Next Up: Down Payment

The Desert Falls International Sports Resort received the changes in zoning that they needed in order to bring their half-billion dollar dream to life.

On Tuesday, the Mesquite City Council took just 20 minutes to churn through the rezoning of a dozen parcels located within the borders of the 935-acre project located near the intersection of Falcon Ridge Parkway and Hardy Way.

Much of the zoning involved a downshift, as 477 acres of land currently zoned residential or commercial were rezoned as Park and Recreation Open Spaces (PUD-OS), creating a total of 615 acres of park land.

The only upward change was the rezoning of more than 70 acres from residential to General Commercial (PUD-CR-2).

While the City Council’s agenda item included a Public Hearing, a step the council missed when originally approving the sale of the land to the Desert Falls group back in February, they could have skipped it as nobody from the audience took the microphone to speak in favor of or against the mammoth project.

The council also didn’t stumble over the requirement of a four-fifths super-majority, quickly approving the measure 5-0.

According to Economic Development director Bryan Dangerfield, the next step will be for the developers to come up with the 5% down payment within the next 60 days, since the sale was contingent on the zoning change.

In February, the council voted unanimously to approve the sale of the land, valued between $23 million and $46 million, for the paltry sum of $6.6 million.

According to city officials, the developers still have not provided the Design Standard Handbook which will be required before the new owners can pull permits for the project, although they have provided revised layouts of the property.

The version shown during Tuesday’s city council meeting appears to have stripped out the nine-hole golf course shown in the original plans, and moves some of the softball fields closer to Falcon Ridge Parkway.

According to Dangerfield, the first phase of the project is expected to be built within 30 months, although neither the city nor the developers have disclosed where the $500 million needed to fund the project will come from.

In other action on Tuesday’s short 16-item agenda, the city council:

• Voted 5-0 to approve the Population Element of the city’s Master Plan, showing the official 2008 population of Mesquite at 19,750. The updated figures also estimated that the city would reach a population of between 75,000 and 95,000 people by the year 2035.
• Voted 5-0 to approve the new Wastewater chapter of the Public Services and Facilities Element of Mesquite’s Master Plan, including the current construction of an expansion to the city’s current wastewater treatment facility, in spite of the fact that the current facility is only at 60% of capacity.
• Voted 5-0 to approve revisions to the city’s Transportation Capacity Improvement Plan, including changes to the way the city calculates Impact Fees on new construction to fund new roads within the city.
• Voted 4-1 to approve a new five-year contract with Motivational Systems Inc. to continue allowing MSI to lease space on directional signs located on public property throughout the city. Councilman Smith cast the “nay” vote.
• Voted 5-0 to approve a 36-month extension for Kokopelli Landscaping to begin construction on land their purchased from the city in the Mesquite Technology and Commerce Center. The original sales agreement required that the company needed to begin construction on the parcel by July of this year, an unlikely scenario considering the current economy and continuing problems in the construction loan industry. Kokopelli must report to the city council again within 24 months to update the council on their construction plans.

The council meeting ended at 6:15 p.m., just an hour and 15 minutes after it began.