Why isn’t there more land to develop in Las Vegas? Industry blames BLM

By 
Las Vegas Review-JournalJuly 2, 2024 – 6:00 am

A former long-time Bureau of Land Management employee said there is nothing stopping the agency from releasing prime land in the valley to help alleviate the current real estate crisis crippling the Las Vegas Valley.

Mike Ford, one of the owners of Las Vegas-based Abbey, Stubbs & Ford, a public lands consulting firm, said there are a few magic numbers to keep in mind when looking at this issue.

“There’s 2.9 million acres of BLM land in Clark County, and that’s what we really need to focus on because land managed by the other (federal) agencies is generally not available for disposal because it has environmental attributes or it’s part of a congressionally designated special management unit.”

Ford said the Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act passed in 1998 identified around 67,000 acres out of the 2.9 million potentially available for disposal in the Las Vegas Valley that could be utilized for either commercial or residential development. He added around 33,000 acres of other small BLM parcels are littered throughout the county and are identified for disposal that could also be developed.

“The idea was for the BLM to be totally out of the urban land management business in the valley within five to 10 years,” he said about the original 1998 act that saw Congress direct the federal government concerning the land. “And that hasn’t happened.”