Residents offer ways to use and protect Sloan Canyon area

Thursday, May 12, 2005 | 9:33 a.m.

Henderson resident Terrie Schaefer collects six to eight trash bags full of soda cans, beer bottles, plastic containers and cardboard boxes every Monday morning when she walks her dog in the Sloan Canyon area near her home, she said.

The desert area has become a haven for weekend partying as well as dog walking.

On Feb. 15, as 9-year-old Mambo, her Australian shepherd and black Labrador mix, raced along the trail, Schaefer said she discovered a bra among the beer bottles.

The area just south of the Las Vegas Valley east of Interstate 15 will be managed as a national conservation area soon.

"That was a surprise," Schaefer told 77 other people attending a public hearing Wednesday night at the Paseo Verde Library in Green Valley.

The Bureau of Land Management has prepared a draft environmental impact statement and management plan for the 48,430-acre conservation area after public hearings on Tuesday night and in November, trying to find a way to preserve, conserve and enhance the area.

Henderson developers are building homes against the conservation area's boundary on the northeast side, Charles Carroll, conservation area manager for the BLM, said.

For Schaefer the area offers solitude and spectacular views from Black Mountain.

Neighbor Lloyd Moore said he has found construction materials including swimming pool plastics dumped in a valley further along the same trail where Schaefer walks her dog.

Blas Gomez said he has pedaled his mountain bicycle along a powerline road, exploring Sloan Canyon and its beautiful vistas and Indian petroglyphs.

At least 1,700 ancient images have been discovered carved into the rock within the wilderness area that is inside the conservation area.

Gray-haired mountain enthusiasts, 300 strong, belonging to the Sun City Hiking Club offered to help develop trails in the Black Mountain area so people can enjoy the beauty of a wildland area so close to home.

Michael Carey, a member of the hiking club, offered to help develop and maintain trails in the area.

Perhaps sharing the trails, keeping the western side for hikers and the eastern edge for dirt bikes could help solve the problem, audience members suggested Wednesday.

Area developers may even be willing to build peripheral trails near their homes, if the BLM allows it.

But others wanted to keep the area open for motorized off-road travel, target shooting as well as hiking.

Lester Anderson has spent 27 years in Southern Nevada's desert, hunting, shooting and riding dirt bikes.

"Now they're trying to stop us from riding motorcycles," Anderson said, noting that those who use the desert try to protect it.

"Don't restrict areas," Michael Harris said. "Everything needs to be included in the plan."

Gun enthusiast Leslie Dunn said shooting should be prohibited in the conservation area.

"It's illegal to shoot a gun in Clark County, except for specified ranges," he said.

Jeff Belcher, a 20-year Henderson resident, said he is an avid outdoorsman and owns dirt bikes and guns.

"I see both sides," Belcher said. "But I obey the rules. If a road is closed, then I don't use it."

The maps are vague for a reason, Carroll explained. Trails have not been designated yet, until all of the public comments are weighed and included in the final plan by June 23, he said.

"We knew this was going to change," Carroll said.

Plans for Henderson to build a scenic drive in the area might increase visitors comparable to the more than million that trek to Red Rock Canyon, Carroll said.

The Red Rock Canyon area is known worldwide by geologists, hikers and rock climbers.

"Not the Stratosphere, not Caesars, but Red Rock Canyon is on most visitors' lists of things to see," Carroll said.

The Sloan Canyon National Conservation Area was created to provide open space next to a growing urban area, he said.

Although the public hearings are over, written comments will be accepted until June 23.

Comments can be mailed to: Bureau of Land Management, Las Vegas Field Office, Attn: Sloan Canyon NCA, 4701 N. Torrey Pines Drive, Las Vegas, NV 89130-2301.

Faxed to: (702) 515-5023 (Attn: Sloan Canyon NCA).

E-mailed to: sloan]information@bab.com

The Web site for the project is http://www.sloancanyon.org.