Letters to the Editor, March 21

McManus aims to preserve town

Bravo for Councilman Kiernan McManus, a hard-working, honest Boulder City native concerned with the direction our community has been heading. He’s a man free from outside control, who stands for transparency and integrity in our local government, and who continuously supports, among other goals, historic preservation, conservative growth and fiscal responsibility. Anyone who has followed City Council meetings knows Councilman McManus has continually been an independent voice and that he’s for us, the residents of Boulder City, to preserve the town we love and know, not only for now but for future generations.

On another note, anyone taking a swipe at Boulder City Community Alliance, an organization that was founded to give the residents of Boulder City a voice against big business practices and questionable transparency, just hasn’t attended enough meetings.

Linda Barnett

Alliance’s special interest to maintain city as special place

Recently, Boulder City Community Alliance has been called a “special interest group” and that any candidates endorsed by the group will need to do our “bidding.” BCCA is a special interest group, but not like the ones that receive large campaign contributions from corporations and families with deep pockets that like to call shots for their “endorsed” candidates. Our special interests lie in protecting the special interests of the community.

We do endorse candidates that believe in maintaining the growth ordinance, focus on historic preservation, and in giving a voice to the community as a whole. We do not have funds that we use to propagate back-door deals, nor do we request any endorsed candidates to use their seat in order to propose and vote on items that would cause harm to our community.

BCCA is open to anyone who wants to attend meetings, share their voice on our Facebook page and share ideas that maintain our quality of life. So, yes, we are a special interest group. Boulder City is a special place and we are interested in keeping it that way.

Laura Pyzer

Candidate’s campaign misleading

In a recent ad, mayoral candidate Kiernan McManus falsely claims he removed more than 2,000 acres of land supposedly proposed for development.

In fact, the council voted unanimously with no debate to remove several large parcels from the land management plan. Now, McManus claims he removed the parcels because they were “proposed for development by Rod Woodbury,” which is a complete fabrication.

Some truths about Eldorado Valley: When the federal government (transferred ownership of ) … Boulder City in the 1950s, the town was only 33 square miles. Due to rapid growth, in 1979, citizens passed the controlled-growth ordinance (about which, my late father was quite pleased).

However, the valley was still in unincorporated Clark County, on federal land, so developers were constantly lobbying to release it for development. That led, in 1995, to our city leaders acquiring 168 square miles as a buffer against development.

In 2006, when developers proposed to build 7,000 homes in Eldorado Valley, we once again fought them off.

McManus has lived here since 1953, so he either knows the truth and chooses to ignore it or isn’t as familiar with history as he attempts to convey.

Mayor Woodbury continues fighting at the forefront, spending hundreds of hours working with the county, the city of Henderson, and the federal government to hold the line against massive development.

A couple of examples: Rod is leading negotiations to prevent valley land from being annexed by Henderson for residential development and he’s fighting the county’s proposed release of Bureau of Land Management land for development.

Without the tireless work of dozens of our city’s greatest leaders, over the course of five decades, our pristine Eldorado Valley would be overrun with tens of thousands of homes.

McManus is knowingly misleading the people and continues to intentionally twist the land management plan process in order to confuse voters. Don’t fall for McManus’ dirty campaigning.

Will Ferrence