Residents air doubts about plans to revive downtown

Jeffrey Libby

Thursday, Jan. 17, 2002 | 11:13 a.m.

About 60 residents of downtown Henderson listened quietly to a short presentation that was more than a year in the making. It detailed the final draft of plans to revitalize business on Henderson's downtrodden main drag -- Water Street.

Then, for about an hour, the convention center ballroom echoed with their complaints, impatience, confusion and an overwhelming sense of fear that the city was intent on buying their 1940s, government-built homes and tearing them down.

Arthur Harszy, a Henderson resident since 1953, wanted to know where his $279 in taxes for the redevelopment agency had been going for the past six years.

Erika Swapp raised her hand to say that for 4 1/2 years she had put off building a garage and planting trees at her downtown home -- she'd heard rumors, like many others, that the city was buying up homes.

Another woman complained that the Nebraska Street home she and her husband have owned for 25 years has lately been surrounded by homes purchased as rental properties by speculators hoping to be bought out by the city. Slumlords, she said.

At least one issue is clear.

"We need to come up with some way to counter these rumors because it sounds like they've kept people from planting trees and painting their houses," Mary Kay Peck, director of community development, said. "We want the downtown to be surrounded by vibrant houses. And we're not going to buy them, so spiff them up."

Cody Walker, an administrator with the redevelopment agency, said it was safe to say that the redevelopment agency has purchased enough property to keep planners busy for the next 10 years.

The rumors at least have a basis in fact. Since 1996, when the city formed the redevelopment agency with the goal of rebuilding 1,300 acres in the oldest part of the city, the agency has spent close to $5 million to purchase and tear down about 33 homes along Water Street.

The agency has also dabbled in about 10 market studies similar to the $164,000 study completed this month by Chicago-based Clarion Associates. The agency, however, has attracted little new business or investment.

But this time, they say, is different. The latest study provides a roadmap with specific long- and short-term plans, said Bob Wilson, director of the redevelopment agency.

This time, the map starts at Lake Mead Drive and Water Street, where the redevelopment agency plans to create a head-turning gateway for motorists.

"If you're driving down Lake Mead today, you don't have a lot of cues to turn on Water Street," Leslie Bethel, a partner with Clarion said. "Today you've got Staz's American Motorcycles, a re-use of a gas station. You've got the Best Western across the street. But you don't have anything that really grabs you."

The plan is for a unified theme, something with a slipstream 1940s industrial style -- Moderne -- according to Bethel.

Wilson said he has been talking with owners of both corner businesses and is working on plans to tear down some existing buildings and dress up others. Part of the funding will come from a facade improvement program with a $200,000 first-year budget. A $500,000 revolving loan program has also been funded and is in the planning stages. Once plans firm up there, Wilson wants to find developers to build on a 4.4-acre city parcel just south of the motel. The parcel was pieced together with 16 former house lots.

Plans also include putting utilities underground, widening sidewalks, cutting vehicle traffic to one lane in each direction and opening a civic plaza that is visible from the street.

Michael Holland, who has run Gold Casters Jewelry on Water Street for 19 years -- long enough to pierce ears for daughters of women who came in as young girls -- was one of the few business owners at the meeting. He also serves on the newly formed Downtown Business Association.

"With improvements comes more cost, and I actually like old Henderson the way it is. I've got all my bills paid. My landlord's never raised the rent in 14 years," he said. "If the city never did another thing I wouldn't care, but I guess people like progress."