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County to honor savior of Las Vegas Wash in ceremony today By Mary Manning LAS VEGAS SUN When Vem Bostick came to South­ern Nevada in 1972, it was to study plants and animals around the Nevada Test Site, where the United States ex­perimented with nuclear weapons. But his scientific curiosity and love of research led him to examine water in the desert, and now he is considered a leader in protecting Southern Nevada’s scarce desert wetlands. A four-month research project in the Las Vegas Wash started Bostick into a lifelong pursuit to save the marshes and wetlands being eroded by treated wastewater and frequent flash floods flowing across the Las Vegas Valley. And save them he did. In 1972 Bostick spent January through April on contract with the Uni­versity of JSfevada, Las Vegas, assessing the 12-mill-long wash. The Las Vegas Valley was just beginning to see a popu­lation explosion. By 1974 he became a member of the new Las Vegas Wash Development Committee, coordinating efforts for a statewide parks bond that would even­tually save the wash. Those who were side by side with him exploring the wash agree that Bos- ! i 1 LORI CAIN / LAS VEGAS SUN Researcher Vern Bostick is being honored today for his 30 years of trying to protect Las Vegas Wash. tick never gave up the fight to save the way. wetlands. “We wanted to honor him as a per- The County Parks and Community son, not a politician,” Harris said. “We Services Department will honor Bostick refer to Vem as both the Lewis and the with a monument to his achievements Clark of the Las Vegas Wash.” to be unveiled at 10 this morning at a A grove of cottonwood trees with pond renamed “Vem’s Pond,” said Jeff benches for resting and contemplating Harris of the parks services. The Wet- nature as well as a bronze plaque will lands Park Visitor Center is off Broad- be placed at the pond, Harris said, bent Boulevard east of Boulder High- “It’s about time,” said Norma Cox, 1 * I 1 m 1 ' ? WKm ' H 1 . ? H I ? m ? i I who with the League of Women Voters wetlands can help with the job. joined Bostick’s battle to save the wash “Those contaminants got there from in the late 1970s. “He spent a lot of the Las Vegas Wash,” Bostick said, time fighting for it.” “We need the wetlands to remove what The fight has continued for decades, those treatment plants can’t do.” Only 10 years ago the future of wet- Fortunately, the county, Southern lands in Southern Nevada was not Nevada Water Authority, the Las Vegas bright. Valley Water District, the county Sani- “He made so many politicians angry tation District, federal and state envi-along the way,” Cox said of Bostick’s ronmental agencies teamed up to save frequent appearances before the Clark the wash in the mid-1990s. County Commission, the Nevada Envi- Today Bostick can see the fruit of his ronmental Commission and other water scientific labors as Clark County builds boards. a 2,900-acre wetlands park and hun- Bostick said that on his first visit he dreds of volunteers clean up the gar-discovered nearly 2,000 acres of robust bage in the wash every year, wetlands, 1,500 of them cattail Bostick, 88, said he has watched marshes, when he plunged into the over the decades as the wetlands green ribbon threading across the east- shrunk to less than 200 acres, era edge of Las Vegas. “Sometimes it seemed nobody lis- Over the years the wash has col- tened,” he said. “They could have been lected treated sewage, valley runoff and stopped very easily, but nobody was in-ground water from the entire region, terested.” sending it into Lake Mead. County estimates put the final price All of those flows have eroded the tag for finishing the wetlands park at wash, cutting the channel up to a foot more than $100 million today, deeper every year and taking the plant “It’s awful expensive now,” Bostick life into the lake with them, Bostick said of the multimillion-dollar effort to said. rebuild the marshes. Treatment plants face a growing ___________ - _________ ______ problem of freeing drinking water of Mary Manning is a Sun reporter. She can be harmful chemicals and bacteria, but reached at (702) 259-4065 or by e-mail at Bostick says a properly functioning manning@lasvegassun.com B 1 M a < * > k / 1