Carson loses a battle to keep auto dealers

On Wednesday, Carson City edged closer to losing its biggest sales tax producers when Michael Hohl and A.M. "Dink" Cryer had the winning $14.6 million bid for the public land just on the other side of the Douglas County line.

Hohl owns six dealerships in Carson City. Cryer owns Carson Dodge Chrysler.

They decided to purchase the 144 acres of land controlled by the Bureau of Land Management just a few days before Wednesday's successful bid.

Hohl told reporters at the sale that Carson's auto dealers had given the city "every opportunity to put something together that made sense."

The signal is clear. Carson's car dealers are getting ready to become Douglas County's car dealers.

Carson City's only chance to stop the sale lies with the federal courts, where the city has sued the BLM. Carson's argument is that not enough work has been done to determine the economic impact of the sale.

Even if the city wins, it will just be a delaying action until the BLM completes another impact statement and the land goes on sale again.

Certainly, neither of the car dealers who purchased the land on Wednesday will be too well disposed toward making a deal with the city should the sale be successfully delayed.

Carson City is home to more than a dozen new and used car dealers, who generate about a fifth of the city's sales tax income. Should the dealers leave for Douglas County it could cost the city coffers up to $3.7 million a year, more than Wal-Mart and Kmart generated together.

That's the bad news.

It is up to Carson City to make something good come out of this. Carson has been reliant on Lyon, Storey and Douglas, essentially economic colonies, to pay its bills for too long.

Retail has gone south, literally, and now Carson needs to find a new source for revenue.

Redevelopment and clean industries are where Carson's future lie. Hopefully.