pretty much the same arguments used in bug #170032, bug #170046 Please remove all %{_libdir}/lib*.la files and static libs from the -devel package. This will reduce libtool/library bloat. Further, it will (mostly) solve the problem of needing to add extreneous Requires: neon-devel to other (-devel) packages built against neon-devel (to account for the references to /usr/lib/libneon.la in their own .la files). (mostly Library) packages with .la files of their own that BuildRequires: neon-devel will need to be rebuilt after this modification. Most notably apr, apr-util. If you insist in still including the .la files (and static libraries), please package them separately into something like neon-static, so it would be possible to omit this extra crud in other rpms that BuildRequires: neon-devel via BuildConflicts: neon-static
rpm requires the static neon library. The .la file is part of the interface. Adding a new subpackage for the static library just increases bloat not removes it.
Yeah, if you insist in including the static lib (and not packaging it separately), then the .la file is required. In the shared-lib-only case, it's not.