LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) – A proposal to sell 65,000 of public lands across Clark County was halted in Congress, Wednesday night, after bipartisan opposition.
The proposed amendment was introduced by Northern Nevada Congressman Mark Amodei as part of President Donald Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” or the House budget reconciliation. It would have allowed for the sale of 65,000 acres of federal land across Clark County. Funds from sales would go to the U.S. Treasury.
The proposal faced fierce opposition from Southern Nevada Congressional lawmakers, escalating Wednesday during a Rules Committee Hearing.
Wednesday evening, Republican Congressman Ryan Zinke of Montana stripped the provision that would sell Nevada lands before it could have gone to the floor for a vote. The entire proposal would allow the sale of 450,000 acres of public lands across the U.S.
“This was my San Juan Hill; I do not support the widespread sale or transfer of public lands. Once the land is sold, we will never get it back. God isn’t creating more land,” said Zinke in a statement sent to FOX5.
Amodei’s spokesperson referred FOX5 to his website for a statement about his reasoning for the proposal.
“The reality is, most of my colleagues don’t fully grasp the unique challenges Nevada faces as a state that is 80% federally owned. For years, folks from my district, and even across district lines, have voiced serious concerns about how these vast stretches of public land could threaten Nevada’s economic momentum and competitiveness if we run out of usable acreage,” Amodei said on his website.
This week, Congresswoman Dina Titus of Las Vegas introduced an amendment to nullify the proposed land sales in Clark County, calling it “Screw Nevada 2.0” in a recent op-ed published in the Las Vegas Sun.
“This is an area that he does not represent. He snuck this provision in during the middle of the night without consulting with me or any members of the Nevada delegation or the Clark County Commission. If he had, he would have known there was not support for this and this was not a responsible way to accommodate growth or manage our natural resources. So I’m here to defend the public lands in my district and stop them from just being auctioned off,” Titus said in testimony before the Committee, Wednesday.
“The Amodei proposal doesn’t require that land sold in Nevada be used for housing. In fact, there is very little information on how exactly this land would be used,” said Congresswoman Susie Lee, who also introduced an amendment to stop the public land sales in Utah to protect the water supply from Lake Powell and the Colorado River. “This could divert 28 billion gallons of water each year from Lake Powell, the Colorado River to communities in southern Utah– away from Nevada, Arizona and other basin states,” Lee said.
The proposal was criticized by Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s office; the Senator had worked with local and state leaders on the “Southern Nevada Economic Development and Conservation Act”. The bill, according to a spokesperson for Cortez Masto’s office, would release 25,000 acres of federal land for development and protect over 2 million acres of public land for conservation and recreation.
“Senator Cortez Masto is deeply concerned that Representative Amodei’s legislation will exacerbate drought conditions and bypass processes she worked to protect in her legislation to ensure Clark County and other stakeholders statewide are consulted before land sales are made,” a spokesperson emailed to FOX5. “His legislation would not ensure that land sale revenues return to the state of Nevada to fund water projects, education, and conservation,” the statement said.
Though the “Southern Nevada Economic Development and Conservation Act” has bipartisan support across Nevada and from state lawmakers, the proposal still faces opposition from environmental groups and water groups who call for use of “infill”: utilizing available plots of land in the urban center of the Valley.
“I think if that [affordable housing] were the true focus of these lands bills, then we would see a greater emphasis on mandating affordable housing in these bills. But we are not seeing that. And we’re also not seeing a focus on infill development, when we know the RTC of Southern Nevada identified 80,000 acres of land that’s within our disposal boundary,” said Jackie Spicer of the Nevada Environmental Coalition. The group, along with other organizations, hosted a town hall for concerned residents over the weekend.
“In Southern Nevada we have enough housing– we just don’t have affordable housing. People cannot afford the houses they’re building, and there’s no guarantee that the homes that would be built south of the valley would be affordable or attainable for working people,” Spicer said.
Titus has also expressed concerns over Cortez Masto’s legislation.
“The assumption that this bill is the silver bullet to address our housing needs is flawed,” Titus said in her written op-ed, which her spokesperson sent to FOX5.
“As for local governments’ thirst for more property tax dollars, the cost of infrastructure to support development far outweighs any potential revenue gain… Statistics clearly show that growth does not pay for itself. There are schools, roads, and transit systems to be built; services like fire, police, and trash collection to provide; more traffic issues; and air pollution to address. These problems are exacerbated by sprawl,” Titus said.
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