Las Vegas Weekly

[Secession]

On pins and Needles

A tiny burg wants to become part of Nevada. But are they really Nevada-worthy?

Courtesy of Vegas.com

The “What’s New” section of the Needles, California, website contains not one but two—count ’em, two—press releases. The first touts an open house to discuss future roadway projects, while the second reminds Needlesites (or are they Needlesians or Needlesmen and Needleswomen?) that the animal clinic is offering $6 rabies shots.

Still awake?

In the May 1 edition of the Needles Desert Star, we learn that city officials are concerned about the sheriff’s department’s price for servicing their 5,000-person hamlet. We’re really struggling here to—oh, what’s the word?—care.

By way of needlescalifornia.com, we discover that the city is named after “a group of pointed rocks on the Arizona side of the [Colorado] River.”

Scintillating.

Try as we might, we at the Weekly can’t see any reason to accept Needles into our borders. In case you haven’t heard, talk of Needles seceding from California sprang up after San Bernardino County officials refused to fund the town’s struggling hospital. Now some folks want to leave the Golden State for the Silver State.

Ask yourselves, fellow Nevadans, is Needles worthy of our state? We’re all too happy to poach business from our neighbor to the west—last month, Nevada Development Authority employees handed out Gummy Bears on the steps of Sacramento’s Capitol Hill in an attempt to sway entrepreneurs to our friendlier business climate.

But taking a whole city? Give us Napa, not Needles.

We’re already too “California”-ized—we’ve got traffic, smog, gangs and a wallet-crushing real estate market. We don’t need another tax-sucking municipality. Especially one this boring.

If the heavy odds against secession aren’t reason enough to kill the idea—redrawing state boundaries requires approval from both state legislatures, a majority of voters from Clark and San Bernardino counties as well as Congress—we offer a few reasons of our own.

Population. Needles has a total populace of 5,000. Come on—Las Vegas has high schools that size.

Weather. Needles has some of the hottest temperatures ever recorded—125 degrees on July 17, 2005. Does Las Vegas really need that kind of competition?

Jobs. The median income in Needles is $26,108. We can’t exactly see Las Vegans fleeing to the southern border to supplement that income.

Name. No offense to this fine city, but with the recent endoscopy scare, we’d rather steer clear of anything regarding needles.