Editorial: The city’s bad deal

Thursday, Dec. 6, 2007 | 7:12 a.m.

Given the opportunity to do the right thing, the Las Vegas City Council ignored it last month and instead gave an Arizona developer an exclusive sweetheart deal.

On a 4-3 vote, the council approved The Tapestry Group's plan to build 270 affordable apartment units on 15.25 acres of federal land near the Spaghetti Bowl. In return, the group will get to buy the land at 10 percent of its appraised value.

By law, local governments are allowed to work out deals for affordable housing projects on federal land, but what makes this deal particularly odious is the way it was done. Tapestry never bid on the project. There was no competition.

The city had been in a period of exclusive negotiations with Tapestry. After that period lapsed without a deal, Councilwoman Lois Tarkanian, who represents the ward the land is in, asked the council to put the project out for bid, as Clark County routinely does.

However, Tapestry said it would walk away if it had to put in a bid, and looked to lobbyist Richard Bryan, a former U.S. senator and governor, to push the deal through.

Tarkanian tried to block it by refusing to put it on the agenda, but Bryan talked with Mayor Oscar Goodman, who placed it on the agenda.

"This is worth millions and millions of dollars," Tarkanian said. "This is our responsibility ... and (the public) is trusting us to do it the right way."

However, a majority of the council - Goodman and Councilmen Larry Brown, Gary Reese and Steve Wolfson - voted the wrong way and approved the Tapestry deal.

In the process, the majority trampled a basic tenet of good government: public bids on projects. The bidding process provides a level playing field to those bidding. It also provides competition, which should produce the best deal for the taxpayers, and the transparency allows the public to see how and why a deal is made.

By voting for the Tapestry deal, those in the council majority acted like back-room politicians, pushing through a deal carried by an insider. And, by doing so, the council failed the citizens of Las Vegas.