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City's Red Tape Sinks Local RAC

City had required owner of Nevada's Mesquite Auto Rental to obtain a used car sales license and jump through additional hoops before being allowed to move the business.

by Staff
April 15, 2009
2 min to read


Mesquite Auto Rental, which had been located in Mesquite, Nevada for nearly a decade, closed its doors on April 1 after the city turned down his request to move to another location in the city, according to Mesquite Local News.

Owner Jim Olson said a city official told him the only place the city would find acceptable was on the western edge of town, near an auto mall. But the only building currently standing in that location is Mesquite Ford, meaning Olson would be forced to buy high-priced city-owned land and build a new building.

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By the end of 2008, Olson had decided to close the business. Mesquite Ford invited him to move his business there because a Hertz car rental company was pulling out of the dealership. But the problems escalated from there.

While Olson was arranging to transfer his licenses, a State of Nevada official required him to obtain a used car dealer’s license. That meant he would have to complete a large number of new application forms in addition to the additional licensing fees. He said he had no intention of getting into the used car business because his car rental business did not involve selling used cars.

He also discovered he would also need a second business license from the City of Mesquite. At that point, Olson decided he’d had enough.

Olson plans to take the remainder of his rental car fleet out of state and sell the cars.

“To be candid, it is easier to close than to comply with new regulations and codes being imposed by Nevada and the City of Mesquite,” he wrote in a note on his Web site.

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