Update: Census puts Douglas population short of 50,000

The U.S. Census figures released for Douglas County on Thursday revealed there were 49,488 people living in the county when the count was taken last year.

That’s up 2,491 from the 46,997 counted in 2010, or a 5.3 percent increase.

Douglas is the seventh most populous county in Nevada, right behind Nye County. However, it does have nearly twice the population of the eighth most populous county, Churchill.

Most of Nevada’s 3.1 million residents live in Clark County, which is home to 2.265 million, an increase of 16.1 percent over the last decade.

Washoe County is the second largest in the state with 486,492 residents, up 15.4 percent over the course of the decade.

On Tuesday, Douglas County planning commissioners debated proposed changes to the growth ordinance for more than three hours but couldn’t come to a consensus.

Approved by commissioners in 2007 after the Nevada Supreme Court upheld a challenge to the 2002 ballot initiative and ratified by voters in 2008, the ordinance placed a 2 percent cap on building permits.

Even as voters were going to the polls, the Great Recession was beginning to take a bite out of the housing boom that arrived with the early part of the century.

Sustainable Growth Initiative representative Jim Slade said the goal of the initiative was to even out those boom and bust times.

He pointed out that no one in the county had any control over the factors that led to the Recession.

“What I’m saying and what staff is saying is that we don’t again allow growth without limit,” he said. “Then there will be another exogenous factor that will cause it to crater.”

Nevada Builders Alliance Chief Executive Officer Aaron West told planning commissioners that builders were working as fast as they could.

“We don’t have the labor, materials or anything we even need to contemplate 1,000 homes here,” he said. “The people who are building are building as fast as they can.”

West said that of the 4,000 permits with vested projects in 2007, only 1,000 of them have actually been built.

The time it takes for a project to come to market is in the nature of how the projects were approved.

Douglas County commissioners are proposing to alter the growth ordinance to reduce the number of permits that have gathered in the pool due to the Great Recession.

At their July 1 meeting, Douglas County commissioners instructed staff to bring back changes to the ordinance.

Spurred by a big increase in home values and demand, the first half of 2021 saw just over 200 single family building permits, according to county records, compared to 200 permits issued in all of 2020.

As of last the beginning of July, there were still 581 permits in the current project pool and 1,452 permits available for individuals.

The 2 percent growth cap allows 418 permits to be issued during 2021. Until this year, the county builders haven’t exceeded the number of permits available under the annual allocation. From a spreadsheet issued by the county, the pool of project permits decreased by eight this year.

Commissioners expressed concern that a single large developer could pull a substantial number of permits, prompting staff to suggest a 10 percent cap on permits issued from the pool in any given year.

Another proposed change is the elimination of banking and borrowing permits from the ordinance.

Deputy District Attorney Sam Taylor pointed out that even within the ordinance a development agreement is required.

“It is, in a sense, superfluous,” he said. “Without a development agreement it cannot be used.”

Planning Commissioners Bryce Clutts said he was uncomfortable with the timeline for the revisions.

He said the ordinance has been in place for 14 years and that the changes are being made without reaching out to stakeholders.

“Why the haste and immediate need to resolve this here?” he said.

Slade described the 2 percent cap as a glide path and that the goal of the revision is to not make up for the last 10 years over the next four or five years.

Commissioners are likely to have the first reading of the ordinance in September and a second reading in October. It’s possible the ordinance would be on the ballot for ratification in 2022.