NDOT to stop using salt-based road de-icer
Nevada transportation officials announced Tuesday they will stop using a salt-based road de-icing product that has been linked to lead contamination in the water of some Mount Charleston residents.
The road salt is being blamed for a spike in chloride levels in the groundwater well that serves the Rainbow Subdivision in Kyle Canyon. According to the Las Vegas Valley Water District, the chloride is making the water more corrosive, causing it to leach lead from the plumbing in some older homes.
The district issued an alert to its customers in Kyle Canyon on Monday, after water samples from three homes in the Rainbow Subdivision showed levels of lead above the federal safety standard.
“In light of this news, NDOT has decided to discontinue using Ice Slicer on the road, everything west of the Rainbow Subdivision so that runoff can’t make its way down to the wellhead,” said Nevada Department of Transportation spokesman Tony Illia.
Instead, state road crews will treat the highway uphill from the affected neighborhood with sand, which does not melt snow or ice but does provide some traction for vehicles.
The change will be made with the first snowfall this year, Illia said. Clark County officials are mulling
LEAD Victor Joecks is off today. His column will return.
unchigliani said.
On a voice vote, six of seven commissioners — Giunchigliani excluded — said they did not want to adopt rules and procedures for marijuana lounges. Chairman Steve Sisolak said the vote doesn’t stop commissioners from addressing the topic at a later meeting.
Sisolak said the commission would ask the Clark County district attorney’s office for a second opinion when the commission reviews the issue.
No option for tourists
In Nevada, the argument for social pot lounges has an additional layer. More than 43 million people visit
Las Vegas each year, but gaming resorts have universally banned marijuana on their properties, meaning tourists have no legal place to consume the drug.
That was the idea behind the push by state Sen. Tick Segerblom, D-las Vegas, to change Nevada law during the 2017 legislative session. But Gov. Brian Sandoval said he was dubious about the idea, and lawmakers let Segerblom’s bill die without a vote. Segerblom asked the Legislative Counsel Bureau for an opinion to see if a new law was needed to allow such lounges.
Several members of the public, including a yoga instructor who wants to teach cannabis-infused yoga and a “cannabis chef,” said the county should move quickly to allow lounges and other social venues for marijuana use.
The yoga instructor, 38-year-old Emily Wilson, said she offered cannabis-infused yoga classes at three studios before she was told it wasn’t allowed. Cannabis yoga is in “huge demand,” Wilson told the Las Vegas Review-journal after the meeting, adding that her classes often attracted more than 30 students each.
Wilson also wondered why alcohol-and-yoga classes are allowed, but not weed yoga.
“They don’t understand,” she said of the commissioners.
Contact Colton Lochhead at clochhead@reviewjournal. com or 702-383-4638. Follow @ Coltonlochhead on Twitter.