Floyd Lamb zoo idea surprises council

Sito Negron

Thursday, Nov. 6, 2003 | 11:49 a.m.

A surprise proposal to turn Floyd Lamb State Park into a zoo popped up Wednesday, saw its shadow, and went back into the recesses of Las Vegas City Hall for more discussion.

During a discussion about whether city staff should continue talking to the state about eventually taking over the park, Ward 6 Councilman Michael Mack offered up an idea to place a "world-class" zoo at the park.

His colleagues on the council, with an abundance of caution, ended up directing staff to continue discussions with the state on the issue of taking over the park. As the zoo proposal was not posted on the agenda, it was not discussed much, and Mack said he would keep talking to the people making the proposal, media producers Mona and Ed Sher.

Their spokesman, Marvin Miller, said he could not be specific about the idea yet. "We'll be glad to peel off the layers of the onion" as discussions evolve, Miller said.

He did say that the Shers were willing to make a "substantial" investment in the project.

The Shers said their intent was to give something back to the community in which they've lived for 10 years, and to preserve and understand wild animals.

"We're trying to make it happen for Las Vegas ... however we can make it happen," Mona Sher said.

They said the project would include cooperation with the Bowmanville Zoo, a privately owned property near Toronto. Miller said they were looking at a state-of-the-art facility, on about 200 acres. For a size comparison, he said, the San Diego Zoo operates on about 150 acres.

Mack, in introducing the proposal, started by echoing other council members' concerns about the financial burden Floyd Lamb State Park could entail. Then he made the announcement that a few weeks he was approached with the zoo idea.

"When I first heard about it I got very excited. This is a world-class city," and it deserves world-class attractions, he said, paraphrasing similar statements often made by Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman.

He said that his foremost concern was that "we have to preserve the rural character of the park. We can't destruct that in any way." But he said it might be possible to incorporate the park -- and its nearly 2,000 acres of land -- into a master plan under way for the northwest part of the valley, and make the zoo part of it.

Miller then spoke briefly, as did Roger Bullock, who said he was the Shers' banker at Bank of America. After that, Goodman said he had been advised by city lawyers legal that the council could not discuss the matter any further or act on the zoo proposal because it was not posted as part of the agenda,

A zoo at Floyd Lamb Park is not a new idea.

In the early 1970s, the Nevada Animal Preserve, a 25-cage operation that also exhibited a hippopotamus, a giraffe, a lion and a tiger, existed on the eight-acre Gilcrease Bird Sanctuary that was located near Floyd Lamb Park. That zoo folded in 1976. Floyd Lamb Park was attempting to operate a zoo around the same time, but it ran into financial trouble.

Except for the zoo proposal, the discussion Wednesday about park followed the same lines it has every time the issue has come up. City officials said Las Vegas taxpayers should not be saddled with the cost of running the park, estimated at close to half a million for maintenance in the first year alone. Still, they see the land as a valuable piece of property in a section of the northwest valley that eventually will become part of the city.

"It would be a mistake" not to find a way to secure the land, said Ward 4 Councilman Larry Brown. "In the old days, that was the end of the universe. ... In the next generation, that will be an in-fill park."

Floyd Lamb State Park is surrounded on three sides by the city, and eventually will be within the municipal boundaries. The 2003 Legislature the past session made provisions for turning it over to the city, but the negotiations over how to do that are stuck on some key details.

The issues include cost of maintenance and potential development, the municipal Northwest Open Spaces plan, which could take a year to complete, and flood control and other infrastructure in the area.

The city gave the park to the state in 1977. The state Legislature this year passed three bills, two in the Senate and one in the Assembly, that would allow the city to take it back.

The city tried to negotiate for 50 to 75 acres of the park for flood control, but the state declined, preferring instead to make a deal for the whole park.

Of the park's approximately 2,000 acres, slightly more than half of it is leased by the state from the Bureau of Land Management, so the BLM land would have to be included in the deal, according to the state rules passed this year.