Dayton officials say hospital can wait to do landscaping

Builders of the Carson Tahoe Dayton Hospital on Highway 50 near Smith's won't have to put in required landscaping until after they build and lease two professional buildings slated for the project.

The Lyon County Commission voted recently to approve amending the agreement to alter the landscaping requirement.

Donald Smit, of Project One, who is building the hospital, parking lot, helicopter pad and two professional buildings, said it was inappropriate to put in the landscaping until the hospital had tenants to build for, or the doctors could put it in themselves. He said at the time of the agreement, the county had a landscape ordinance requiring landscape plans before parcel maps could be filed.

But county commissioners voted to rescind the ordinance in 2006, and Smit said the amendment to the agreement was the only thing standing in the way of the parcel map filing.

"We believe in landscaping," he said. We have tried to be good neighbors. All we want to do is get the parcel map filed."

The commission will vote on the amended development agreement at its June 1 meeting.

Smit said the company has started the extension of Medical Center Drive last week.

He said the project had been held up by water transfer protests by the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe, but that another entity had loaned the hospital water in the interim.

• Contact reporter Karen Woodmansee at kwoodmansee@nevadaappeal.com or call 881-7351.