Drought, water use primary issue for council candidates

James Howard Adams, who is seeking re-election to the Boulder City Council, will face Cokie Booth during the Nov. 8 municipal election.

Both said one of the biggest issues haunting not only Boulder City but the entire Las Vegas Valley is the drought and constant decrease of water levels in Lake Mead.

If re-elected, Adams said one of his goals is to tackle this issue. He also says that he has plans for more solar plants in the desert, which could help power Boulder City if the Hoover Dam is no longer able to.

Adams says there are two main things to consider when discussing the drought.

The first is to find a solution to the wastewater problem, as Boulder City is the only Southern Nevada municipality that does not reuse its wastewater. The second thing is to understand the overall governmental process and how things take time.

“It’s easy from the outside to think that everything can just happen with the snap of a finger … that is not the way government works,” Adams said. “It takes a long time. It took me almost three years to get a light down at the skatepark, which was needed,” he said.

Booth said one of her biggest goals is to find a solution to the water recycling problem as well, whether it is directly reusing the water or sending it back to Lake Mead.

She also brought up her plans to remove irrigated turf to cut back on water. Booth said people need to embrace living in the desert and cut back on grass.

“A lot of people think that desert landscape is just rocks, and I hope people don’t just dig up their grass and throw rocks in their yard. Because there are a lot of different things that you can do design-wise, and that’s where I think the city could help — giving people design ideas,” she said.

Adams entry into local politics came in 2017 when he helped ensure that the city’s growth control ordinance would not be changed.

“I was seeing a dramatic amount of change in Boulder City, and I became aware that if I actually wanted to see changes, I would have to be willing to be a part of it myself,” he said.

Adams also is a big advocate for historic preservation and mentioned that the demolition of the old Boulder City Hospital in 2015 was devastating to him. The hospital was close to his childhood home.

Booth, who is running for City Council for the second time, said pollution at Lake Mead in the mid-2000s got her involved in local government.

She says she remembers walking her dog along the lakeshore and seeing a bunch of dead ducks and questioning why the ravens did not pillage the carcasses. She soon discovered that water runoff from the sewage plant was producing a toxic chemical that was harmful to surface-drinking mammals.

“I just said. Oh my gosh, what is a child? A surface-drinking mammal,” said Booth.

Contact reporter Owen Krepps at okrepps@bouldercityreview.com or at 702-586-9401. Follow him on Twitter @OKrepps85.