Unions continue their attack on home builders

Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2003 | 9:01 a.m.

A trio of unions and their allies who have blamed the home-building industry for new water restrictions are planning another protest, this one during the Clark County Commission zoning meeting.

The unions, including locals representing Teamsters, plasterers, painters and pipefitters, have battled the home builders for years in an effort to unionize the Las Vegas residential construction industry. They recently have urged the region's water agencies to cut off or slow down water to new residential development.

They held a similar rally and picket-sign protest in front of the Las Vegas Valley Water District offices earlier this month.

Wednesday's protest is scheduled from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. outside the County Government Center. The County Commission is scheduled to meet the same day for its regular zoning meeting.

"We see no reason why tax-paying residents in the valley should have to finance growth that the home-building industry is profiting from," said Shell Sherman, director of a union coalition dubbed Raising the Standard of Liberty.

In a press release, union officials said the home-building industry "continues to evade opportunities to come forward with a plan, especially one that would involve their industry in absorbing the cost of increasing the supply of water, an imperative resource needed for the growth that the industry is planning to participate in."

The industry's representatives have said that the unions are actually concerned with hitting the industry in any way possible and that most people move to Las Vegas for jobs, not for new houses.

Vince Alberta, Water District spokesman, said many of the region's largest residential developers have taken concrete steps to reduce the use of water at new subdivisions. Howard Hughes Corp., developer of Summerlin, recently announced that it would no longer allow front-yard grass at new homes in the master-planned community, one of several steps it was taking to curb water use.

Alberta said businesses, including casinos, which are required to submit water-conservation plans, as well as thousands of individual homeowners, have responded to the call to save water.

Recent numbers have indicated that the region may have cut use by as much as 15 percent over previous years, although water officials warned that those numbers are preliminary.

"The home builders, as many of the other stakeholders in the community, have begun to demonstrate leadership in this issue," Alberta said. Conservation measures such as the restrictions in place throughout the region are largely due to a four-year drought that has threatened water supplies in Lake Mead, Alberta and other water officials say.

But union members say residential development will cause shortages of the resource, drive up costs and require water rationing.

"I represent workers and retirees in this valley," said Todd Lair, business manager for the plasterers local. "We don't want to see them strapped with subsidizing the home-building industry."

Alberta said that while the area has added about 20,000 new homes a year, rates for water haven't soared because of it.

"The Las Vegas Valley Water District has had the fewest number of rate increases for any utility in this community over the last eight years," Alberta said. "One."com