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Apr. 28, 2008
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Struggling district first needs residents

By ALAN CHOATE
REVIEW-JOURNAL

Click image for enlargement.

The historic area known as West Las Vegas needs a lot of things: new businesses, a grocery store, investments in infrastructure, remodeling and new construction, and better transit access, to name a few.

But first it needs more people.

That's one of the conclusions reached Sunday at a workshop that paired urban planning experts from across the country -- all in town for an American Planning Association conference -- with residents and activists from the area, which was once the thriving center of Las Vegas' black community.

"You don't have enough households to support businesses right now," said Debbie Roberts, an environmental consultant and association member from the Los Angeles area. "So your first step is to build up your households."

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    • Exactly, said Las Vegas City Councilman Ricki Barlow.

    "That's what I've been saying from Day 1," he said, "and I'm glad that they get it."

    The hard part, of course, is figuring out how to do it.

    There are several hurdles. While vacant land abounds in the district, it tends to be in small, individually owned parcels, which are not exactly attractive to a developer looking to build new housing.

    People also are attached to their properties, which usually belonged to parents or grandparents and represent a big part of their families' local histories.

    There's also a fair amount of distrust in the community. At the conference, several of the dozens of people in attendance noted residents' fierce antipathy to being included in the city's redevelopment area, which would have made additional development funds available. The reason? People thought the city would steal their property.

    Barlow said he, too, is wary of using the city's eminent domain power to assemble packages of land to present to developers. Under eminent domain, a government can forcibly take property from its owners for a fair price.

    A better model, he said, might be one in which people voluntarily grant an option on their property that would be exercised when it's time for a project to start.

    The fact that the real estate market is tumbling makes this a good time to move forward, he said.

    "This is the best time to start preparing, so as the pendulum starts to track upward, we're ready to go," Barlow said. "You'll have the canvas in your hands. It's assembled and ready to go."

    West Las Vegas is formally defined as a 3.5-square-mile area bordered by Carey Avenue on the north, Bonanza Road on the south, Interstate 15 on the east and Rancho Drive on the west. But the focus Sunday was on a smaller area around Jackson Avenue, which in the 1940s and '50s was known as the "Black Strip."

    Segregation was alive and well in Las Vegas then, and blacks created a parallel city within a city, complete with nightclubs, casinos, doctors' offices, banks and stores.

    The color lines began to crack in the 1950s, and as the civil rights movement progressed and blacks had more living and entertainment options, the area was decimated.

    In addition to attracting residents, boosters should focus on making the area more attractive by building wider sidewalks and other pedestrian improvements, landscaping, and helping existing businesses improve their exteriors, conference participants said.

    Lee Brown, a planning consultant from Illinois, cautioned against being too attached to the district's history.

    "The original core is probably larger than what you can support today," he said.

    And while it will take time to get the housing effort started, it will be still longer before the one-time jewel of the neighborhood, Jackson Avenue, has any chance of reclaiming its historic glory.

    "We will not be able to start by rebuilding Jackson," said Hannah Brown, a longtime West Las Vegas resident who helped moderate Sunday's workshop.

    "Jackson street will have to be a result of the revitalization."

    Contact reporter Alan Choate at achoate @reviewjournal.com or 702-229-6435.

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    College Grad wrote on April 29, 2008 03:31 PM: I don't see why any upstanding,educated and concern citizen would not want to support revamping a area of town that was once thriving. I feel that we should offer as much support to this project as we do the resort corridor or the recent downtown modifications. If you truly care about this city then you should live the negativity at home and focus on how you can help!


    Las Vegan wrote on April 29, 2008 03:07 PM: I'm excited to see focus being put on this neighborhood. Lets not push the people out, but help them by providing help to them, so that can be trained and taught how to take ownership in improving there own neighborhood.

    Improve the neighborhood by dropping drug use, and violent crimes, and bringing in more business' options (for them to own and run), and maby increasing public transportation in the area. Doing these things will bring in more people, people who will be of the likeness of the current residents, who will take care of their homes, work for income, and care for one another.


    Tony- wrote on April 28, 2008 05:01 PM: Mr. Pink-

    I think he is laying low ever since Hillary gained strength. Also his (Obama's) preacher is causing him troubles again.

    Actually Obama can fix North Town. Let him drop out of the race and spend his millions on drug rehab, gang intervention, job training, good parenting, reading skills, and down right manners for the low lifes who live in West LV.


    Mr. Pink wrote on April 28, 2008 02:49 PM: Where is Mr. Green to spout off his "Obama will fix it" BS?


    Vindictive wrote on April 28, 2008 10:56 AM: KK, just another whiner (Yawn)... Got a quarter on you?


    KK wrote on April 28, 2008 10:32 AM: Look people. As long as the cops keep killing citizens without remorse, then the world wide travel alert will remain in effect. Further, until we see some of those crummy cops get fired, arrested, jailed and fined, we will continue to warn the planet to stay away.
    It apparent that the people in Nevada like it when the cops murder and get away with it.. Does any one see any protest over the execution of the mother in front of her children in Henderson? To date that cop who killed her, continues to joke and make fun of it. He's back on the streets abusing motorist and harassing the community.
    So we advertise "No more people" for Nevada. Enter at your own risk. Carry a gun to protect your family from the cops. Sue at all cost. Be as dirty as the cops are. Make up stories and lie.
    Live someplace else thats more user-friendly. Stay out of Henderson and West Los Wages. Spen your money in another state. Sell out. There are too many empty houses in Clark County, they don't need any more. Besides, those new houses are sucking the lake water dry.


    Mike G wrote on April 28, 2008 08:20 AM: What idiot decided to call North Las Vegas West Las Vegas?


    contra wrote on April 28, 2008 08:00 AM: You have more people in that city than you can successfully handle now- and no one wants to come there now either with the crime out of control, the highest in foreclosures, and the corruptness that is rampid. Make it what it is -a desert- and give the bob cats and mt. lions and roadrunners some place to live again instead of them having to hang out at the Mandalay Bay to get a drink of water