Local officials are optimistic the Amargosa Valley Science and Technology Park project can be completed and tenants moved in.

The U.S. Office of Inspector General has recommended the county return a $3 million U.S. Economic Development Administration grant awarded in 1999 for failure to complete the industrial park.

The industrial park, and the Pahrump High Technology Center, now the Great Basin College building, were supposed to be part of a high tech corridor along Highway 95 designed to create jobs after the downsizing at the Nevada Test Site in the early 1990s.

"Our plan is to finish the park," said Dave Swanson, Nye County Nuclear Waste Project Office assistant administrator.

"We didn't have enough money to finish it with the original grant and there are a number of reasons for that. One is the escalation of the cost of the materials, particularly steel, from the original project grant," Swanson said. "The second one is a big one. When we originally talked to NDOT about the highway, a turn lane was not part of the equation."

Eventually items like fire hydrants had to be dropped from the improvements and electricity wasn't provided to the site. The audit notes there are unfinished roads in the industrial park, no lighting, a water tank with less than half the specified capacity and a well producing only 50 gallons per minute which had unacceptable arsenic levels.

"As a result of that we couldn't market the office park, it wasn't finished. Now we do have a prospect for buildings there," Swanson said.

The U.S. Department of Energy has talked about moving a sample management facility from the Nevada Test Site to the proposed office park, he said. The State of Nevada has also talked about establishing a site to store geologic materials in environmentally controlled conditions.

The OIG audit stated Nye County should develop a sound marketing plan for the industrial park and labeled the county a high-risk recipient for future EDA grants.

U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D.-Nev., announced the awarding of the grant during a function in Pahrump in December 1999 in which he said it was the largest grant approved in the state by the EDA. The county had the opportunity to purchase 350 acres in Lathrop Wells at fair market value, but only ended up buying 60 acres.

"At the time, this seemed like a worthy and promising project with widespread support in the community," said Senator Reid's spokesman, Jon Summers. "Senator Reid supported this as a hedge against the ongoing job losses at the Nevada Test Site and expected the Economic Development Administration to work with the local leaders to ensure the final project work plan was both viable and stood a reasonable change of succeeding."

Swanson said it would be useful for the U.S. Department of Commerce to send an expert appraiser to establish the value of what was eventually built there.

Nevada District 36 Assemblyman Ed Goedhart, R-Amargosa Valley, was a member of the now defunct Science and Technology Regional Development Corporation in 2001-2002, the board that conceived of the high tech corridor concept. It was also to have included an automotive testing facility in Beatty, refurbishing the old Beatty Bullfrog Mine and enhancing the Tonopah Airport among other projects.

"There were so many people involved and so many consultants. These things drag on for months and years," Goedhart said. "Some things don't get followed up on, t's don't get crossed and i's don't get dotted."

Goedhart called it "paralysis by over-analysis." But he said, "whenever everything was disbanded we were told we didn't have a fully functioning park but we were in compliance with the EDA grant."

The best thing that happened was the county got land privatized that had been under federal control, Goedhart said.

"Whenever you go out for these types of grants it gets exhausting. You get caught in so much red tape," he said. "As you have turnover and consultants come and go it's possible some of that information was not turned over to the EDA on a timely basis."

Nye County used a New Mexico consultant, Don Watson, to supervise the high tech corridor project. The Economic Development Authority of Esmeralda and Nye counties was expected to form an economic development district.

Goedhart noted former Nye County Nuclear Waste Project Office Director Les Bradshaw left in 2004, he also mentioned former consultant Rachel Nicholson worked on the corridor project.

While there were problems drilling a well at the industrial park site, Goedhart said a well was drilled across Highway 95 at the rest stop which turned out to be a good producing well.

"We have 60 acres and at some point people are going to settle in there. We have water rights purchased," Goedhart said. "Now it's just a question of whether they have to pump (water) in from a mile away."

Electricity could also be extended fairly easy to the site, Goedhart said, noting industrial prospects will have more infrastructure there than buying a bare piece of desert.

Goedhart envisions possibly a solar power project on that land, with Valley Electric Association wheeling the power to Nevada Power. A previous solar and wind project however was rejected by the U.S. Air Force on the Nevada Test Site due to interference with radar.

The county has pushed to get the U.S. Department of Energy to have more of a stake in Nye County and house workers at the local level, Goedhart said. While the project wasn't really targeted at Yucca Mountain, the OIG audit noted that repository now isn't set to open until 2017 or later, putting off any economic spin-offs farther into the future.

Nye County Commissioner Joni Eastley, the oldest sitting member of the commission who first took office in January 2001, said the county will absolutely repay the $3 million if that's what it has to do.

"We have to respond to actions that were taken by staff members who aren't even here any more," Eastley said. "We've got a whole new board of commissioners, whole new staff members.

"If somebody did something wrong in the past and we have to take the licks for that we'll do that. We're not going to shirk our responsibility."