Columnist Jeff German: County has some unhappy builders

Sunday, Oct. 23, 2005 | 10:11 a.m.

The push by influential home builders to gain control over the county's inspection process was never in the public's best interest.

It made no sense to let the home builders hire their own "independent" inspectors to speed up construction at the expense of the quality of new homes.

But weeks after the County Commission approved a program that gives the county -- not the home builders -- the ability to contract with private inspectors, the mighty home builders are acting like bad sports.

I'm hearing grumblings within the industry that some companies no longer have a desire to participate in the program, which is supposed to ease the workload of the county's building inspectors.

"They're unhappy with the way it turned out," said Irene Porter, the executive director of the Southern Nevada Home Builders Association.

Furious is probably a more appropriate description.

That's pleasing to the ears of Zack Gharibian, a senior county inspector, who led the charge to keep the program out of the hands of the home builders for the sake of the home buyers.

Gharibian told me that KB Home, the largest home builder in the valley, recently sent word to him that it doesn't intend to participate.

KB Home executives didn't return my phone calls, opting to deflect the calls to a local public relations firm, which never got back to me.

But Gharibian, who's still not crazy about the program himself, said he knows why KB Home has decided not to support it.

"This isn't what they thought they were going to get," he said.

And they don't know how to act like good losers.

It's not exactly a surprise, but Richard Land has made the final cut in the hunt for a new Nevada Taxicab Authority administrator.

This is the dreadful job that requires you to kiss the ring of the wealthy taxicab barons.

Land, as I pointed out in a recent column, resigned Sept. 27 as chairman of the five-member board that oversees the Taxicab Authority so he could apply for the full-time administrator's position.

After interviewing Land, who served on the politically appointed board 3 1/2 years, and the rest of the applicants last week, Land's former colleagues included his name on the list of three finalists.

The names have been forwarded to Sydney Wickliffe, director of the state's Business and Industry Department, who will hire the new administrator.

The other two names on the list are Acting Taxicab Authority Administrator Kenneth Mangum, who's been with the agency two years, and Steven Sellers, an Army veteran and former probation officer, insurance agent and mortgage broker.

I wonder who has the political clout to, ahem, land this job?

Call it another case of incompetence by those who built the Regional Justice Center, or a clever county conspiracy to silence an inquiring news media.

Whatever it is, courthouse reporters for the Las Vegas Sun and the Las Vegas Review-Journal made a surprising discovery Friday when they moved into their respective press rooms at the so-called high-tech facility.

Somebody there forgot to hook up the power outlets.

It's hard to write stories about the move-in troubles at the Regional Justice Center when you can't start your computer.

"This is one of those things that happen when you have a new building," said Chuck Short, the county's court executive.

Just the same, for the conspiracy theorists, Short was quick to disavow any knowledge of the snafu.

"It certainly isn't anything I've had my fingerprints on," he said. "The good news is there's no bias here. We're giving both newspapers equal treatment."

I'm sure the courthouse reporters will return the favor in writing -- with equal enthusiasm -- once their computers are up and running.