In a City Cast podcast last April, John Entsminger, general manager of the Southern Nevada Water Authority, referring to turf removal in the Las Vegas Valley, stated “we haven’t gone after parks.” This statement is not true. Many thousands of square feet of turf has been and is slated to be removed from Las Vegas Valley parks as “non functional.”
According to Mr. Entsminger’s statement in the same podcast, “We’ve taken out enough grass here in the Las Vegas Valley to lay an 18-inch wide piece of sod around the circumference of the globe at the equator and started our second lap … that’s a lot of grass.”
Yes, it is. And thousands of our legacy trees are dead and dying because of it. As the cooling effects of all that turf and trees are gone from our valley, it is becoming a “heat island,” a result predicted by horticulturalist Norm Schilling in testimony before the Clark County Commission in 2023.
Turf in parks in the harsh environment of the Las Vegas Valley has intrinsic functional value. It should not need to be defended. Many residents enjoy turf in parks in myriad ways apart from organized sports. High water costs and “excessive use fees” as well, as government restrictions, have intentionally made green respite in our own homes increasingly out of reach.
Thus, seeing an occasional stretch of green in a valley park as we drive around the city becomes increasingly paramount to the quality of life here. We don’t need what little turf is left in our valley parks turned into more desert walking paths. (Lined with dead or suffering legacy trees.) We have enough of those already.
We should not have to park our cars and walk into the interior of an area to recognize a community park. The very idea that the remaining turf in our parks has to be defended as “functional” is nonsensical. It is functioning to keep us sane. We need a cool spot to lie down and look at the clouds if we want to. That is function. That’s the point of a park.
The first agenda item of the 2027 legislative session should be an emergency amendment to AB356 to specifically save our existing valley parks. At the rate of turf removal right now, that may actually be too late.
Stephanie Steffen
