Numerous changes proposed for new billboard ordinance

Thursday, Feb. 7, 2002 | 9:17 a.m.

The list of possible amendments to Clark County's still-untested new billboard rules is growing.

Clark County commissioners added seven new amendments to the controversial ordinance while taking away one. The commission introduced a total of 26 amendments during Wednesday's regular zoning meeting.

Commissioner Erin Kenny introduced five amendments proposed by the Nevada Outdoor Media Association, a billboard industry trade group.

Debate and voting on the amendments is scheduled for Feb. 20. The discussion is likely to be spirited.

Community activists were bitterly disappointed when a split commission on Dec. 5 adopted a new law governing the placement of billboards. The rules they adopted were proposed and written by representatives of the billboard industry.

The commission at the same meeting rejected a proposed compromise ordinance hammered out by the industry and community activists.

The vote sparked an ethics complaint against Commission Chairman Dario Herrera, who supported the industry-backed ordinance and whose wife is a consultant for the billboard industry.

Herrera said a provision of the Dec. 5 ordinance giving the final say to the commission over almost all new billboards prompted his support. The old law allows billboards to go unchallenged in the central commercial area along the Strip, which includes part of Herrera's district.

This way, his constituents have more protection, he said.

The Dec. 5 vote was supposed to end a year of acrimonious wrangling over the issue of where to allow billboards. But Commissioners Bruce Woodbury, Chip Maxfield, Myrna Williams and Yvonne Atkinson Gates, citing numerous problems with the hastily passed law, asked that the law be reworked.

Woodbury led the effort. Citing the interests of residents in his district and the city of Henderson, the former commission chairman wants to keep billboards away from an approved area along Interstate 215, the Las Vegas Beltway, east of Warm Springs Road.

The Dec. 5 law has never been formally enacted. The commission last month asked that it not be recorded -- a necessary step before it can take effect -- until the amendments are included.