Neighbors plan hotel battle

Eric Leake

Tuesday, Nov. 23, 2004 | 8:46 a.m.

Neighbors of the proposed Durango Station neighborhood casino met Monday night to begin strategizing how to fight and beat -- or at least downsize -- the project.

About 75 people gathered in the multipurpose room of Wayne Tanaka Elementary School, just down the street from the hotel site on Maule Avenue near the Las Vegas Beltway and Durango Drive in southwest Las Vegas.

Organizers told people that plans for the site -- a 216-foot tower, 1,000 hotel rooms and 195,000 square feet of casino floor -- amount to much more than a neighborhood casino.

"You can see the Strip casinos from here. Now visualize that casino being moved right in front of your face. I'm serious," said Anna Serra-Radford, an organizer with the newly formed Southwest Residents for Schools and Neighborhoods First.

That image was one that worried Raeanna Ybarra, a mother of three and employee of a Strip hotel.

"I don't think it's safe," Ybarra said. She has two sons at Tanaka Elementary School, and her daughter will start kindergarten at Tanaka in 2006.

"Casinos are what made Vegas, on the Strip, not backed up to your back door," Ybarra said.

The Clark County Commission approved use permits for the hotel site as far back as 1997, opposition organizers said, when Rhodes Ranch was being developed. Without an extension the permits will expire in January.

Carolyn Edwards, also with the Southwest Residents group, said an impending expiration on the permits barring an extension is an opportunity for change.

She said things have changed since 1997. What was to be baseball diamonds is now an elementary school and a park in a community of young families.

"Our leverage is now. And our leverage is based on the change of circumstances," Edwards said.

She urged people to attend upcoming meetings that will address the plans.

The Spring Valley Town Advisory Board is set to review the site's permits Nov. 30 and make a recommendation. The County Commission is scheduled to consider them during its Dec. 8 meeting.

Summerlin Residents for Responsible Growth President Gabriel Lither told residents of the struggle they had in store.

Lither helped lead this year's opposition to Red Rock Station, which is being built now, but at 200 feet, it will stand 100 feet lower than originally planned.

"It was a David versus Goliath type fight. It was. And you people are in for a similar fight," he said.

He admitted that the hotel may be unstoppable.

"If you can't do that, at least make it something you can live with," Lither said.

Representatives of Station Casinos were unavailable for comment Wednesday evening. Serra-Radford said Station Casinos was not invited to the meeting, which she said was informational and primarily for residents.

Mariana Salem attended the meeting because she was concerned about how tall the hotel would be and if it would block her view of the mountains, which she loved seeing Monday covered in snow.

Salem, who is retired and has a granddaughter at Tanaka, was also concerned about traffic.

She and her husband knew of the hotel plans when they bought their Rhodes Ranch home more than three years ago and said it could be an asset if done right.

"Casinos usually have good restaurants. I mean, we have to be honest," Salem said.

"There's quite a number of benefits. I think we can work together."

David Sanchez said that while he did not want the hotel to adversely impact the value of his new home, it would be convenient for entertainment and when relatives visit.

Keith Oliver, whose child attends Tanaka, said the benefits did not outweigh the risk to children and the neighborhood.

"Alcohol and casinos go together. Everybody knows that. They're going to be coming out of the parking lot. That's too close to the school," Oliver said.

"It's an accident waiting to happen, unfortunately," he said. "It may not be my child, it may be a neighbor's child."