Clark County to receive long-awaited clarity on building code regulations

Wednesday, March 22, 2000 | 10:33 a.m.

Clark County staffers are working to clarify and simplify the outdated tangle of rules governing new construction in the unincorporated areas of the Las Vegas Valley that have given suburban homeowners fits when installing backyard spas and thrown a monkey wrench into many of developers' plans.

The Clark County Comprehensive Planning Department has begun seeking public input on its draft rewrite of the zoning and development code. It is tabled as a discussion item today before the Clark County Commission.

The 600-page draft Unified Development Code is meant to streamline, simplify and consolidate rules now contained in Clark County statutes.

The rewrite is the first in the 54 years that the county has had zoning and development rules on the books, Lesa Coder, assistant director of Comprehensive Planning, said.

Coder said the rewrite will make the code easier to use for professionals -- developers, engineers and real estate agents -- as well as laymen -- homebuyers and homeowners who want to improve their property.

"Most of (the rule changes) seem to be long-needed," said Steve Holloway, executive vice president of Associated General Contractors, a Las Vegas trade organization. "It is time that the code was streamlined and standardized.

"It will make doing business easier," Holloway said.

"These things often end up reading like the IRS code after they've been written and amended over the years," agreed Rick Smith, president of the Southern Nevada Chapter of the National Association of Industrial and Office Properties.

The new code is "chock full of definitions" so people can understand, in lay terms, what a rule means, Coder said. In many cases, the new code includes illustrations with the text to take the guess work out of interpreting the text.

The new code also has many cross-referenced charts and step-by-step easy guides to work through what would and would not be allowed.

The county staff has included these fundamental proposals: