BYWAYS PLUS: DATES! - Desert Magazine of the Southwest

Vol.1, No. 2
March, 1980 -*• CLARION*-
"The nosiest newspaper
in the West."
OPERA HOUSE BUYS TOWN
Death Valley Junction was built in 7923 by the Pacific Coast Borax
Company to house its employees.
Tax on Gold Sales Levied on
Producers and Refiners.
California has levied a six per
sent sales tax on sales of gold
bullion by producers and refiners.
Investors have long paid the
usual six per cent retail sales tax
on gold purchased from dealers
but for reasons lost in antiquity
when the precious metal was
boght from miners or smelters,
it was exempt from the sales tax
in Calfornia.
"It probably dates back to
gold rush days when many laws
were passed to make things
easier for miners," said a legislative
analyst. "All we are doing
now is closing what has become
a loophole."
The new law becomes effective
July 1, 1980, and until that
time any bullion purchases from
Tie Desert Magazine/March 1980
refiners or producers do noi
apply.
The new sales tax does not
apply to industrial purchases of
gold by businesses that intend
to resell it, such as electronics
firms that use gold in manufacturing
sophisticated equipment,
or jewelers or dentists who
make products for resale.
It does apply, however, to
business firms that literally
consume gold and do not pass
on the product to customers in a
different form.
An investor in the future may
not avoid paying the tax by declaring
that he intends to sell it
and therefore should be treated
as a business.
Palo Verde Valley TIMES
Blythe, California
Peter Simon's death Valley Junction, for sale with no takers
throughout 1979, has been optioned for $150,000 by operators of the
famed Amaragosa Opera House, the condemned community's only
present "living" resident.
Nevada
Wilderness
Released for
Mining
Operations
Burea of Land Management
Nevada state director Ed Spang
has signed an order to release
420,000 acrea of public land in
Eureka, Nye and White Pine
Counties from further wilderness
consideration.
The decision follows a special,
accelerated wilderness inventory
done to expedite requests
to mine gold and barite in the
area. That special inventory was
released for public comment on
Aug. 3, 1979, Spang said. Public
comments were received from
17 persons: 15 supported the
Bureau's recommendation to
release the areas and noted
numberous roads and other
man-made intrustions, and two
stated the area deserved further
study.
Spang said all comments were
carefully considered and checked.
Based on these comments
and the information gathered
during the Bureau's inventory,
he decided to release the areas
because they lacked naturalness
and outstanding opportunities
for solitude and primitive, unconfined
types of recreation,
[Continued on page 28. ]
The purchase was made feasible
from financial assistance
pledged by the Trust for Public
Land, a non-profit organization
dedicated to the preservation of
historic sites and structures.
Simon, a Jean, Nevada, casino
owner and real estate
developer, had previously asked
$300,000 for the abandoned
town but no bids were reported.
His next scheme was to offer 33
equal shares in the community
at $30,000 each, the funds so
raised to pay for restoration and
necessary repairs to the municipal
water and sewer systems.
State and county health authorities
had closed Death Valley
Junction in its entirety, except
for the Opera House, and ordered
it abandoned earlier in the
year for alleged pollution of the
water supply by contaminants
escaping from the antiquated
sewer system.
Simon hoped to attract investors
interested in establishing a
self-sufficient resort community
just large enough to feed,
house, and entertain a single
busload of tourists at a time.
The only entertainment, of
course, would be famed ballerina
Marta Becket's performances
at her Opera House.
Aside from the Opera House
which has already opened for its
winter season, Death Valley
Junction consists of a small hotel,
a restaurant, a garage and
[Continuedon page 28.]
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