EDITORIAL: Stop stalling and settle the Badlands dispute
Las Vegas needs to quit sending good money after Badlands.
Last Wednesday, the Las Vegas City Council voted to appeal one of its four Badlands cases to the Nevada Supreme Court. The multiple cases all stem from the same long-running dispute. The city repeatedly blocked developer Yohan Lowie from building on the shuttered golf course. A group of wealthy and influential citizens in the nearby Queensridge neighborhood objected to the construction.
But the city previously zoned the golf course for residential construction. That means Mr. Lowie and his company, EHB Cos., had a property right to build on the land. When the city refused to allow construction, Mr. Lowie sued.
This case was always straightforward. What the city did was a textbook example of a taking under the Fifth Amendment. When the government takes someone’s property, either through eminent domain or denying their property rights, the government must compensate the person.
Unsurprisingly, the city has lost repeatedly in District Court and in the state Supreme Court.
“When a governmental agency acts in a manner that removes all the economic value from privately owned land, just compensation must be paid,” Supreme Court Justice Douglas Herndon wrote in a unanimous ruling from April.
In a memo this summer, Las Vegas City Manager Mike Janssen estimated the city could owe more than $500 million. That would be a significant portion of the city’s annual budget. He warned the city could freeze hiring, delay planned projects and even sell city assets.
The City Council’s next move is obvious. Beg Mr. Lowie to settle. He’s even shown a willingness to do so. In 2022, he agreed to settle with the city for $64 million and land-use entitlements. The city should have jumped at that proposal, but it made a late change that scuttled the deal.
The city has spent more than $6 million on outside legal counsel in this case. It approved another $500,000 in August. It’s unclear why the city needed to spend so much. Presumably, its in-house lawyers were perfectly capable of losing repeatedly.
Just two City Council members, Victoria Seaman and Nancy Brune, voted against the proposal to appeal the ruling. Ms. Seaman, who is running for mayor, has worked for years to resolve this issue. Her past warnings look prophetic. Other council members, including Mayor Carolyn Goodman, should swallow their pride and admit Ms. Seaman has been right all along.
If Las Vegas City Council members want to gamble, they should do it with their own money. Their Badlands foolishness has already saddled taxpayers with steep losses.