choice. They do not need to sell.
They are free to live there indefinitely, only not with the same amenities they enjoy today, with beautifully landscaped fairways to view out their windows and from their back yards.
Instead, they are destined to look forward to construction of perhaps the city's tallest hotel structures to begin looking over onto them, which should the developer so choose, will go on with or without them.
So, their choice is to either watch a likely unpleasant future unfold from the discomfort of their back yards, or to move on to something elsewhere with a better chance of keeping their pristine surroundings for a longer period than they have today.
In the Las Vegas Valley growth is inevitable. We should fight it when it violates our rights, as has Pappas, but do our best to accommodate that inevitability when otherwise spinning our wheels.
LEO D. TAFOLLA
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