A graph provided by Carson City Community Development showing residential building permits by type since 2004.
Courtesy
Convened as the Growth Management Commission on Wednesday, Carson City planning commissioners approved capping population growth through residential building permits at 3 percent.
With Commissioner Vern Krahn absent, the commission unanimously recommended to the Board of Supervisors approval of a resolution allocating 774 residential building permits for 2026, 802 permits for 2027 and estimates of 826 for 2028 and 851 for 2029.
An annual report conducted by Community Development shows issued residential building permits below available allocations over the last 20 years, meaning actual development has not recently hit the 3 percent cap.
Furthermore, the State Demographer put Carson City’s population at 60,266 as of July 1, 2024. The State Demographer’s five-year projections for the city show growth between .7 and .8 percent, culminating in an estimated population of 62,476 by 2029.
“The Growth Management Ordinance was originally implemented in the late-1970s in response to a moratorium by the State Division of Water Resources on new subdivisions in Carson City due to wastewater and water capacity issues,” according to the annual report. “For most of the growth management program’s history, the total number of building permit allocations available each year has been based upon a maximum growth rate of 3%.”
Planning Commission Chair Charles Borders questioned the methodology behind the number of permit allocations, worried the 774 permits available next year would be too many. He has proposed using a buildout population estimate (previously put at 80,000) versus current population and dividing the difference over a set time frame to come up with each year’s permit allocations.
“But that could be readjusted based on what’s left, not some artificial number of about 3 percent of the population,” he said.
The current methodology uses the State Demographer’s population count and the U.S. Census’ people per household estimate of 2.36, plus the preceding year’s actual number of permits issued, which was 271 in 2024.
The formula for the permit allocations is available at https://legistarweb-production.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/attachment/pdf/3361957/Methodology__Number_of_Available_Permits.pdf.
“The methodology is not locked into statute,” said Community Development Director Hope Sullivan.
Some commissioners worried lowering the growth percentage or number of allocations would send the wrong message for economic development, hampering the city’s ability to attract employers. Planning commissioners agreed to review the current methodology in a future meeting while still using the 3 percent this next year.
“Carson City really, with these regulations, is the only entity I know in the state of Nevada for local jurisdictions that actually does this,” said Planning Commissioner Robert Pyzel.
During the GMC’s annual review, the school district and city departments weigh in on capacity and service issues, ranging from water usage to call volume at the sheriff’s office. This year, no district or department recommended denying the 3 percent growth permit allocations.
Speaking Wednesday, Public Works Director Darren Schulz addressed the city’s struggle to fund road maintenance and its relationship to new development. He argued while new roads can cause congestion, pavement degradation occurs with or without new development.
“They need to understand that if the road sits out there, and no cars drive on it, in 25 years, I have to replace that road,” he said. “If you have a lot of heavy truck traffic, obviously that does a lot more damage to asphalt roads than, you know, your passenger vehicles, that sort of stuff. But adding a few additional half a percent of cars to the roadway surface, I can’t measure it. It’s so negligible we don’t have a way of measuring it, and nobody around the country measures it either.”
Planning commissioners requested roadwork information from the Regional Transportation Commission be included in the GMC report in the future. The RTC prioritizes regional and local road projects every year, though the city has previously estimated a $21 million funding gap between maintenance needs and current funding.
Asked by Planning Commissioner Ellen Dechristopher how developers could contribute more to road maintenance, Schulz — saying it was his opinion — suggested developers use an HOA or other entity to provide slurry seal to new roads after five years.
“There’s no cracks, there are no potholes, it looks really good,” said Schulz, “and everybody thinks, ‘leave it alone, don’t touch it,’ but in reality, at that five-year mark, if you can put that first in, that extends that asphalt for another additional decade where it doesn’t require maintenance.”
Before the GMC, planning commissioners held their regular meeting. In other action:
• Planning commissioners unanimously approved a special use permit for construction and operation of a climate-controlled personal storage facility and five separate buildings for indoor storage of boats, RVs and personal storage on 4.78 aces of general commercial and retail commercial land (two parcels) at 393 Eagle Station Lane.
The facility will have 382 units and an office onsite, according to planning staff. Nine conditions of approval set landscaping and buffering requirements, among other measures, and limited the hours of operation to 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily.
Planning commissioners added another condition of approval Wednesday that the developer must include the location of dry utilities on future site plans and be responsible for any relocation of utilities or easements.
• Planning commissioners unanimously approved a SUP to replace a temporary cellular facility with a permanent 100-foot-tall monopine telecom tower on general commercial property located at 1281 N. Roop St.
Applicant Verizon Wireless proposed the tower where coverage “was affected by the decommissioning of a site located at 705 N. Plaza St.,” according to a staff report.
Planning commissioners modified one condition of approval to ensure the monopine is painted green and added another condition that the screening material for the monopine be maintained.
• Planning commissioners unanimously recommended to the Board of Supervisors approval of a proposed ordinance that would change the zoning of 18.5 acres of single family 6,000 zoning and .13 acres of public community zoning to multifamily apartment zoning, making way for 384 apartments.
The site at 699 N. Lompa Lane in the Lompa Ranch North Specific Plan Area on the east side of I-580 and is split zoned between multifamily and single family 6,000, with a small portion of public community zoning. A special use permit was issued in 2022 for 306 units, but that project did not move forward.
On April 1, the city’s Parks and Recreation Commission approved a concept plan for a small dog and large dog park on the southeast side of the project that will be connected by pedestrian infrastructure.
“We’re excited to get this project moving forward,” said applicant representative Ken Krater. “We do feel that rezoning the entire property multifamily apartment will basically just help carry out the vision of the North Lompa Ranch Specific Plan.”
• Planning commissioners unanimously recommended to supervisors approval of an ordinance that would replace municipal code for temporary use permits.
The new code would restrict certain events like carnivals or temporary sale events to nonresidential zoning districts and limit entities to no more than two permits a year. Permittees would further be limited to 60 days total in a year and to 30 consecutive days for a single event.
Planning commissioners also recommend approval of an ordinance regarding downtown vendor carts. It would not change design standards for vendor carts in the downtown mixed used zoning district but would move approval of such carts from the Redevelopment Advisory Citizens Committee to the Community Development director.
Both of the city’s redevelopment areas are set to expire in the next decade, Sullivan said. She said city code enforcement can address vendor carts in unauthorized zones, prompting Borders to ask if a food truck is a vendor cart.
“No,” Sullivan said.