The Our Place county-run shelter for women and families is being passed from RISE management to the often harshly criticized Volunteers of America, after Item 9 passed without discussion this week at a commissioners meeting, despite its more costly bid, according to County Communications Manager Bethany Drysdale.
The item indicated VOA, which has come under repeated criticism for its handling of operations at the previous Record Street shelter and now at the Cares Campus, from several local social workers and the unhoused themselves, was “the most responsive and responsible bidder.”
The item indicated “VOA will provide staffing, program management and administrative oversight for the Our Place campus. The contract will be awarded for a transitional term of two weeks in an amount not to exceed [$75,000] for the period of June 16, 2025 to June 30, 2025 and an initial term of twenty-four (24) months in an amount not to exceed [$3,987,879] for the period of July 1, 2025 to June 30, 2026 and [$4,127,455] for the period of July 1, 2026 to June 30, 2027, with the provision for up to three (3), one (1) year renewals.”
Commissioner Mike Clark, who was seeking a more detailed explanation, received a separate email from Candee Ramos, in the same office as Drysdale, indicating “the evaluation committee, which is made up of both internal staff and stakeholders, scored VOA higher in the scoring process. This was a standard procurement/RFP process that included a qualifications-based process vs. a commodity or construction low bid process. Pricing is only one of the five criteria delineated in the RFP. The team offered to let you see the scoring if you would like.”
VOA’s overall two-year bid was $1.2 million higher than RISE’s which had run Our Place since its opening in 2021, to the surprise and delight of many at the time that a grassroots organization would be awarded such an important county contract.
We contacted RISE executive director Benjamin Castro but did not hear back.
RISE is an acronym for Reno Initiative for Shelter and Equality.
The sprawled out 20-acre Our Place campus includes a free clothing boutique, several family and women’s homes, a general shelter area and a dining hall, which several social workers have told Our Town Reno is a much more welcoming model than the prison like warehouse look and feel of the Cares Campus. Throughout the years, local facilities run by Volunteers of America have had extremely restrictive access for our team of reporters, while with RISE we were able to visit Our Place on our own whenever we asked.
A recent review of the VOA run general Cares Campus shelter from a month ago, which we cleaned up for spelling, indicates: “I just moved to the Reno area and having a place to go for a warm bed and food to eat, I am glad Nevada Cares exists. However now that I have been at the campus for a bit, the staff treats you like it is prison, they have probably 12 showers in one bathroom and I think 3 of them work, have been broken for couple weeks now, you have to stand in line to show, they have a nice kitchen sad they don't use it, Catholic ministry prepares the food and it’s not that good, why they are serving chili in the spring is very questionable, oh wait they serve sloppy Joe's at lunch and then turn the leftover into chili…”
Another by Robert Lintner from a year ago alleged “all the staff are never on the same page with each other and each shift tends to make up their own rules everyday depending on who you are!!!!” echoing similar complaints we’ve received in our reporting of ongoing issues of perceived favoritism, long wait lines and unclear rules at the Cares campus under VOA management.