Las Vegas defends plan for federal building

Sito Negron

Monday, Nov. 8, 2004 | 10:58 a.m.

Lawyers representing Las Vegas will be in court Tuesday to defend the city's controversial decision to allow developer Irwin Molasky to construct a Social Security building in a residential neighborhood.

"The judge is either going to say 'I agree with the citizens, you win,' or he might agree with Molasky, or he might say 'I'm going to send it back to city council for further review,' " said Larry Anspach, president of the Neighborhood Alliance Association, which gathered more than 1,000 signatures opposing the building.

Las Vegas City Council voted 4-3 in December to revise the city plan governing land use and rezone the 4.26-acre plot on Buffalo Drive and Del Ray Avenue, across the street from Buffalo Park.

Anspach and other neighborhood residents immediately gathered outside the City Council Chambers and began talking about a lawsuit. Councilwoman Janet Moncrief, who voted against allowing the building in her district, became a target because, residents said, she had not done enough to gain council support for the neighborhood's position.

Partly because of that decision, Anspach and members of the association began a recall drive against Moncrief. The drive continues, although the neighborhood and Moncrief find themselves on the same side of the Social Security building issue.

"I still don't agree with the decision (to allow the building) but it's something you live with," said Moncrief, who declined to comment directly on the lawsuit against the city.

The lawsuit argues that the city went against its own procedures for amending the general plan and rezoning the property. The general plan sets overall land use for an area, while zoning could be considered a subset of the general plan, and applies to specific pieces of property.

In this case, the general plan considered the area "desert rural," a residential designation, and the council changed it to "office." Then it rezoned the specific property from "residential estates" to "office."

Neighbors called that spot zoning -- allowing an incompatible use, in this case, commercial, within an area that otherwise is residential.

"As late as 2001 there was a (commercial) application on an adjoining piece of property. It was incompatible with the residential area, it was spot zoning," said Stan Parry, the lawyer representing the neighborhood. "Then two years later nothing has changed in the area and the master plan requires for amendment that there be a change in the character of the neighborhood. Yet the city council approved it 4-3."

Parry said that changing the general plan requires a "supermajority," two-thirds of the entire Planning Commission, before the proposal can be sent to City Council. He said the Planning Commission vote to approve the general plan amendment was 3-1.

"So we believe it never should have gone to the City Council," Parry said.

He also said the application for the general plan amendment was improperly filled out. Anspach said that might sound like a minor point, "but it's actually very important. If the judge agrees with Molasky he's basically setting a precedent for every developer in the city, who can say 'Well it doesn't matter if we fill this out correctly.' "

The city attorney handling the case was not available for comment.

Pamela Puppel, a Molasky spokeswoman, said company policy is not to comment on ongoing litigation.