Good afternoon.

This is the Southern Nevada Council of Governments for May 26, 2026, and we are officially called to order.

And I'm gonna ask for roll call if I can.

Councilman Knutson.

Here.

Commissioner Jones.

Member Alan Polensky.

Excuse Commissioner McCurdy.

Councilman Stewart.

Excuse.

Councilwoman Larson.

Excused.

Councilman Giurcio.

Councilman Black.

Councilwoman Ashurst.

Excuse.

Thank you, Chair.

You have a quorum.

Thank you so much.

And we're on public comment.

Comment during this portion of the agenda must be lended as matters on the agenda for action.

If you wish to be heard, please step forward now.

Hearing and seeing none, we'll close the public comment period.

And item number four is for possible action to approve the final minutes by reference of the regular meeting of March 31st, 2026.

I'll entertain a motion.

There's a motion, please vote.

Aye.

And any opposed.

Hearing none, those pass.

Moving on to item number five, presentation by Seth T.

Floyd, interim executive director of the city of Las Vegas regarding initial findings on group homes between stakeholders.

And I'll turn it over to interim.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Yes, I guess I'm official now.

Uh Seth Floyd for the record.

Thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

I was just double checking to make sure we had the uh PowerPoint ready to go, which we do.

So uh pretty exciting update, I think today on the first topic that you all have chosen uh to study and to dig your teeth into this year uh of group homes, and it's a big topic.

Um this is actual footage from some of our uh meetings where we have been trying to navigate through this issue.

Uh it there's a lot to unpack.

And so this report will be what I would call uh an interim or preliminary report because we are not all the way to the finish line, but we've made some significant progress.

Uh there's some other folks in the room here from uh all the jurisdictions and and including the state who are gonna come up and help walk through some of what we've found out.

And one of the things that makes it complicated, uh, and really a good one uh for regional collaboration is kind of shown on this chart here.

You've got a number of government and agency stakeholders from the legislature, the state, uh, the court system, Metro, all the local governments, and then within each local government, there are a number of divisions and departments, depending on which jurisdiction that that touch this issue from planning, business licensing, building and safety, fire, uh police, uh, and code enforcement and some other uh divisions as well.

In fact, what one thing that's been interesting, which we're gonna talk through in a bit, is the fact that a lot of these calls for service are coming through kind of in roundabout ways because fire, for example, I think all of us are fire departments are responding to medical calls, they are the ones actually getting entry into some of these homes, seeing the conditions and then reporting those out uh to the various other agencies.

Another reason why I think this was uh an appropriate topic for you all to choose first, and I think part of the reason it it struck a chord with all of you is that uh a number of these homes, and we've seen it both internally, like I mentioned mentioned with our our fire uh teams who've gone in there and on responding to medical calls.

Some of them have had pretty rough conditions uh when they've gone inside uh to answer and respond to those medical calls.

Now I don't want to as I was looking through this PowerPoint.

I realized that we're a little gloom and doom here presenting some of the bad data.

This doesn't mean that all group homes are bad, uh, but there are a lot of issues that we've seen, and those came up in our conversations.

We have, speaking of our stakeholders here over the last uh month and a half or so.

Staff has met with every jurisdiction.

We've gotten uh fire departments on the call, police departments, code enforcement licensing, all been on Zoom calls.

And I want to thank all the jurisdictions uh who are who were represented on this board for their participation.

They had full rooms in most cases, bringing all their resources to have a chat with us and try to understand what the issues were.

And I appreciate everybody really jumping in and taking this seriously.

We we learned a lot.

Uh we took pages and pages of notes.

In fact, we even had to employ our AI note taker because I said I can't write fast enough for all this information that we're getting.

So we we were able to get a lot of information from that.

We've also looked at calls for service.

I highlighted a few uh arrest reports that that highlight some of the things that have been observed in these various types of group homes.

As you can see, a lot of these are homes for the elderly, but not all of them, the vulnerable populations uh for most of them.

And you're getting calls for service, and these are just a few examples of some of the things that that we've found and uncovered in in those arrest reports.

Uh a few more examples.

Uh, here's uh an example of one particular uh home.

There were 21 calls for service.

Three of those were for child abuse, nine for disorderly conduct, five for domestic violence, and another for robbery.

You can see why a lot of neighbors and constituents are calling you all uh about these homes because they are seeing these issues and experiencing them in their neighborhoods.

Just a few other examples we pulled from uh said Metro calls for service uh fights, domestic violence, um, disorderly conduct, uh, and assault, um, some allegations of gang activity uh at some of these uh group homes.

So, again, not a surprise why you all chose this issue and why you've been uh hearing from your constituents on them.

So, with that, I'm gonna oh, actually, but let me talk about one more thing uh real quick.

So, one of the other things that makes this issue a fairly complex one to dig into and why we are giving you an interim report first is there are also a number of private sector stakeholders.

One of the other things that we've learned, and we've learned a lot of this from the state, uh, and Cynthia and Paul are here, and they may talk a little bit about this, is there's a lot of different ownership structures.

Many of these group homes are lucrative business models, and so folks are finding different ways to get into this market.

Uh, and so you have the residents, of course, who are stakeholders in this, but you also have the operators who are operating these, and some of them are have one operation, some have multiple, some have multiple illegal ones.

In fact, uh, I just told Fred on our team this morning we were in a meeting that had nothing to do with group homes earlier, and I learned that one of the ways that fraud is happening is that when there's a call for service at one and it's an illegally operating group home, they will move those patients to another home that they have, and our our fire uh first responders are seeing those same people at different homes because they are being moved around, and that was one we hadn't heard uh yet.

So we're still uncovering different ways that folks are trying to get around rules and regulations here.

Then there are, of course, the community and neighborhood stakeholders, the HOAs, the neighborhood associations who are experiencing these homes in their neighborhoods, and then in some cases, there are the investors who are investing in these properties as well.

So there is a lot that we are are working through here to come up with some uh recommendations for you at the end.

And with that, I want to turn it over to our planning manager here at the city of Las Vegas, Fred Solis, who's gonna walk through a little bit of the history of group homes and where we are with regulation today and how we got here.

It uh Fred went back and watched.

We I think every jurisdiction back in around 2010, because of a case here in southern Nevada, had to revise some of our land use rules in response to uh uh I believe it was a ninth circuit case.

And during those times, we all had some pretty robust public hearings.

Fred went back and listened to ours.

A lot of the same issues that you all were seeing and your counterparts, uh, your predecessors were seeing back then, we are still seeing some of those issues today.

So I think it's uh timely and appropriate that we are digging into this and trying to start addressing those.

What I also think happened is we overcorrected in response to that ruling, uh, and and we just said we're hands-off on all of these, and that has in some ways maybe, and and that's all of us, that's from our staff too, and I'm guilty of it as well.

I've said, Oh, it's a group home, we can't touch it.

We're we can't regulate those, and that's that's not the the full story.

Uh so that'll be part of our recommendations at the end as well.

But let me turn it over to Fred to walk through some of that history, and then we'll get some other folks up here to talk about uh the state's gonna uh give you an overview, uh, along with we'll talk about some of the um public safety components, and well in the way answer some questions at the end.

All right, thank you, Seth.

Uh Fred Solis, community development city of Las Vegas for the record.

So, how did we get here?

So back in 2007, uh 2007, the Nevada Fair Housing Center filed a lawsuit against Clark County regarding the regulation of group homes.

At the time, most jurisdictions align their land use restrict uh requirements uh with the state statutes.

In 2008, the federal district court ruled that the existing state laws regulating group homes were invalid due to being preempted by federal law and being discriminatory based on the American Disabilities Act and the Fair Housing Act.

State law was subsequently amended in 2009 to comply with both FHA and ADA requirements, and local ordinances were also amended to comply with the 2008 ruling during that time.

Uh City Las Vegas themselves, we we changed our code in 2010, and it stayed it stayed pretty stagnant since then.

So basically what we approved in 2010 is is basically what we have now.

So um so the oversight gap.

So in 2025, the city of Las Vegas completed a study looking into these group homes.

Um the next couple of slides here are specific to that study and city Las Vegas.

However, after talking to the local jurisdictions, uh, you know, we can we can reasonably assume that a lot of these activities are still taking place, not just in the city but throughout valley wide.

Um so one of the most important things is that is that the city does not license community residences.

That that um responsibility falls to the state.

So the state has basically two licenses that fall within our group home land use category, and those are abbreviated as AGC and CBLA.

So basically AGC is residential care facilities for groups, and this basically deals with uh mental and chronic illnesses, and then CBLA is uh community-based living arrangements, and this is for mental or physical disabilities, and these are the two categories that routinely fall within our uh five to ten group home uh land use category.

So um if uh if a group home facility falls outside of the AGC or the CBL state license, then we run into some oversight issues.

There's minimal oversight.

So for example, if if if we don't issue a license and the state does, well then that's the state fire fire marshal's responsibility to go inspect that home to make sure it's certified and and for all life safety purposes.

Now, if it falls out of the AGC or CBLA and we don't have a state license or a city license, then that's where you kind of run into these oversight gaps where no one's really looking at these things, be it building officials, code enforcement, or fire marshals.

So that's I think it's one of the gaps that we got to try to try to fill there.

Um current code enforcement is complaint driven, so we don't have any proactive inspection programs.

So if we issue a conditional use license uh or conditional use license, and it doesn't have a state license, then um again the oversight just kind of stops there after the land use approval.

Um outside referring agencies don't often consider local land use restrictions.

So if they do obtain one of this AGC or CBLA licenses, then the state typically does ask, hey, do you guys have your city uh your city approvals?

Uh but again, if you have uh if you do something outside of these two licenses, then again you have the oversight.

And in our case with the city, um, you know, 15% of over 120 or 130 approved uh group homes from 2020 2026, only 15% actually had a state license.

So that's a big gap there that that we aren't uh regulating.

It's a big it's a big big miss there.

So moving on to the the issues we identified within the um within the study is that again we have no inspection programs for unlicensed facilities and our oversight is reactive.

So um code enforcement code enforcement doesn't go out unless something happens.

Our first responders don't go out unless they have a call.

So um that it's that that it's all reactive in in our current state.

Um we have limited coordination with state and local referral agencies.

So there's a court or a nonprofit that is referring individuals to these locations.

Um we don't have the best communication with them, so I think that's something we can look to improve on.

Um again, a low percentage of facilities are required to obtain state license again if you're disabled or if you have a chronic or or mental illness, those are the ones that are typically get um that get uh licensed through the state.

But if you are outside of that realm, if you let's say you're uh a home from domestic violence uh victims, which you aren't necessarily protected by by any of these federal laws, uh they typically lumped into a group home land use-wise.

However, uh there is usually or there's not always a licensing process for that.

Uh and finally, there's a limited land use and licensing categories.

So uh something we can do as as a as an entity is look at other land uses that accommodate for these other uses that aren't that don't have protected classes, but if we can license them and regulate them, we can look into doing a little bit more proactive enforcement and and regulation rather than reactive.

Thank you.

Thanks, Fred and a lot of information.

Let me pause there and see if the board has any questions, uh just kind of on that high-level background based on our study that we did, and then if not, we'll move on.

We can ask them at the end.

Yeah.

Uh thanks for the the dent briefing on that.

Uh just wondering uh are assisted living facilities under the AGC?

Uh yes.

So the the assisted living is under, I have those written down here.

Yes, the AGC.

And and so a lot of times assisted living for the our purposes will fall into commercial, more commercial type business, but it does cover um for the five to ten in the homes as well.

I I was just gonna mention that I think it's important to kind of recap our last meeting as well.

Is a lot of us are getting calls from neighborhoods, but we also had a discussion that we want the folks who are in these group homes protected.

Um, and that's that's how it came to my attention was I had metro officers reaching out saying we were going to the same house over and over again.

There's something wrong.

And I think we've seen that from the fire department as well as thousands of calls to these group homes where where folks are being treated in improper ways.

And so we need to protect both the people who who need to be in group homes as well as the neighborhoods, and I think that's just important to keep in mind.

Yeah, and I think that is a uh perfect segue into uh the next part of the report, which I'll turn it over to Marco where we're gonna dig into some of those calls for service, uh, the numbers and what types we're seeing.

So with that, I'll turn it over to Marco.

Good afternoon, Mr.

Chair, members of the board, Marco Vallada, City of Las Vegas for the record.

As Seth and Fred have have uh built us up to uh this is this is something that has multiple touch points, and we certainly wanted to take a look at things from multiple angles and get a number of stakeholders involved.

We obviously have uh a number of ways that we can look at this from an EMS standpoint from a fire standpoint from uh from a public uh policing standpoint.

And we took and we took a first cut here just to give you a a general sense, um, not a comprehensive one, but a general sense of what we're dealing with.

And this right here reflects this chart right here reflects calls for service for uh the group home set here for uh about a year period spanning from May of 2025 to present.

And if you you can see here that you know that they span the spectrum, and there's there's a number of of serious calls.

When you get into the actual locations of where these are and where there are repeat calls for service, it starts to build up.

Um here's a map that depicts the general locations of where they are within metro's uh jurisdiction, and you can see they're in the residential neighborhoods all across all across the valley.

Um we're doing a similar exercise right now where engaging with North Las Vegas and North Las Vegas PD and Henderson and HPD for a similar look.

Uh interestingly, we've found through our group stakeholder discussion that we only have about um two group homes in Boulder City.

But that being said, um, you know, we had engagement with Boulder City as well as part of this.

And when you see the repeat calls, there are some explanations as to why certain ones come up more so than others.

There might be certain explanations for the ones like close to UMC.

And you break down by type type of call, the most serious ones or the top ones that we have, um, other disturbances, assault and battery assisting a citizen or follow or follow-ups.

You see some of the same locations that are coming up repeated times where you have more calls for service uh for those for those particular instances.

Dive in and you saw Seth bring up uh cup uh towards the beginning in his introduction, you know what those are and why they're why they're coming up.

Um you have repeat uh you have repeat instances because of who some of the actors are at play.

Sometimes it goes down to who's licensed, sometimes it's the nature of the individuals that are at the uh at the actual facilities themselves.

There's a lot more to unpack, and but this gives you a flavor of so to speak of what uh of what we're encountering and what we're delving into, and we hope in the final report that we bring to you later in the summer that we get into HPD and we get further analysis, uh North Las Vegas PD and see what other types of uh uh calls of service and see if there's geograph anything else geographic that can come up uh uh in terms of um the distribution.

And we hope in the final report that we bring to you later in the summer that we get into HPD and we get further analysis, uh North Las Vegas PD and see what other types of uh uh calls of service and see if there's geograph anything else geographic that can come up uh uh in terms of um the distribution.

We'll also look at fire and EMS as well, because there's a similar distribution there as well.

And if you're looking if you're looking at things like the people that are inside the homes themselves or the um the neighbors that are complaining, it doesn't matter.

These are you know, these are issues that are have to be dealt with and are ultimately making our way to your offices uh for us to uh investigate and and find solutions for North Las Vegas.

Uh again, a similar distribution that you can see um across uh across our jurisdiction.

Uh we'll get into the where they where they are and what what's going on at each one of these and what types of calls that we get uh for for each one.

Over the last month, uh we talked to a number of different uh uh we have we held stakeholder sessions with uh our jurisdictional partners.

And here today we'll we have uh several people that we'd like uh to share some information with you on the planning and permitting and licensing side, uh the state licensing aspects, uh what the building officials are doing and public safety.

But we got into a lot of questions, and and so far I think it was it was revealing, you know, having a number of different departments and divisions in the same room to go through what some of the collective experiences are.

And I think it's safe to say that with a few exceptions, our experiences are more or less the same across the board.

Um Fred kind of illustrated some of that uh in his in his uh uh in his initial report discussion as well.

Um that being said, our definitions across group homes was something that we talked about.

You know, is there defin if is there uh a need to look at NRS and how we define these things?

Is there a need to look at things from a building code standpoint and what um uh what classifications there are?

Um we try to get an idea and a sense of how many of these are operating per jurisdiction uh that are current and active, or what or how many might be slipping through the cracks and what types those are.

Um how do we treat them from a zoning frame per framework, whether there's any distance separation requirements, uh from a licensing standpoint, um, that consistency, the discussion that we have between the local and the state, you know, whether or not we have the same classifications and what whether we're using the same definitions, um how we inspect them, uh, when does code enforcement get involved, uh who uh who gets looped in and at what point, but whether it's fire and EMS, uh, does the police uh report as well?

Um what are some of the common public safety uh issues that come up?

Um usually it comes down to uh living conditions.

Uh sometimes it, you know, if there really is habitability or sanitation issues or blocked egresses, ADA issues, too many people living there, those are things that are commonly being brought up uh across the board.

So today uh we will have uh Andy Powell from City of Henderson talk to you a little bit about uh the planning and permitting side, and again, because this is a a group effort here, we we wanted to give the flavor of what's going on in the in the jurisdiction, and then you know, again, taking a little bit of liberty here.

I mean, assume also this is taking place within uh within your jurisdiction as well.

Uh we'll follow with uh Cynthia Leach and Paul Schubert with uh the Nevada Health Authority with the states to talk about uh the state uh licensing.

We have Alan Burris uh with Clark County, uh the assistant manager of our plan exams, and then Alfredo Malesio will round us out from City of North Las Vegas to discuss uh public safety side of things.

Mark Marco, do you mind if I ask a yes before we get into that?

The the Ninth Circuit case was 2008.

Obviously, there I assume that that was not the last lawsuit that was ever filed in the Ninth Circuit across the country, given it's a federal law.

So yes, we're looking at solutions, what we can can we do, what guidance do we have?

Would we look at um from other case law that gives us the parameters for what we can actually do?

Yeah, Seth Floyd for the record.

So the reason why we focus on that one is because that is the one that and I think when you look at the legislative history for all of us, that changed the way we were all doing land use, particularly around distance separations and a variety of other things because it essentially said the way we were doing them was wrong.

And I think all of us had to go and update our codes.

Um what we will do, all of our city attorney's offices, um including ours, which is the one I have, did pretty deep analyses, and we all went up to the legislature and gave testimony.

There's a pretty lengthy legislative history.

What we can do is update that uh for current as we make policy recommendations for new ordinances that we may want to adopt.

But the reason why that has been our focus is because that's someone that really switched uh or required us all to reexamine our codes at the time.

Thank you.

Uh for the record, Andy Powell, planning manager with the community development services department at the city of Henderson.

Um, as Marco and Fred and Seth have said, the process is pretty similar, I think, across all the jurisdictions.

Um when the the ruling was made by the Ninth Circuit and we had to take a look at our codes in the city of Henderson, we used to have a distance separation requirement for for group care facilities.

Um based on the interpretation of our attorneys, we we got rid of that.

We no longer require a use permit unless there's we're over that um 10 person threshold.

So on the entitlement side, we really don't see them until they come in for the license.

We do still the city um of Henderson require uh a license for all group care facilities.

So when they come in there, one of the first things that our licensing folks will do is direct them for to get a zoning compliance form.

Now, as long as that's in any residential district, it's permitted by right.

So it's it's a it's a pretty easy sign-off on our on our part.

But what's also required then is um an inspection from our building and our fire safety team.

So they're gonna take a look at all of the life safety measures, if there's anything on the permitting that's required, like stand-up bars or exit lighting, any of those sorts of things, they make sure that all of that's in place.

And then if the state fire marshal, if it's in one of those categories that Fred had laid out, um, where the state fire marshal is going to require um a per a permit, then they have to get a fire safety permit as well.

Umce they commit those inspections, the next thing that our licensing folks will do is make sure that they get a form from the applicant showing that they have started the application process for the state license as well.

The state won't sign off on it typically until I think I think Fred mentioned this as well or Seth maybe, um, until we're we've completed our licensing, they want to make sure that the that the zoning is compliant.

So once our licensing is issued, then they go on to the state.

And really, this is where that's kind of the last we see of it, unless there's something that comes up.

That's like like Fred said, uh our code enforcement activities are all reactionary in in nature for them for the most part.

So if there's a complaint, many of which in this space, what seems to be the most common thing we really see is if there's excess of parking in front of the house because they've got too many people crammed in, that's going to trigger something.

Or if there's a life safety event so far, if if our if our um if our police or fire folks get engaged, that's that's where we're gonna see vote.

But really, um at the city of Henderson, we haven't seen quite the same scale of of issue as some of the other jurisdictions, probably.

I worked with our with our fire folks this week this week, and all of these facilities in total, they're they're seeing on average about 200 calls of service over over the course of the year.

So it's not a small, it's not a small thing by any means, but it's not maybe the same level that we've seen in some of the other jurisdictions.

It's just we've been fortunate to not see as many of the bad actors potentially.

That I'm happy to answer any questions.

Uh on the calls for service that have happened, do you guys chart the acuity like from murdering someone in the house to I had a bad dream because it's all encompassing, right?

So yeah, so that data is from our fire department.

I haven't I haven't gotten far enough down the road with our with our police folks that we probably have more of that kind of stuff.

So the on the on the fire side, it's almost always you know life safety issues of of some sort.

And then I'm sure there's a distinction because this is a broad uh definition.

There's some that are child care facilities.

There are group homes for senior citizens.

I presume like the calls for service that are most severe are not either one of those.

Yeah, so this this is specific to the to the group care facilities.

The the child care ones we would have in a in a separate in a separate bucket.

So this this is just those ones that are in that two to two to ten uh for us, five to ten, I think for some of the other jurisdictions group care type setup.

Thank you for the clarity.

One quick question for me is when you do have uh something that sorry, when your police are fire respond to a group home, does it trigger something within the city to contact the state to to look at their licensing or their inspection process?

I'm not a hundred percent certain.

Um I can tell you what what how it's worked in similar situations.

So what would happen then is our police or fire will then will trick will open a uh a will it our asset management system is is contact Henderson, so though that'll that'll start and open a case that won't be closed until we've figured out what the resolution of the issue is.

So I would assume then it gets contacted state, but I would have to find get some clarity on that when I get back to the office.

I think that's what we found in some of the calls we had is there wasn't a connection between the local municipality and the state.

So it was a whole bunch of calls that piled up.

The boots on the ground knew there was an issue, but didn't know who to call.

And so that that that would be the question maybe for next time.

Sure, thank you.

Good afternoon.

I'm Paul Schubert, uh, and I'm chief of the Bureau of Healthcare Quality and Compliance.

This is my boss Cynthia.

Hi, uh good afternoon.

Cynthia Leach, administrator for the division of health care purchasing and compliance under the Nevada Health Authority.

And so I'll just tell you a little bit about uh our background with facilities.

Uh and the terms that have been used so far are pretty nonspecific, in other words, group home.

That's that's a very non-broad, it's a broad term.

Uh and actually uh two of the facility types have been discussed the uh residential facilities for groups and uh community-based living arrangements, uh, one being more for elderly and disabled and the other for uh persons with mental illness.

Uh but actually we license six different uh facility types in the general category of group homes or residential settings.

So it's important for us to identify uh the actual statutory type of a facility before we engage with that facility or the complaint about that facility so that we understand exactly um what services are being provided.

So those six statutory definitions are of course in NRS and they're in chapter 449.

And I'll just real quick go through them.

They're they're residential facility for groups, uh home for individual residential care, which is for two or fewer uh adult residents, intermediate care facilities for indiv individuals with intellectual disability, that's any age, uh, and there's no limitation on the number of beds, but they only serve uh intellectually disabled uh individuals.

And then there's psychiatric residential treatment facilities for children up to the age of 21, if somebody the age of 20 is still considered, I guess a child, but anyways, um those are for psychiatric uh diagnoses.

Then we have rehabilitative residential mental health care uh for children and adults, uh no limitation on beds and they they serve persons with mental illness as well.

And then of course, community-based living arrangements, uh, which only uh can serve adults and only six uh adults in any one facility, again, uh for mental illness.

So with that, I I just you know wanted to illustrate that uh we have some specific definitions, and each one of those definitions uh are important to us in in understanding the services that are provided.

So if uh we receive a complaint about an unlicensed facility, then we have to match that the the allegations in that complaint to a statutory definition.

And depending on which one um it's matched to, then we uh conduct an investigation.

Of course, we we need to schedule that investigation and and get investigators out on site to the facility.

Um if it's an unlicensed facility, sometimes we are able to gain access.

The the people in the facility will allow us to go in.

Uh other times they will not.

And so we ask for law enforcement assessment assistance to gain access to the facility.

And depending on uh the officer that is uh sent to assist us, they may um escort us into the facility, recognizing that we have statutory authority to to do an investigation uh into any premises based on the allegations.

Uh but others don't necessarily recognize that authority, and so they will either go in themselves and come back out and tell us, well, this is what we saw, this is what's going on, uh, and they look at it more as uh a wellness check for whoever's in the home or the facility.

So again, it's it's difficult sometimes for us to gain access or entry when we are able to, and we're able to make observations about the residents in the facilities, if they are receiving the statutory services, and for instance, those statutory services for a residential facility for groups are provision of food, shelter, assistance, and limited supervision.

And for instance, those statutory services for a residential facility for groups are provision of food, shelter, assistance, and limited supervision.

And it's connected by the and term, which means that all of those things have to be provided in order for you to meet that statutory definition.

So if we find that, yeah, food and shelter is being provided, but there's no assistance or no limited supervision, or either one of those, then we have no authority, or our jurisdiction goes away.

And so then we have to not substantiate that complaint and most often maybe refer it back to the local uh authority, code enforcement or whatever, to uh conduct whatever investigation they can.

Um let me just look at my notes here.

Oh, okay.

So if we are able to um uh to substantiate a complaint, then we uh have authority to issue a cease uh and desist notice to the facility.

We do that through our deputy attorneys general, and um, and then the facility has 30 days after issuing that notice after being served the notice to either apply for a license, which we would prefer they do, or to cease operating.

And of course, all different kinds of things occur.

You know, they will uh request a hearing, or they will or they will apply, or they'll just continue to operate and ignore the notice, and then we have to go back and uh take more forceful action with the deputy's attorney general.

So that's all the notes that I had.

I'm I'm sure you've got some questions for us, and uh hopefully we can answer it.

Yeah, I just I just want to clarify on that last point.

If it the types of issues that we get on and as local government representatives that are not necessarily what's going on inside abuse, neglect, etc.

Parking issues, nuisance issues.

You guys go in there, you you do your job, which is very limited in scope, and then you really have no authority to deal with the many other issues that we get to deal with.

Right.

That's so true.

Uh again, Paul Schubert.

Um yeah, when we're looking at an actual licensed facility, our authority is necessarily limited to the care and services that are provided, and we're looking at whether or not uh that those services are provided in a safe manner, that they're appropriate, that uh you know, patients are being taken care of, or residents are being uh cared for properly.

Um that's we do have some general jurisdiction with regards to the environment uh in terms of you know, it needs to be clean, it needs to be sanitary, but uh yeah, that's kind of where our jurisdiction ends.

It it doesn't extend out to the street, so to speak, and parking issues or or neighbor issues or those kinds of things.

Uh thank you for the uh for the report.

And I want to thank everybody who's put so much work into this.

Um and um we we wanted to pick something as far as the first item as we were recreated over here that we could go ahead and accomplish within our first year.

Um I think we picked a good item because rather than try to get uh a star that we accomplish something very clearly we think we're seeing a big problem out there.

Uh and I think this is something that uh we've all been aware of.

I could tell you that I get very upset.

If you want to take my blood pressure right now, you'd probably have to call EMS because that's how I'm upset about how the thing has gone so far.

You know, and now it's not beyond bringing it back in, but it's it's made it so much more difficult to do.

I have neighborhoods now, at least in my ward that are considered to be upscale neighborhoods.

Uh yet we have group homes, whatever you want to call them in there, where they're knocking down walls inside the home, right?

And they're just uh adding small bedrooms in there and charging people $750 a month just for the bedroom, just to sleep there.

Plus one has gone as far as uh putting uh electric in a shed in the back and moving a mattress in there too.

And of course, the other disturbances that come on during the week where the multiple cars, parties in the back, and all of that.

Um I don't want to go into too much detail because uh make people crazy here right now.

But you know, I'm committed for the sake of the residents here, aside from everybody else to make this thing work valley wide.

And I think that we're contributing to a lot of this just by hearing what what's going on in in Henderson, what's going on in Boulder City, what's going on here and there, North Las Vegas, you know, we're part of the problem.

You know, uh, we're having a difficult time just trying to get a handle on Airbnb.

You know, we don't have the the kind of where for all to work with those those local HOAs.

Local HOAs are a contributing factor because while they may know they're in there, they don't do anything.

These are volunteer people that have mostly no clue what the hell they're doing to begin with, they're not gonna put themselves out on uh on an issue that maybe a resident they don't really care that much about, or it's gonna create more problems for them.

They need to have some culpability in this.

They have to have some responsibility in bringing that information to us the way they're supposed to bring to us on the Airbnbs.

That would be one thing.

Uh, and I think we have to stop moving away on a lot of things, but specifically this, you know, the the silo mentality that what works in Henderson is great, may not work in North Las Vegas, it may not work in Las Vegas.

We need to come up in some fashion or another with guidance and use.

I don't want to sit on a board over here and at the end of all of this still have no control over what we're talking about, and it goes back to all of these different jurisdictions.

That's a waste of my time.

But what I want to see is how we could, as a board, get an umbrella all over all this and make us these not the deciding people, but let's come out with a set of rules and regulations that all of the other people have to deal with, whether it be fire, police, somebody has to be accountable for what they see, and you have to have a central point.

It's almost like uh a police dispatch where everything goes in there and it comes back out again to different areas that need to be addressed.

That's just my short version of what I'm listening so far.

Thank you.

Thank you, Count.

Go ahead.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Chair.

It seems to be uh two issues.

Uh one track is looking at how we can tighten up policy within the parameters that will allow us to stay in accordance with what the federal law says.

Uh but the second piece is to me is is going to become a resource issue as it relates to code enforcement.

Uh and with the emergence of Airbnbs and with you know, all that we're seeing with you know the nuisance they cause and communities, those are two tracks that we're gonna probably have to really take a hard look at as we look to have some type of umbrella policy that covers all the jurisdictions with you know very uh narrow parameters within.

But uh I think we're gonna have to go back and on the enforcement side, at least take a look at you know how much we're allocating, you know, individually and collectively towards this very specific issue as it relates to compliance as it relates to you know folks who are non-compliant and who are operating outside of the law.

So I would be interested in seeing how we can have that discussion along with continuing to receive information and that's gonna help help guide the work and I had just one quick question, and maybe it's a report for next time.

But the the question about you you mentioned complaints come in.

If you're able to document where those complaints come in, and if we can identify if our local police and fire agencies have a way to connect with you to establish a complaint line, that seems to be something that's been missing.

So, Mr.

Chairman Seth's Lloyd for the record.

Yeah, I'm glad I'm glad you hit on that point.

I had a couple of notes here from that as well.

First of all, I appreciate that Paul talked a little bit about definitions.

So one of the very first things we did after we talked with the state the first time, and we've had a few conversations so far, is to go back and actually chart out whether our definitions all match.

And they kind of do in some ways, and they kind of don't.

So uh one of the things we're gonna have to do in our final report is explain what the definitions are, how the state defines defines them versus how each of the local jurisdictions do, because I think that's part of why there's confusion in the coordination, because we're not always talking about the same thing, which is the second point I wanted to make.

And it goes to cooperation and coordination.

I think the number one thing, and it came up in our first or second call with the state is we gotta find a formal way.

We have a lot of data.

We have a lot of information that different agencies are gathering when they're whether they go on a call or they get a complaint, they're not always getting funneled to the point where they can be dealt with.

So, for example, if it's a care issue, obviously that's the state.

But when the state goes out, if they're seeing deplorable conditions in the on the property, obviously there needs to be a way for us to coordinate that response with code enforcement or whatever the appropriate uh licensing agency is.

So I think that's gonna come out as one of the simplest things that we can do is that coordination, but not just informal.

I don't I know at least in the city of Las Vegas, I suspect it's the same in other jurisdictions.

We will have a contact at the state, for example, or at another jurisdiction, and then that person retires or or gets a new job, and then now we don't have that anymore because we haven't formalized that uh coordination.

So I think that's something we both agreed on very early on that that we need to take care of.

So that'll certainly be in the recommendations.

Yeah.

Uh one quick uh clarification.

When you were speaking a moment ago, um, and I may have this wrong in my mind, that certain facilities, you use that word facility, have a limitation on beds, and other facilities have no limitation on beds.

What is the facility that you're talking about?

Because most of the ones we deal with are in private homes.

Yes.

And and that's um all of the ones that I'm mentioning here are the ones that are uh operated in private homes.

There's a limitation on beds in a home for individual residential care.

Two or fewer residents, that's that's all they can have.

There's also limitation for uh community-based living arrangements, which can only have six residents in the home.

The others do not at least within our jurisdiction, they don't have a limit on the number of residents.

But yes, they can operate in a um small residence or they can operate in a large assisted living residence.

But but there would be a limitation on the beds in those those residents within uh a community.

They well, yes, the local jurisdiction would have have a uh may have a limitation.

Um, and then there the the limitation for us would be space availability, uh, because within the regulations, we only allow certain numbers of residents in any one given room, and then that room must have a certain uh square footage.

Okay, thank you.

And I just wanted to point out in our in our initial conversation with Director Weeks, who's over the Nevada Health Authority, um, I think it was clear this is not a one-way conversation.

The state was also looking to this board to help provide some guidance as well.

So this is going both ways, looking for ways to improve at the local and state level.

So I appreciate you taking the time to be here.

Thank you so much for having us.

We really are committed to being part of the solution.

We want to we want to collaborate with that.

Thank you very much.

All right, and next, so next up we're gonna have um Alan Burris with Clark County, and an interesting component of this that actually was running in parallel to when we chose this topic was the building officials in southern Nevada through Snowbow, one of my favorite acronyms, the Southern Nevada building officials.

Uh, they had been working on also looking at building code issues with these facilities because obviously when you get the the type of populations that are going in there and the numbers, you get into access issues and other code issues, and they've been exploring that.

And if you look at their minutes, they've done a very deep dive into these issues.

So I'm looking forward to this report.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

Alan Burris representing Clark County, and it was the City of Las Vegas building official that came to us and asked if we would get involved in this, and then he took a job up higher and left me as the chair of this committee.

So here we got uh all the jurisdictions together.

We try to get the state partners involved, the state fire marshals planning, zoning in this, and we we've really tried to take as deep of a dive as we can because as you guys know, you're listening to your constituents all day.

It's very polarized and the neighbors don't want it.

The businesses that stand to make a profit want as many as they can get their hands on.

So there's a lot of money to be made, but there's a lot of angst on the other side.

So we want to make sure we get it right, and we've been fighting with this thing since 2008, like everybody else has.

So I started looking into where this came from, how it came about, and the FHA guidance was very clear in our state law.

If you read it, follows exactly what the FHA guidance was in that lawsuit was that for the purposes of zoning, we cannot restrict these occupants from being allowed in a single family residential neighborhood.

But it doesn't say anything about the building itself and what the code requirements for life safety are.

So I want to be careful not to duplicate any information that's been spoken about today.

I want to be respectful of your time, but um one of the points of clarification is we limit as a jurisdiction to a residential care facility for groups that's in a single family neighborhood that's converted to single family home is limited to 10 beds, and that's it.

After that, they're not allowed.

But what I'm hearing from the state is that they'll allow as many as they can have the actual space that they need for, which conflicts with what we're actually approving the buildings for.

So just kind of a little bit of a dive into how the building codes look at buildings, is we have occupancy classifications in our buildings, and those occupancy classifications are designed to protect the people that are in that building because each occupant type has a different level of need.

So for instance, if I have a prisoner, I obviously can't move them out in the parking lot if there's a fire because I'm gonna have a problem with public safety.

So I have to protect those people in place in an institutional occupancy that protects and defends in place.

Same thing with the critical care facility or ICU or something of that nature.

If I have a big assembly space like this, I have to have more fire alarms and things like that, more fire-rated walls, smoke compartments, to allow the massive group of people time to get out of the building safely and to provide them that extra time that they need.

Well, these residential facilities, they're designed for a certain level of protection of the occupants.

And single family homes are designed to create a tentative environment for a limited amount of time for people who are familiar with that property to be able to get out of the building in the event of emergency.

So what we're seeing with these residential facilities for groups is after the reaction by everybody, and we wrote all these laws and ordinances to address the FHA lawsuit, the International Code Council came up with new rules in the international building codes that we all adopted as jurisdictions and the state, and they addressed the categorization of these.

Now we have category one residents and category two residents in the NRS now and the NAC now, they're not exactly definitive, and they don't exactly follow what the building code is, and the building code is more definitive on what it is.

And it says the category one and category two patient or care of recipients are capable of self-preservation and they can egress a facility with limited physical or verbal assistance.

So category one, I don't need any help getting out of the building.

Maybe I've got some kind of physical disability or some kind of uh I'm elderly infirm, but I can still get out on my own without any help.

And then the category two is it takes me more than I believe we get four minutes by NRS to get them from their sleeping area to the outside of the building.

And those can be with limited verbal or physical assistance, not total assistance.

People that are incapable of self-preservation of building codes are considered institutional care recipients, and those will get institutional occupancy classifications, which will add the fire alarms and the fire-rated walls and the additional type of fire sprinkler systems that protect the people for longer periods of time.

When we take these residential care facilities and we just give a carte blanc and we say we can put whatever kind of patients you want in there, and we have these people that are invalid and they're not capable of cell preservation.

That's when we're seeing the increased demand on our fire protection services.

We're seeing a decreased demand on our EMS services.

So some of the data that you heard from the city of Henderson, he said it was only 216 cases last year.

But what he didn't say is that was 35 homes.

So you had 216 calls for service for EMS in 35 homes.

So the average calls for service in the city of Henderson and the city of Las Vegas to this point, and I apologize, I don't have data for all the jurisdictions, we're still compiling that.

The average calls for service to a group home is 4.5 visits per year per home.

The average calls for service for a single family residential home in the same jurisdiction is 0.17 calls.

So it's 23 to 24 times the amount of calls for service as a traditional single-family residential home.

Now, FHA's mission when they said that we didn't want to be able to discriminate as people, is that they wanted people to be able to live in a residential environment, just as you're allowed to have eight occupants to ten occupants in your home if you have a large family.

They say, Well, you can't discriminate these people because they have a disability if they have eight to ten people in their home because it's the same, they have the same right to residential home environment we do.

And we agree with that, and the mission is to try and make sure that we provide these group homes for these people that maybe they need a little assistance, maybe they need a little care, they need somebody to help do their laundry, prepare their meals, maybe they're a little bit have a mental disability, they need a little bit more of a caretaker environment.

So these are able to get those people in a living environment that is less financially demanding so that they can have a little bit more affordable housing so that they have a place to go outside of one of these very expensive institutional occupancies, and they can live in a residential environment and live somewhat of a normal life.

What we don't believe that is good for the jurisdictions or the residents of these places is to take these people that should be institutionalized in institutional occupancies where they have that access to care, where they have the building that actually is designed to actually protect the patients in their beds.

We don't believe that it is appropriate to interpretation of these regulations to allow those type of people to be in these facilities because as you've seen from the metro side and the police side, the calls for service is substantial, but the EMS calls for services substantial.

And FHA in their determination, they've put out a joint statement with uh the civil rights department, and they've said that if you are having an undue burden on the jurisdiction, then that is not a reasonable call a reasonable accommodation.

And so what we're looking at, the reason we're compiling all this data is we're trying to find out what the undue burden on their jurisdiction is, and we're finding that that undue bur burden on their jurisdiction is pretty great.

So what we're trying to focus on now is we're trying to focus on getting all the jurisdictions in the town to see where the accessibility requirements go from residential requirements to commercial requirements, and when these occupancies go from being a residential occupancy where these people just need a little bit of health, help no more than you having your parents when they get a little elderly come live with you, you can take care of them a little bit.

And we're trying to make sure that we keep those people engaged without allowing them to take these into nursing homes.

And that's another thing that IBC does define well.

We were talking about doing some definitions, which I'd like to see NRS and NAC adopt some of these definitions in, is they have a definition for assisted living facility and they have a definition for nursing home.

And a nursing home is any care recipient is incapable of self-preservation.

So if you have one care recipient in that building that's incapable of self-preservation, it's no longer a care facility for groups.

It's a nursing home, it's an institutional occupancy, and those care recipients should be somewhere where they're not using our EMS for their health care provider.

They're they're having a health care provider on premises.

And so what's happening in a lot of these is we're seeing that they're using EMS for their health care provider, which their first responders and their their job is to come in an emergency, not on a regular basis.

We're seeing some of these houses in uh city of Las Vegas just in the first five months of this year, you got a single house that's had 39 calls of service for EMS.

Um, and there's 10 or 11 that have had over 25 calls of service to a single house in the first five months of the year.

That is no longer a single family residential use.

And so those are the things that we are trying as the building officials in the building departments.

We're trying to find a way to make sure that we're not violating anybody's civil rights and to make sure that these buildings are being provided with the infrastructure necessary to shelter to protect these people in place at a level of abilities they have.

That was enlightening.

Thank you.

A little bit scary too.

No intention to be scary.

I'm just kind of curious.

So, in that instance that you just described, what do you do for citation-wise, or you know, when there's when you determine that it's no longer that capacity.

So this is the challenge that we're having is a jurisdiction we approve it for a certain use.

But as you've uh heard from the state that they have a different set of parameters they use, which is why it's so important for us that we brought the state into our meetings, is because we need to figure out a way to sync those parameters up with ours.

Um we're trying to figure out who's going to regulate these 85% that aren't regulated, because if there's only 15% regulated, then what's happened to the other ones?

And we are actively working in my work group to try and find a piece to where we can automate and tie in the first responders call the service when they go out that they could put in a note and it automatically goes to email depository somewhere that shows these people, hey, this facility has this going on, or this not facility that is a single family residence, has a whole bunch of people in Gurney's on oxygen tanks, and then that would because they write the report anyways as part of their incident report.

We would like there to be some way to automate that going now.

Each jurisdiction obviously has their own software programs, their own infrastructural needs, their own operational needs.

So that's going to be a heavy lift, and it may be a jurisdiction by jurisdiction.

But that is a conversation we have begun, and it's going to take a little while to flesh out.

We were told there's kind of a July 1st timeline where you guys like to have a lot of this resolved.

We're trying to meet that deadline, but I don't think we'll be able to accomplish all of that by then.

I said June 15th.

You gave yourself two extra weeks.

I take everything I can.

Nice job.

Thank you so much.

Um, one more thing that we didn't talk about is that the we're talking about the group homes, but it was brought up to us today in our meetings that there is uh also a large discrepancy on the child care facilities.

Um, we only allow six children in a single family residence and child care facilities, and that's every jurisdiction in southern Nevada.

It's written in our local amendments.

The base code says five.

There is an NRS somewhere that allows that to be six.

We all adjusted our base code to match NRS.

We found out this morning that the state automatically allows 12 in a single fabric.

So they're double what we're allowing and what we're approving their buildings for.

So that's something that we're gonna have an extra session next week to try and see if we can get our head wrapped around how we can coordinate the agencies on that.

I would love to see that because we had an example of that in Henderson, where someone was uh running an unlicensed daycare for over 35 years, according to her, with over 16 to 20 people unlicensed, no one coming out checking anything, which is extremely dangerous, and um anything could happen.

And so I'd like to see something done with that.

Thank you very much.

I appreciate it.

It's a it's an issue across all jurisdictions.

That's why this is good that we're talking about it.

Uh, Seth Floyd for the record, I just wanted to mention also, since um Alan brought up the the child care facilities.

It highlights the same issue with with group homes.

You're balancing, I think that the real challenge is we're trying to balance both a need out there in the community.

I mean, we are obviously looking for places for folks to either get care or child care uh and trying to find creative ways to do that, but also do it in a way that protects those residents.

And to your point about it being a little scary.

Yes, I've been reading their minutes too.

There's a a lot of difficult information out there about how we're finding that balance between providing the right care in a safe environment, but also making sure there's enough beds for folks, and it's tough.

And both those priorities are important.

Thank you, sir.

Appreciate it.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Alfredo Molesio, uh Director of Land Development for North Las Vegas.

Um really glad to be here uh to be your last presenter on this topic, anyways.

I'm gonna let Seth close it out.

I'm sorry.

Seth's gonna close it out.

So um, as we learned today, I think that not all group homes are built the same.

I think we all want them to come from a place of wanting to help people and to be supportive.

And I think what you're finding is that we're gonna find is that many uh group homes you don't even know that they exist because they run a good shop and their reputation is that we run a good shop and we don't have any problems at our facilities.

It is the other ones that we're trying to look at, trying to figure out what how best um we can integrate them into the community um as they are supposed to be or allowed to be.

Um to the chair's point, even sitting in the back here, um, in regards to our first responders, it sounds like our first responders, police and fire, need to be lawyers, business licensed people, planners, building officials, um, all like wrapped up into one one category.

And so that's probably a lot um to ask.

And so um this is why this this issue uh does persist in some areas.

We started looking at our data, looking and having those conversations with our fire um and police as well, and we found a lot of the same things.

Um the the fire talked about how well if you do have a senior facility to the the councilwoman's point that um there's gonna be a lot of calls for health-related issues related to that age of that they're all have brought together on.

Um similarly, if there are younger folks um having to live together.

And so I think when we look at the data for for North Las Vegas, it was something like 20% of uh the facilities in the last six months had more than three calls.

Um, and again, those are the ones we know about.

And so I think as a as a team, we're we're gonna try to put together a lot of recommendations based on the feedback we get from our um first responders to try to find some overall solutions.

And that's all I have.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate it.

And it's almost like we planned it, Alfredo, even though we we didn't, but that's a perfect segue into where we're headed.

So a number of the topics that came up today, and uh maybe a few others actually have come up for your consideration, and it's what we are looking at, including in our final report.

So a few things uh requiring initial and periodic inspections for compliance.

We we found that there is a gap there.

Uh implementing proactive inspection programs.

Now, one challenge there, of course, that you heard about is if they're not licensed that we don't know about, we have to know about them first to then implement a licensing and inspection program.

And then probably the number one, these are in no particular order, but I think I would probably put at least right now the third one as the top priority enhancing the interagency coordination, particularly between the jurisdictions and the state to make sure that we're sharing information both directions.

Uh, I I like the idea from the building officials about the automated data that goes to a central place where we can all access it.

It does maybe a heavy lift, but I think we can get over that hurdle if if if that's the direction that we want to go because I think that's there is a lot of data out there that we have.

It's just putting it in the right hands to get something done.

And of course, uh tracking these specific facilities.

One thing that, you know, you slice this data a lot of different ways.

One way I had not sliced it until someone said it today is the number of calls per service per uh group home.

Uh, I think that's an interesting one to look at because at what point are you exceeding what you would expect uh from these certain types of care facilities because those numbers are quite high, especially when you compare them to a standard single family home.

So that's those are some of the data that we're gonna have to dig a little deeper into.

Uh timeline wise, uh, someone mentioned uh Alan mentioned July 1st.

Uh, we are aiming for having a final draft of the report done by the end of June because that and the reason that's not an arbitrary deadline.

Uh, the state has to start submitting its policy recommendations to the governor in July for the next legislative session, and so we want to make sure that we have our feedback included in that, even if it's not final, we at least want to have them including that uh in their request.

We will give you all a final report at your August meeting.

That is when we will do our our uh response back to you all from everything we've heard today and putting all this stuff together in one report uh for for you to digest, and then we can decide what direction we want to head as local jurisdictions after that.

We are having a workshop with the state in June.

Uh Director Weeks is coming down.

I'm sure Cynthia and Paul will be participating in that as well.

Uh, we're gonna do a full afternoon uh kind of working through some of those state issues that we've heard and try to get them to the finish line for their policy recommendations.

And then, of course, if we do have some legislative changes that we want to propose, we should be done well ahead of the 2027 legislative session.

So uh with that, I'll open it up to any questions.

We'd also love some feedback from you on what after you've heard the this information today.

Is there anything that we are missing or something that you're hearing out there that we haven't captured in the data that you've heard, and what else do we need to explore as we get to the finish line?

Um, thank you, Seth, and to all the present presenters.

This was super helpful, and obviously you guys dealt uh way into the weeds on this, which is what was necessary.

Given this is uh national policy that we're responding to and have been responding to.

We're not the only jurisdiction around the country that is dealing with it.

So if you haven't already um definitely reach out to NACO, Commissioner Kirkpatrick is here, she's very involved in national NACO.

I'm sure she can reach out to them and then League of Cities, obviously.

I'm sure they have many cities around the country that are dealing with very similar issues.

So don't need to reinvent the wheel as we come up with policy proposals.

That's a great presentation.

I align I align with the recommendations that you made.

I think they're the right recommendations, and just again to reiterate this was a discussion, it was a healthy discussion with Director Weeks that as she identifies policy proposals and budget requests of the the legislature.

She wants to work with us as a support system so that we can jointly identify what those goals would be and help to prioritize for the state.

And I think it's worthwhile uh at this point, it's good information.

So thank you very much for the report.

Thank you.

Thank you all.

Thank you all for taking the time.

And that brings us to item number six.

Uh this is also a presentation by Seth Floyd uh regarding the Southern Nevada Housing and Commercial Lands Committee and recent public lands cells.

Yes, thank you, Mr.

Chair, uh Seth Floyd for the record.

And I'm actually gonna turn this over here in just a second to uh Marcy Henson and Commissioner Kirkpatrick from the county uh because they have been speaking of being in the weeds, they've been in the weeds on on this issue.

But I just wanted to uh intro it a little bit here and mention that, and I'll I'll try not to mention SNRPC too many times because we are trying to divorce ourselves from that group as part of this rebrand.

But one of the enumerated powers that you have and that that has carried over from the SNRPC is issues related to federal land disposal.

And I think that makes a lot of sense because those issues affect all of us, maybe a little differently depending on the jurisdiction, but we all deal with the amount of federal land uh that is in and around southern Nevada.

It's been a hot topic in the news and at the federal level over the last year or two.

Uh, and in the in the last year and a half or so, if I've got that about right, uh, Commissioner Kirkpatrick, in conjunction with the governor's office, has convened uh everyone in southern Nevada, a lot of stakeholders, home builders, commercial builders, local jurisdictions, our real estate folks, a variety of different uh departments.

I'm sure she's gonna talk about that.

In fact, I was looking for an email address in one of the uh emails I got, and it was like 53 emails that I received, and so I never found that email address because there were so many folks on this uh email list.

But what they did is they took a look at both the land available for disposal, but then dug a little deeper into the process for that disposal.

And it was a really fruitful conversation uh that led to some policy recommendations and even a meeting with the AVSO, which I can never remember what that stands for, but it's the appraisal folks, the third party appraisal folks.

Oh my gosh, I can't believe you have that memorized.

All right, I need to write that down somewhere.

Um I can never get it right.

But uh a meeting with them, they actually came out to Las Vegas and we had a great.

I never would have thought I would have enjoyed an appraisal conversation.

Um, but we made a lot of progress on how that process works.

Some of it was over my head, but I understood enough of it, I think.

Uh, and out of that came a report, and that report has some recommendations for some action items that uh, and I have to credit Andy Powell for bringing this to my attention.

He we were at this ABSO meeting, and he said, you know, this might be a good thing for the the COG.

And I said, Oh, this is Maryland's, I am not gonna get anywhere uh near that.

And it turns out actually she was looking to maybe have get some help with this and carry this forward uh regionally, at least I hope that's the case.

So uh with that, I will turn it over to Commissioner Kirkpatrick and to uh Marcy, and then I'll be happy, and I'm sure they'll be happy to answer any questions you have.

Thank you.

Thank you for waiting through the last presentation as well.

Uh thank you uh very much, Marilyn Kirkpatrick for the record.

And uh I I want to start.

There was a lot of people that worked on this.

Commissioner Jones had a part on the streamlining the process.

Um Commissioner Gibson had a part on land availability, and I pretty much took the rest.

Uh, but at the same time, I want to give a little bit of context on how we got to where we are.

And um, so about a year and a half ago, I was asked by the governor's office to represent local government on the housing bill.

Um, because I it was very voisterous in local government is not the problem.

We're not the only problem, right?

So quit trying to mandate stuff uh that we are supposed to do because it's making the process work.

So that got me a seat at the table 25 meetings later.

Uh, then we had a big meeting with all of the developers, and at that point I had to ask Marcy for help because she's great when it comes to snippelema.

But we had a large meeting with the BLM to and all of the local jurisdictions as well as um hundreds of stakeholders throughout the process.

I think we had over 90 people that showed up at the state building to discuss this.

And what we learned is um maybe some of us are dinosaurs because 30% of the people in the room had no idea how the snippoma process worked, which was crazy to me, but I get it.

And so uh we met, we walked the BLM, walked through the process.

Marcy helped me make uh sheets for everybody to follow it, and lo and behold, uh they had no idea how that process worked.

And and their big complaint from the home builders was local government has too much uh RP and P leases, they should get rid of all of it.

And I'm like, stop talking to me because we could go back to the old days where you can actually pay fair market value for that, and I'm gonna require it in the development agreement.

That that didn't go over so well, but it was okay.

Uh so then I offered uh with the BLM to host additional meetings to kind of dig in the weeds.

What is the real issues?

And so we did that.

So BLM state, uh, as Seth said, over 53 people were on there, and we really dug through a lot of the issues of hey, not for nothing a couple years now, no home builders have actually even nominated any lands, or uh the land that you want's been reserved for 20 years, so we need that communication center out in the northwest.

So we this is a working document.

I want to be clear to say that because there's a lot of action items that we as local government need to do uh to keep our word into maybe Starbucks and mandated legislation.

Uh but we want to keep it going.

And so when Seth and Marcy approached, we were looking for a way.

How do we put that information out there?

So at the county, we want to do this.

Uh crazy things at the ABSO meeting, we worked very hard to get them there.

They said, hey, we don't even know who to call.

We just call the front desk and they say what's the highest investment, and what do you think happens, right?

So I said, okay, I'll create a directory.

So now they all have a directory on who to call across all jurisdictions.

In fact, I went a step above and did it for the whole state.

So then, but now we need somewhere to put this so we can say to those people that are coming here when it comes to housing, when it comes to our plans, when it comes to the BLM land, uh, put it in one central location.

And I really think regionally this would be a good spot.

You've had the authority to do it for a long time.

Marcy will maybe give you some history on uh how we used to do it.

Uh, but then we got busy, we started growing and people forgot, and I didn't realize until I sat in a room with uh 25 national home builders, they had no idea what the simple map process was, and it scared me uh for one, but I do think it's an opportunity for you all to really kind of put it out front and and show.

Um so with that is the context.

Um again, it's a working document uh because we want to keep the conversation going.

Every jurisdiction has participated.

So whether it's elected, whether it's staff, everybody has continued to meet uh so that we can get some of these things done.

And one of the action items is for us to establish a website.

So this might be the perfect opportunity for Marcy to give you a lot more detail, but it really was a whole bunch of folks with a lot of I don't know, Justin, how many meetings do we have?

Uh too many meetings, hard meetings, right?

You had to have hard conversations to uh get down, but this really does show where local government really is doing their part.

So with that, I'm gonna turn it over to Marcy.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, everyone.

Marcy Henson.

I am Clark County's director of environment and sustainability.

And you might be asking what the environmental gal is doing here talking about land availability.

Um, but my program has dedicated funding category in SNEP Lima, and so it's um uh incentivized me to be um very knowledgeable about the act and how it operates and how we make land available for disposal and uh what the revenues and proceeds go towards.

So um just take an opportunity to level set as Commissioner Kirkpatrick mentioned.

Um we have um had a lot of new faces involved in land development, planning, zoning here in southern Nevada.

And it became obvious to all of us during these discussions that um there was an opportunity to make sure we're all operating with base information about how the law works and what our roles are in it and what the role of the development community is.

Um so it was enacted in 1998, and it was signed into law expressly for the purpose of identifying in an orderly efficient manner land that could be disposed of by the Bureau of Land Management here in Southern Nevada, and it also articulates a revenue distribution that's completely unique across the United States.

So it's administered by the Department of Interior, primarily through the Bureau of Land Management.

There are numerous offices that participate in the administration of the act.

Um, the Nevada State Office, the Las Vegas Field Office or LVFO, um Denver uh is involved from a BLM perspective, and then also the appraisal valuation services office of the Department of Interior.

And I'll talk a little bit more about what their role is.

So the proceeds from land disposal stay in the state of Nevada.

They are identified in the act to be um uh funded in certain categories.

Um it includes uh 5% to the state of Nevada Education Fund, uh, 10% to Southern Nevada water infrastructure, and then categories related to parks, shells and natural areas, capital improvements for federal lands, and then of course the MSHCP.

Um lands can be disposed of within a designated boundary known as the Las Vegas disposal boundary here in southern Nevada, and those um auctions are done competitively through highest bidder based on fair market value.

So just in a nutshell, um, the way that sorry, let me catch up.

Apologies.

The way that the land sale nomination process works is lands can be nominated.

This was uh I'm an epiphany that we had over the last 18 months of who can nominate land.

Pretty much anyone can nominate land.

It's typically driven by developers.

Developers typically do due diligence and identify parcels that will meet their project needs and interests, and that um you know can cover their expenses and and make their profit.

Um, but local governments can nominate, the BLM themselves can nominate.

Um, and the way that typically works here in Southern Nevada is that each of our jurisdictions has um a way in which either a form is filled out or an email is sent or a letter is provided with certain uh types of information on it.

The BLM then receives that nomination from the unit of local government after there's some due diligence done internally.

One of those things that can be done among the local jurisdictions is to reserve parcels for park trails and actual areas.

And so Commissioner Kirkpatrick mentioned that that's one of the things that happens through this process.

And there's been a lot of debate and education that's occurred about those reservations with the development community.

The BLM receives the nominations and they go through a very detailed process for identifying existing easements and grants and existing uses on those lands and prepares them for auction.

That includes requesting an appraisal through the appraisal valuation services office.

So it is a separate independent entity within the Department of Interior.

And we came to learn from our development partners in the community that the way in which appraisal valuation services office sets fair market value is becoming more and more important.

And more and more complicated because the parcels that tend to be remaining in the disposal boundary typically have encumbrances on them, might have distance to infrastructure that can be challenging and weigh on the valuation of that property.

And whereas it used to be a pretty simple exercise for AVSO to do the appraisals, it's really not the case anymore.

And it's affecting the fair market value.

And for the first time in the history of SNPLIMA, we've seen a number of auctions that include parcels that receive no bids.

So obviously something's off there, and we need to work with AVSO on that.

I've been around since the very first round of revenue came out of Sniploma.

We had never met anyone in the appraisal valuation services office.

So this conversation was long overdue.

And we've we've learned a lot and have found that there may be a role for them to even come and connect with the council of governments here.

The nominations are sent out for public comment, and then they go up for a competitive auction.

And the law says that they have to be sold for no less than fair market value.

And typically what we've seen is a very competitive auction process where most of those parcels are going for more than fair market value.

But that that base makes a big difference in the cost of that development and particularly on the residential side, what that means in terms of those costs being passed down to potential home buyers.

Marcy, we'll just comment on the frequency of auctions and the direction from the state director.

Yeah, so when SNPLMU was first passed, we had, I mean, I think at one time there were four auctions a year.

It's dwindled down to one auction a year.

From the time of nomination till that one auction takes place, there can be 18 to 24 months between nomination and when the auction's held.

So the fact that there's only one held a year has been pretty crippling in terms of getting land out on the market for development.

We have received a commitment from the Nevada State Office and the AVSO that their goal is to go back to having two auctions a year, a fall sale and a spring sale.

So we're all trying to work together to make sure they're getting the information from all of our agencies to help them be as efficient as possible and deliver on that promise to do to do two auctions a year.

And those would be those would be in-person auctions as well, so that they can get some traction.

And as we all probably know, that revenue distribution goes into a special account, and then typically on an annual basis, the Bureau of Land Management will open nominations for each of the categories, and we will prepare nominations for parks, trails, and natural areas, or in my category, the MSHCP implementation.

So just a little bit about SNPLMA by the numbers.

Originally there was just under 68,000 available within that disposal boundary in the Las Vegas Valley.

Sold to date is about 17.5,000 acres, and we've generated three and a half billion in revenue.

That is far more than Congress really realized, and that was probably all to our benefit.

And it's a reason why there's such a target on the special account back in DC over multiple presidential administrations.

There's about 31,000 acres left remaining for disposal, and as has been mentioned already, you can read about land availability and people's concerns about scarcity in the paper pretty much every week.

There's an article, there's a you know, television news broadcast, and so one of the things that we really want to emphasize is that there are still 31,000 acres remaining in the current boundary.

And then also distance to infrastructure is a big cost that developers are incurring, and then also slope.

So it turns out that a lot of these parcels have slopes that exceed 12%, which is really the upper upper max on residential development and 7% for commercial development.

So even though there are 31,000 acres left, a lot of that kind of gets wiped out based on slope because of the feasibility of really developing those areas.

But we still do have disposal, and so it behooves all of us to make sure we're working with BLM to be as efficient as possible with making that land available.

So as Seth and Commissioner Kirkpatrick mentioned, um, back in the day, as you saw in the original interlocal agreements, um, this used to be a place where federal land disposal coordination occurred.

And city managers and elected officials would sit in a committee and they would review nominations and land sale information, and that was to really make sure that the visibility and the interest remained on SNPLIMA and that units of local government had were you know fully executing their role in the act, which is that BLM is supposed to coordinate with us.

Um, and you know, after a few rounds, everyone kind of you know got into a bit of a stride.

Uh, BLM took more and more of a role in administering the program, and from my perspective, local governments frankly had less and less of a role given to them by BLM, but it's all sort of come full circle where BLM is acknowledging and ADSO is acknowledging there needs to be more coordination.

And I think us as a unit as units of local government are realizing that there's a lot of benefit in us working together on these issues.

So there's an opportunity for this attention and coordination, both in terms of being a repository for information about land sales, parcels that are being made available, um, a hub for information on when the sales are occurring, um, nomination timelines and how are how are those really operating.

Can we get, you know, can we get that timeline down from you know, less like 24 uh 24 months and more in the 12 to 18 month category?

Um, outcome awareness.

Um, as Marilyn mentioned, we've just been learning a lot over the 18 months that it's just not on people's radar screens.

The developers, you know, um aren't really aware of how some of these auctions are coming out, um, when the auctions will occur, what those outcomes are, um, fair market value determinations, et cetera.

And so just increasing that awareness by the development community, you know, look units of local government could be helpful.

Um, a place for uh process improvements to remain visible and prioritized and accountable by BLM, AVSO, and the units of local government.

So tracking progress, helping coordinate on issues and encouraging best practices, and then continuing to be a feedback loop on what other improvements could speed up the process and improve the outcomes.

Um, and then an opportunity for the Las Vegas Field Office of the BLM and the AVSO, who we do have a local representative, we just didn't know she existed, but now we do, um, to come and provide a standing report to all of us on the progress that they're making and answer any questions that we have.

Um, so there could be maybe a standing agenda item for Las Vegas Field Office and AVSO.

So, just some examples of some things that have been identified for process improvements.

This is nowhere near an exhaustive list.

Um 53 people on emails, pages and pages of Excel spreadsheets of action items, these are some examples.

So, for instance, creating a standard nomination form across all of our jurisdictions.

One of the things that AVSO highlighted for us is that they could use more information on these nomination forms to really provide better instructions to the contracted appraisal appraisers.

Um issues like distance to infrastructure, the appraisers, one of the reasons why it's so time consuming is because the appraisers are going out and trying to figure out a lot of information that probably the party who's nominating that parcel has done their due diligence and already knows.

And so if we were collecting that on these forms and providing it to AVSO, they could provide it to the appraisers, just be a much more smooth, efficient, and informed process.

Also, identifying designated contacts at each of our jurisdictions.

So Maryland kind of went ahead and did that, but we need a forum who can keep that uh directory updated and make sure that we have you know the right contacts at each of our local jurisdictions to make sure that that communication is happening between the BLM and our jurisdictions.

One of the other items we identified is providing maybe some standing training for the development community and all of us as local jurisdictions on how these land cell processes work.

It's something that just kind of fell off of our radar screen, and we really learned from the development community.

There were whole entire actors here in Southern Nevada who didn't know how to nominate a parcel, didn't know how the auctions worked, didn't know the rules and regulations, and it would benefit all of us to make sure that our development community is informed about those processes.

And then another action item I spoke of coordinating with the local utilities to make sure that we can get that point of connection information and get that passed on.

I mentioned the standing LVFO and AVSO recurry report to uh this board potentially.

So information on active nominations and status updates, um, details on upcoming auctions, what's going on with the auctions?

Did we have any parcels that didn't sell?

Why might that be?

How can we improve upon the fair market value and the attractiveness of that parcel going forward?

And then issues um related to process or bottlenecks.

And um BLM and AVSO may benefit from letters of support from all of our jurisdictions, and this might be a really good place to coordinate um that kind of advocacy.

And with that, I know we're probably out of time, and so any questions you may have.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, Commissioner Kirkpatrick, always lovely to have you here.

Welcome to the city.

And if you have anything, please don't hesitate to reach out.

I'm so glad that you both came.

Um Miss Marcy, I feel like you so succinctly outlined the last three and a half years of my life.

So good.

Because Word 4 in my area in the Northwest, uh, we live and breathe this process, and you did a marvelous job summarizing it all.

I want to discuss a viewpoint, but put a little asterisk there.

It's not specifically my viewpoint, but I want your feedback on the viewpoint.

Uh I've heard it from builders of different sizes that the way the federal government auctions off the land right now, that maybe there are 15, maybe there are 20 people in southern Nevada that have deep enough pockets to endure the entitlement process at the local government area.

And the close of escrow when you buy, go in this auction is 90 days, correct?

So you have to come up with the cash, but you don't know if the local jurisdiction is going to approve whatever land use you're trying to support there.

Um, it's been suggested that if the federal government would extend that escrow process to mirror the entitlement process, we might have three or four times as many people going through the auction process, therefore increasing the highest market value and therefore giving us a bigger stimulum pot so that we can all argue over who should have the next park on the back end.

Any truth to this?

Do you feel like the argument is valid?

Do you think that we can do something fundamentally to change the way it's done to increase the number of folks potentially participating?

Well, I would look at my commission members to see if they want to weigh in first and then share my opinion.

So that takes out risk, right?

90% of the existing builders out there.

So I don't know that that would change much.

Well, here let me let me say this.

So um we have heard that argument time and time again, right?

Uh but before we go and change legislation, here's what I would say.

You know, we got the ABSO to a meeting uh on their own accord by a letter asking, can you please come and explain the market rate and uh and all of those things?

So I I do think that first and foremost, we need to figure out the appraisal process and the market rate because they themselves admitted in the meeting that maybe there was a couple of Northwest uh parcels that they didn't take into consideration a couple hours away for infrastructure or right.

So I do think this new form may uh put the market rate more in perspective.

And I do think there are some things, and I'm happy to send everybody that report.

Um maybe there's some opportunities.

What happens after it goes to auction twice?

But what is the law say?

It doesn't really address it.

So before we go and try and do one-offs, and you know, it's an act of Congress.

So before we go and try and do one offs, and you know, it's an act of Congress, really actually it took 10 years to get the horizon lateral, right?

Uh so I I do think there are some things, and that's what we were looking for, some administrative things we could do first and foremost to maybe streamline some of that process.

That that's not a question.

There's been discussion of potentially a Western snippema, and if that's the case, we want to fix a whole bunch of stuff, right?

So maybe they don't got to put 10% down the first day, and maybe there's a longer time frame, but maybe there's less of a role for um the SNPLMA books that's been created by the BLM and more of a local government role.

But I mean, all of that, there are plenty that we could do today that can really address.

But to Commissioner Jones's point, we found that many public could not even bid on them.

So we we can't help that, right?

They have to go back to their perspective folks and figure that out.

But I do think that if we can work through this new form and work through this uh Secretary of Interior sent us a letter, uh somewhat saying, and unfortunately, I was right when John Raby retired, but saying he is very interested in giving more authority to uh the local BLM to sign some of this documentation as opposed to waiting.

So um I don't think that it's something that is on the top of my radar because I think there's a whole bunch of little things that we can do first.

And I'll just say also the the other funnel in in all this is that there are only two appraisers in Nevada that want to do work for AVSO because the process is so much more laborious than if they're doing it for literally anybody else.

And so when you have only two people in the entire state that even want to be part of this process, and AVSO requires that for every single one of the appraisals, they have to go through the same process in order to give them a contract instead of just having a you know standing contract with them to do all of the appraisals.

It's just a it's a dumb administrative process.

Well, and to Commissioner's point, so when that came up, and so one of the things we learned from ABSO, and one of the things that has currently happened is now they're gonna contract a whole bunch of parcels at once so that you're not they were going out, it makes our purchasing department look great on 332, but theirs was CFR something or another where they had to contract out on every single parcel before they could put together an auction.

But what what I would tell you if you should take this on, you have the opportunity to hold them accountable with okay, so now we can do two or three uh auctions a year because they can do four or five parcels at once.

But it was um, but they have recognized it, and it's an opportunity for us to be back in the system or the light to kind of shine some of that on to them.

Yeah, and I will say we did hear from some of the builders that this issue of you know closing and entitlement presents challenges for them.

And I think the good news is that a lot of the closing process on the BLM side is administrative.

So we do have an opportunity for those builders who that's problematic to work with the BLM on how do we match up the closing process on their side with our entitlement side.

And I mean, and the entitlement process is something we've all been working hard on, in some cases the legislatures told us how we're gonna do it and what the timing is on that.

So it's something that we're all you know keenly aware of.

Um, but we did hear it, and I think it's something it's it is recorded on our uh lists of issues on our Excel spreadsheet.

Um, and I think the good news is we have an opportunity on both sides, BLM and units of local government to match those as much as we can.

Um, I do think it's interesting that some of these issues that the builders are experiencing now, um, they just weren't a thing, you know, these issues of um it's too much risk.

I mean, all of the biggest builders in Southern Nevada were at all of the auctions the first decade of SNPLMA.

And so some of these things, you know, I think we also need to ask the builders to you know go back to home base and talk about you know some of their processes and some of their risk as well, because this is kind of a some of this is new.

Well, we may have said nicely prove it, and as we said prove it, some of these issues became hard to prove.

Can I summarize um what I heard as far as goals and maybe uh uh commissioner, you can tell me from it came from the governor to you, and so there's probably some goals out there, but what I heard in the presentation was um standard nomination process, get the word out to developers, status updates, standard training, uh working with local utilities, uh working to make sure there's regular auctions and process improvements.

Is that just kind of a high level summary of goals that we'd want to accomplish?

Yes, and most importantly, having it as a standing item so that you could, and one of the other things would be right, Seth, we talked about establishing a website so that we could put um information as those auctions or what auctions were coming up on as a repository.

And I think I know the answer to this question, but I'm just gonna ask it anyway.

Do you think through the process of Snipple Mother be able to we'd be able to carve out funding to support and pay for some of this?

Um I don't know that that we're struggling with some of the costs that Snippel are paying for today.

So I don't know.

I think that's probably I'm gonna let Marcy speak, but I think it's more of a local government because we've been struggling with some of their administrative.

I don't think there's a category that easily would fund this.

There may be an opportunity.

BLM, Las Vegas Field Office, and the state office gets to budget for um their expenses related to SNP Lima.

And so we've been asking them to get creative on how some of these things could be funded through their operational budget and their appropriated dollars.

So we could certainly put that on the list.

It's a long wish list, but there's you know 250 million unaccounted for dollars sitting in the special account.

So I do have 20 years of working with BLM too, so I kind of understand that.

I kind of know the answer to the question, um, but I only ask it because I think Seth, um, if I think if this if this board is is willing to take this on, which I think it's important because it does affect all of us in multiple ways, um, that we're able to keep track of the cost it we incur um in putting this on.

But I I I think it's a worthwhile cause because it it has broad impact to everyone.

And I do think the importance is though, it would be spread out across the valley over time as you guys change chairs.

So every two years, another jurisdiction would be on the hook to cover the administrative piece.

Yeah, and I was just gonna chime in that of course, obviously the county has a very vested interest in our comp planning teams here.

Marcy knows this as well as anybody, so I would certainly, if if this board takes this on, county will definitely um at staff level be providing a lot of assistance and making sure it happens.

Seth, from your perspective, um your thoughts.

Yeah, Seth Floyd, for the record, I I think that uh Commissioner Jones just said it best.

We we've already done a great job of sharing the burden on this.

I mean, I I the first one obviously with the city of Las Vegas taking on the the executive director's seat.

We've done more of the coordinating, but everyone has participated.

I mean, you heard Alan's presentation.

I mean, the building officials, all of them did a really deep dive.

And I think that's a model that we'll follow on other ones as well, where you know Marcy's obviously an expert on this issue, so we'll lean on her a little more for this one.

So I think as long as we are able to coordinate and collaborate and everyone is willing to participate, we can do it with the staff that we have and share share that around.

And I will note another thing to um what why we should be doing it because what we also learned during this process is that BLM did not publish the outcomes of any of the auctions, right?

So this way uh this way we now can ask, uh, which was one of our recommendations, so that we can put it on this um potential forum.

And one last question, if we kind of outline those priorities, um, and if we were to present this to the board next next meeting, uh we could outline those priorities.

Um would you want a website up?

I mean that these are action items that have to happen is the timeline within the next six months to a year.

I just want to make sure I understand your expectations, the governor's expectations.

Uh so I didn't ask the governor his expectations, so uh so it's you.

It's me.

So uh here's what I would tell you.

Look, um, as I said, I I really am trying to prove to the legislature and to tamp down the noise that we at local government are doing our part, and we have been doing our part, and I don't need another AB 213 to tell me there's no affordable housing being built.

Uh so I I think that staff uh would be more than helpful to try and get it up as soon as possible because they don't want to be in that same boat either.

And um so I don't I don't really have a time frame.

I'm just trying to starve off potential legislation uh coming from that seat.

I was never in a hurry to beat up on local government, but I find myself biting back a lot the other way.

Uh but so I don't I don't have a time frame, but I do think that there are some easy things.

We don't have an auction coming for uh until January, right?

So um is there a fall one?

There will be a fall one.

So I mean that's four months away, so that gives us a while, right?

And we do have the IT departments work together.

So I don't a website.

I've seen people throw up a website in a in an hour or 10 months, depends.

So Seth Floyd for the argument, why don't we do this?

If the direction, what we were hoping for from this item was to get some direction on whether the board is interested in taking this on uh as a topic.

And if the answer is yes, what uh commissioner Kirkpatrick and Marcy and I had discussed was then we'll outline a little more specifically timelines, plan of action, what we're gonna do next, next steps, exactly when this is gonna fall on agendas, um, and what those action items would be.

So obviously, as you just heard on the previous item, we have a pretty heavy lift through the end of June to finish up uh or get almost to the finish line on the group homes, and then we can turn our attention straight away to this one.

Uh and so I certainly think in the next month or two we can have those next steps outlined for you and bring that back to you in August with timelines and all that stuff fleshed out.

And we would also need to start at least high-level discussions with people going into the legislature to make sure they're aware because it it does help style off whatever they're going to do.

Yeah, so that that does kind of make the timeline for us.

I I think it's great because it it is so impactful.

Um, I know it is in in my area, and it is for the city of Las Vegas.

Um, but I would welcome comments from everyone, really.

I support making it a priority.

I mean, it's an issue of regional significance, um, especially as Commissioner Kerpatrick spoke to the need for more affordable housing and not needing another study to tell us how much housing we need.

Uh, but one question I did have uh is during the uh the nomination and then the process of sale.

Are there any credits that are given to the potential buyers for the for the development of affordable housing uh with that?

Uh no, there is not, but on the state level in AB 540, they did we as local government did agree to waive some of those fees if they truly could uh prove that they were doing uh affordable housing.

Uh and the second piece which I fought for in AB 540 was that look because I said local government can't keep doing it for free, so we can get our money back for uh waiving those initial fees.

And we do have the hundred dollars an acre deal with with DOI, which I think is either selling for at the actual uh market value, or you're getting it for a hundred bucks for affordable housing.

Go down the line here.

Um Monica Larson, City of Henderson.

I would welcome this.

This is something we've discussed.

It's something a process improvement that needs to be streamlined because it is this big vague uh black box that no one seems to understand.

So I would welcome this.

And it impacts me greatly for West Henderson where all the development is going on, so I would greatly appreciate this.

Thank you.

I think this is definitely um an appropriate home for this topic, and I'm really compelled by the Secretary of Interiors' interest in extending more local authority.

I think that's huge.

Uh, I also uh spoke to the BLM recently uh in a meeting at City Hall, and they're they're not opposed to help and partnership, and I think that's something that we need to harness and do it quickly while we can.

Thank you.

For the record, Francis Planskey, City of Las Vegas, uh completely in favor, I think I guess on email to the in caps to Seth.

Yes, yes.

Uh I am more engaged and want to see this prioritized, sorry guys, even more than the group home thing.

It's just because it affects me more.

Not that the group home doesn't.

I know it affects the entire valley, but this is my everyday in Ward Fourth.

So uh definitely would love to see this streamlining the repository, the website, anything we can do as quickly as we can do it to ensure that by the time January comes and the legislature convenes that we have some real meaningful changes that can we can say look what we did in the interim.

That's great.

Thank you.

Councilman.

Councilman Churchill, North Las Vegas.

Um I definitely agree with my colleagues on this.

I think this uh kind of folds under the umbrella.

We what we should be addressing for our residents out there, not only now but for the future.

So I'm on board.

Thank you very much, Commissioner, for bringing it up to this place.

Thank you for agreeing to have some direction to take it on.

I'm excited.

Ms.

Henson, thank you all your work on this.

And Seth, you have marching orders June 15th for it all.

Are we are we allowed to sleep between now and you are not?

When you're dead.

I appreciate everyone, and uh this uh concludes that.

I think I think the message is very clear.

Um this brings us to our citizen participation.

Public comment during this portion of the agenda must be limited to matters within the jurisdiction of the council.

For anybody who would like to comment, please do so now.

I just want to say for everybody who sat through, this is this has been one of our longer meetings.

I very much appreciate it.

I know there's a whole lot of work that goes into these presentations and a whole lot of thinking uh about what the future of Southern Nevada will look like.

So thank you for for doing that.

Thank you for caring.

Uh, and thank you very much.

And that will conclude our meeting.