Golf course ordered to submit runoff plan

Jeffrey Libby

Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2002 | 11:03 a.m.

Owners of a high-rollers' golf course in the foothills of the River Mountains have until Nov. 15 to submit plans to characterize and control water runoff that is creating a fledgling desert wetland, the state Division of Environmental Protection said Tuesday.

In a two-page letter faxed from Carson City, state environmental engineer Darrell Rasner told Park Place Entertainment, owners of Cascata golf course, that the runoff greening a two-mile stretch of the Eldorado Valley south of the course's signature 400-foot waterfall is an illegal discharge.

"Anytime someone builds a golf course on the side of a hill, the water is going to break out somewhere," Rasner said in a phone interview with the Sun. "If that water doesn't meet drinking water standards and is something that could degrade water quality, then there's a problem and the liability is on them. How it got there, we don't care."

Rasner and other state environmental officials said stopping runoff could prove difficult. But Park Place will have to ensure that any water resurfacing in the desert southeast of the U.S. 93/95 interchange is not tainted by fertilizers or other potentially harmful chemicals, they said.

Park Place officials said tests conducted earlier this year as part of ongoing efforts to reduce runoff show water resurfacing below the course has much the same complexion as groundwater in the mountains above the course.

The tests conducted by an independent state-certified laboratory and by the Bureau of Mines found mostly salts in white calcified residues. The runoff was given a "non-detect" rating to tests for such hazardous metals as lead, mercury and arsenic, said Park Place spokeswoman Debbie Munch.

Park Place officials have been trying to find the source of the runoff and eliminate it. So far, Park Place has been able to limit, but not stop, the runoff, Munch said.

Two Las Vegas Valley scientists say continual heavy watering of the volcanic, mineral-rich rock that the golf course sits on typically produces measurable concentrations of hazardous metals commonly found in the water-driven mining industry. Such metals are regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency.

"With these types of mineral deposits you get signature metals -- mercury, arsenic, antimony, selenium. They're all hazardous metals," said Henderson geologist Scott McKeag, noting that the Nelson district, which borders the Colorado River to the south of the Eldorado Valley, has measurable levels of these naturally occurring minerals.

"The continued wetting of this property could re-mobilize these metals, and if you get a wetland developing, it could lead to wildlife kills," he said.

Gary Russell, a hydrologist in the Las Vegas office of the U.S. Geological Survey, was hesitant to predict whether the watering would produce harmful levels of hazardous trace elements, but said they probably should be measurable and "could become a concern."

"Nevada produces a lot of minerals. It's one of the nice things about the state. We have gold and silver," Russell said. "So it would not be unusual to see a variety of minerals, some of them good, some of them bad."

But even if the tests ordered by the state show harmful levels of hazardous metals, McKeag said, chemical treatments could eliminate or reduce threats to groundwater.

But if water keeps running into the desert, clean or not, the fledgling wetland of salt cedar, cattail and tall grasses will probably spread over more desert, state environmental officials say.

If such a habitat is established, the Army Corps of Engineers said an engineer from the St. George, Utah, office would be sent to inspect it.

"If there is a wetland being created, it's something we're interested in and going to request more information on," said Jim Taylor, spokesman for the Sacramento, Calif., district of the Army Corps.

Because Boulder City owns the land the 18-hole golf course sits on, it could be obligated by the Army Corps to continue watering the wetland after the lease expires and returns to city control. The lease runs through 2038 with three options of 10 years each.

"That's what, in 68 years?" Boulder City Mayor Bob Ferraro said. "It's a long way off.

"Honestly, I don't see any problem if water runs down and into the flat. If it wants to green up that area, so much the better. It couldn't be any better for the birds and the rabbits."

As for residents' concerns about the threat posed by water running under the highway interchange, Kent Cooper, spokesman for the Nevada Department of Transportation, said his agency has been monitoring the situation since the late 1990s.

"We've looked at the bridge structure and the ramp slopes and there is no degradation in any of that," Cooper said. "Right now there is no concern."