As the city of Las Vegas continues expanding to the northwest toward the Las Vegas Pauite Tribal lands, we are working closely with the tribe on an agreement to protect reservation lands while also allowing the city to expand its borders and expand economic development opportunities.
At the April 7, 2021, City Council meeting, the members approved an intergovernmental agreement with the Las Vegas Paiute Council to establish development standards for land in the northwest. The agreement establishes standards for development on lands adjacent to the Las Vegas Paiute Tribal lands, provides for coordination of infrastructure development supporting tribal and city development, and outlines opportunities to collaborate on projects that will grow and diversify the economy and create employment opportunities.
One of the development standards provides the city with the ability to develop 940 acres for a master planned community on land east of the reservation. The city will also benefit from new economic development by working jointly with the tribe to develop a 1,000-acre job creation zone on tribal land. This new technology center, which is still in the planning stages, will create jobs, diversify the economy and create a revenue stream for the city.
Importantly, the agreement will return more than 3,000 acres of ancestral lands to the tribe.
You can view the agreement here.
Since its inception in 1905 Las Vegas has been steadily growing (check out this map that illustrates that growth), but in the last several years planners knew that the city had become landlocked. The city, like an island, had run out of space to grow, except instead of being surrounded by water, the city of Las Vegas is surrounded by other governmental jurisdictions. These include our neighbors in unincorporated Clark County and North Las Vegas as well as the Las Vegas Paiute Tribe, the Nellis Air Force Base Range and lands under the auspices of the Bureau of Land Management.
The agreement adds developable land to the city and also protects treasured tribal lands.