Planning Commission OKs Clark Avenue development plan

By Ralph Pokorny

Nevada Daily Mail

The future of Barry Clark's commercial development north of the Wal-Mart SuperCenter is now in the hands of the city council.

Tuesday evening, the Nevada Planning Commission voted to send the city council positive recommendations on the final plat for Clark Avenue and on all but one part of an amended development agreement for Clark Avenue. The planning commission voted to amend the development agreement to require the project to be started within 18 months or the agreement will expire.

The one part of the development agreement the planning commission did not include in their recommendation is the Community Improvement District that Clark proposes to use to finance the construction of Clark Avenue and other needed infrastructure.

Clark told the commission that he intends to ask the city council to set up a Community Investment District commission for this project. The Community Improvement District commission would impose an additional 1-percent sales tax only on those retail businesses located in the CID.

Businesses are used to making improvements and having their customers pay for them.

"Most people do not pay that much attention to what is added to the total," he said.

"It has never been my intent for the city to pay for the street," Clark said in response to a question from commission chairman John Flynn.

"Does the city have to issue bonds to pay for the work and have the CID pay off the bonds?" Flynn asked.

"That is negotiable," Clark said, adding that when he did a development in Neosho he financed the project through a bank, using a CID to repay that loan.

"We're doing this to facilitate the development of a road south from Austin to Wal-Mart," Clark told the commission.

He said that he has been waiting two years to get this started.

"We just want to move forward with the development," Clark said.

All but one of the existing businesses in the proposed district have agreed to participate, he said.

Clark said that he has not talked to Burger King yet, but he hopes that they will participate.

When he proposed this project two years ago, Clark said that Arby's was interested in locating there; however, since then they have dropped out.

"I hope that when construction starts Arby's will be interested again," he told the commission.

"I'm looking at early spring to early summer next year to start," he said.

Clark Avenue will go south from Austin Boulevard to Wal-Mart, with a bend to the east where it joins with Lincoln Ave., which runs east from Barrett along the north edge of the Wal-Mart property. The bend in the road is needed to meet Wal-Mart's request that the road not appear to be a direct link between Wal-Mart and Austin. Wal-Mart constructed the existing segment of Lincoln Ave. as part of its development agreement with the city.