Applying the International Property Maintenance Code (IPMC) to all of Nye County is an overreach.

“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” - Ben Franklin

The PVT reports that a law was considered to apply the International Property Maintenance Code (IPMC) to Pahrump and elsewhere in Nye County.

According to Nye County Planning Director Steve Osborne, this law allows the county to … “conduct inspections”and fine homeowners who “occupy as owner-occupant or permit another person to occupy premises that are not in a sanitary and safe condition.”

I have lived long enough to know what I am good at and where I fall a bit short. Housekeeping, and for that matter, yard maintenance are not among my top skills. I typically tidy up when guests visit, but even then, my place would never be featured in Good Housekeeping. The last time family came to my home they asked if it would be OK to bring a power washer on their next visit to spray my back patio.

I am grateful when family — or anyone — voluntarily pitches in to tidy up and make my home safer and more sanitary. But a government bureaucracy inspector showing up with white gloves and a magnifying glass for a forced inspection and wielding enforcement powers to fine me if my humble abode fails to comply with his/her idea of proper wouldn’t be such a welcome guest.

I have lived in places subject to a HOA and been threatened and dragged before an HOA board for a “misplaced” basketball hoop, bushes three inches out of trim, and paint a shade darker than allowed. People are certainly free to choose life under an HOA, but I swore a solemn oath that I would never again live under the thumb of that tyranny.

One major motivation for my move to Pahrump was our town’s reputation as a “live and let live” community. A place where liberty means that residents can pretty much do what they want with their own home and property — make their own decisions about housekeeping and yard work — so long as it doesn’t interfere with the right of others to do the same.

The proposed IPMC is HOA on steroids. This is law backed by the full power and enforcement apparatus of government.

No doubt, some will argue that the IPMC is not intended to harass homeowners over petty matters. I must admit that I have not read the entire eight chapters of the IPMC — my tolerance for boredom goes only so far. But, I do know that EVERY law is subject to alternate interpretations. One person’s “safe and sanitary” may be another person’s noxious nuisance. I am a little leery of the government that told me I must wear a mask for my own safety telling me what is safe and sanitary for my home.

Homeowners ruled by an HOA pay good money to subject themselves to property inspections and fines for property conditions that HOA dictators don’t like. Under an IPMC we would, no doubt, pay increased property taxes— and perhaps other assessments— to fund the inspectors, and bureaucrats needed to keep us in line and assure that our property maintenance is “proper.”

It might be better to suffer the aesthetic blight of a neighbor’s “classic car collection” than pay more tax and surrender more of our liberty to government dictates, inspections, and fines.

On the other hand, anyone — government worker, neighbor or other — who is troubled by the condition of my property is most welcome to stop by anytime… and help tidy up.

Philip S. Bovee is an attorney and writer who has lived in Pahrump since 2023.

Editor’s note: The Nye County Commissioners unanimously rejected the bill to extend the IPMC throughout ALL of Nye County, however it remains in effect under the Pahrump Regional Planning District.