ICYMI: Vegas Looks to Build America Caucus

Red tape at new Sin City airport spurs new call for reforms

WASHINGTON – In case you missed it, the Las Vegas Review-Journal slammed decades of delays tying down the completion of a new airport in Las Vegas, while touting the growing Build America Caucus’ focus on “much-needed” reforms. 

KEY POINTS:

• Less than 11 years after its founding, NASA put a man on the moon. In contrast, it will take about another 12 years for airplanes to land at a new Southern Nevada airport — if everything goes well.

   

• The need for reform is obvious. In May, a new bipartisan Build America Caucus started in Congress. Nevada’s Democratic Rep. Steven Horsford is a member. The caucus was created to prioritize “speeding up American infrastructure projects by streamlining requirements and cutting red tape.”
  
   
• Look at the effort to build a new airport in Southern Nevada to supplement Reid International Airport. Local officials have been working on it for 20 years.
  
   
• They need a new environmental impact statement and must do so “in compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act,” according to the project website. “We’re expecting this to take three years,” said David Kessler, Project Manager of the Southern Nevada Supplemental Airport EIS.
  
   
• This is one reason the new airport isn’t expected to begin operations until 2037. That would be more than 30 years from planning to completion.
  
   
• If Democrats or the Build America Caucus want a tangible problem to fix, they should speed up the construction of this much-needed project in Southern Nevada. It shouldn’t take decades to build a new airport in the desert.

Read the full article here.

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