Graduate Students in Reno Lead Statewide Push to Get Housing Help

UNR and then Statewide Resolutions

After considering the plight of various UNR students regarding their housing and stipends they get, Matthew Hawn, the President of the Graduate Student Association (GSA) which represents the more than 3,600 graduate students at UNR, along with 25 other elected members, decided to present a Housing Resolution to highlight the problems that the current students are facing.

The authors of the resolution, Matthew Hawn (GSA President), Taissa Lytchenko (GSA Internal Vice President), Fatema Azmee (College of Liberal Arts & Journalism Representative), Monika Bharti (College of Education and Human Development Resolution) and Arturo Macias Franco (College of Agriculture, Biotechnology, & Natural Resources Representative) requested American Rescue Plan funds for universities in Nevada to go toward supporting affordable housing for students. After careful consideration, the GSA council members voted unanimously and passed the resolution on November 30, 2021.

A partnership was also formed with UNLV's Nicole Thomas (representing UNLV's Graduate and Professional Student Association-GPSA). Together the two graduate student bodies submitted a similar resolution to the Nevada Student Alliance (NSA) to be presented to the Nevada System of Higher Education Board of Regents.

The NSA acts as an overarching student government association for all 10 NSHE student government organizations and represents 110,000 students.

UNR and UNLV grad students then passed a joint resolution on December 2, urging the state to use American Rescue Plan funds for affordable housing for graduate students. To follow suit, the GPSA, also passed a similar resolution on December 2nd to match the NSA and GSA Resolutions. 

President Hawn believes that with these funds UNR, a R1 Carnegie Institution, will be able to help its highly valued research students diminish some of the unnecessary pressures that a student might face due to high housing costs in the Reno area, which he says serves as a barrier to entry for students seeking a higher graduate degree.

“Unless we ban together to address the devastating problem of unaffordable housing in Nevada, our young and vulnerable generations will continue bearing the crux of the financial burden. Is this really the way we want to equip future leaders of our world? “ asked Taissa Lytchenko, Vice President of Internal Affairs, for GSA. “I truly hope that the current Nevada administration has the willpower to answer this urgent call to action to help our students in need.”

Gripping Testimonies for Help

Other members who also helped put the resolution together include GSA General Council Members Fatema Azmee, Monika Bharti and Arturo Macias Franco.

Bharti, an Indian international Ph.D. student at UNR residing in Reno for the last seven years, said, “I think GSA's Housing Resolution will provide a sense of direction on how to make housing opportunities available to both international and [local] students as well as it gives a clear picture of what barriers do exists when it comes to housing. And I think, without question, creating more affordable housing is fundamentally important.” 

“Prices in Reno are too high, and graduate students cannot afford to live here, we risk losing talented individuals to other institutions because of the prices of rent and the low stipend offered by the University,” said Fatema Azmee, a Master's student in History who has been a Reno resident for the past twenty-three years.

“The cost of living has gone up, but our stipend has remained the same. This resolution is important because legislators and people need to know that the graduate student population is growing at UNR but in terms of funding we are very limited compared to undergraduates. Many people view graduate education as optional, but a higher educational institution cannot function without us. Graduate students lead discussion sections and labs, grade, do research and help undergraduates and professors in other various ways. For example, I have gone out of my way to help my students write their essays holding one-on-one zoom meetings with them during the late evenings or even my weekends. UNR is becoming a top tier institution and the President [Brian Sandoval] has big hopes and dreams for the university. I think it would be wonderful if UNR can become part of the Association of American Universities [an organization of American research universities devoted to maintaining a strong system of academic research and education] like President Sandoval aspires too. However, they cannot reach this milestone without great graduate students, and we cannot be great when we are focused on whether or not we have to choose between rent, gas, or food. Our students are mentally exhausted, stretched thin, and with the increases in student housing are at a breaking point. Receiving funds for student housing would help us succeed, so we can help our undergraduates and our professors succeed too.'“

A Student Not Knowing Where He was Going to Sleep

Arturo Macias Franco, PhD Student in the Animal and Rangeland Sciences Program who also helped with the drafting of the Resolution said he had to have three jobs concurrently while attending school full time, and not always with stable shelter. “I always prioritized my education and making my tuition payments so that I could persevere on my dreams,” he said. “With that, I unfortunately experienced hardships that teenagers and students should never have to experience. Finishing 20-hour shifts, working overnight cleaning carpets and toilets, I recall finishing my shifts not knowing where I would sleep each night. At times, lucky enough to have a couch or a floor inside of friends and family houses, keeping up with my schoolwork and research was extremely challenging.”

Franco said sadly he’s heard of many others who have been in his situation. “No student should ever have to choose between skipping meals, or losing their homes in pursuit of their educational dreams,” he said. “The current increases in rent in Reno are extremely alarming and should particularly be worrisome to NSHE and its institutions for the wellbeing and continuation of many students is at jeopardy. As a land-grant institution, serving the state and all Nevadans should be our focus. It is clear that NSHE, our governing body, and our executive leadership should be committed to serving the wellbeing of all students, not only those who can afford the increasing fees. “

The housing crisis in Reno is not a recent problem but a perpetual struggle that a student faces here, year after year, without a permanent solution. Graduate students only have one graduate housing unit which is now having almost equivalent rent as other apartments in Reno. 

Ponderosa village, a housing complex located on campus, only available to graduate students, professional students, faculty and staff, also proposed a 4.5% increase in their accommodation rates for Fiscal year 2023. This means a one bedroom will go from $1,150 to $1,202 per month for a yearly lease, and a two bedroom full unit from $1,370 to $1,432. There is also a two bedroom shared unit possibility which will go from $705 to $737.

The GSA voted against the proposed rent increase after surveying the residents of Ponderosa village twice. However, the Board of Regents on their December 2, 2021 meeting voted in favor of the rent increase with just one of the regents against and one absent.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

NSA RESOLUTION IN SUPPORT OF PROVIDING FUNDS FROM THE ARP TO INDIVIDUAL NSHE INSTITUTIONS FOR AFFORDABLE STUDENT HOUSING - https://nshe.nevada.edu/wp-content/uploads/Academic-Affairs/Student-Govt/NSA%20Resolution%20Supporting%20the%20Use%20of%20American%20Recovery%20Plan%20Funds%20for%20Affordable%20Student%20Housing%20(Signed).pdf

Reporting by Kingkini Sengupta who is also a Council Member of the GSA

A Free Boutique to Shine at Our Place

Nestled within the sprawling campus for about 250 unhoused women and families off of North St. in Sparks, in the back of building 2A, is the Our Place to Shine Community Boutique. It looks and feels like a cozy vintage thrift shop.

Mary Gilbert is working on painting a new section with more warm colors and a mountain scene to make it look she says “more like a boutique and not an institution.” There’s a row of funky hats, racks full of useful and beautiful clothes, cosmetics, hygiene products, and endless boxes of hand sanitizer. The twist: items here are free for those in need at Our Place.  

“So this area is gonna be the space for kids and male identifying folks,” Gilbert, the community engagement director for the Reno Initiative for Shelter and Equality (RISE) explained on a recent tour. “So I'm in the process of painting this right now and all of this will be filled in the way that is over here. And so over on this side, we've got the women's clothes. So jackets are over here. We have sweaters and long sleeve shirts, bras, underwear, socks, blankets. We also have like work wear. We have like scrubs, we have the uniform black pants, which are common in a lot of the casinos and spaces like that. So it's like a multitude of things. We do have dresses and stuff over here for folks that would prefer to wear a dress for like a job interview. Or we also have women who want church clothes. We have a ton of socks. When I first came in here, we had like virtually no underwear, and now we have so much underwear, somebody when they donated a big box of underwear, I've never seen somebody so excited about underwear.  ”

The items are also a stocking area for Our Place outreach director Wendy Wiglesworth, a notorious expert collector herself, who has donated many of the hats. She will sometimes take blankets to people not yet at Our Place but as part of her outreach efforts along the river, where she used to live herself.

“And a lot of these hats, some of them are really fun,” Gilbert said. “Like I think that honestly there's some of them that people come in and they're like, well, look at this weird hat. Right. Like, at least it brings a smile to their face, even if they're not gonna take it with them.”

Gilbert continues the tour meticulously and explains the worth of having a special boutique.  “We’ve got like pants and makeup, and job interview clothes over here, we have a dressing room. So when I first came into this project, it was just kind of like the requests were filled and taken down, which was definitely effective. Everybody got the stuff that they needed. But now with the support from our Washoe County partners, we were able to make it super pretty in here and a space where women can come in, and essentially shop for clothes.  And they get to decide what they're wearing. And so then they leave feeling better as opposed to, you know, just getting they needed. They can get some stuff that they want.”

The boutique is a partnership between RISE which operates Our Place and the Washoe County Human Services agency.  It’s had a soft opening for the ready women’s area, and plans to do a bigger opening once all areas are finished.  Excess donations are sometimes handed out on a per need basis to other advocates doing outreach. 

“The main focus is obviously the folks that we're serving here on campus, but I'm really fortunate to work with folks that understand that if we have enough, then we should be able to share it with the folks that are out there that we can't quite serve yet,” Gilbert said.

Gilbert herself has lived experience with institutions, “and it wasn't super healing for me,” she says, so she’s trying to get it right with this boutique.  “I’m like, why would we not make this a more comfortable space?  We can bring this to the folks that we're serving and then they can have a much more enjoyable experience than feeling like they're in like some weird flesh tone institution, grabbing clothes, right. Everybody deserves that sort of compassion, dignity, and a beautiful space to spend time in.” 

Gilbert draws on her own experiences of living in poverty to make the store part of the healing journey for residents of Our Place.

“I could never go to a store and just like grab whatever I wanted,” she said. “Like I had to check the price tags and be like, okay, I can maybe afford this. And then like, you gotta go up to the register and then you gotta like put things back or whatever. I think that it's not only like a great feeling to know that you can, you can grab things that make you feel like beautiful or comfortable or, you know, like some of the folks that we've had come in have been like, holy crap, like this is the first time, I felt good about myself in a really long time. And also it gives them that motivation to be like, dude, you know, like if I keep working on my case plan, if I keep moving forward, like eventually I could get to that point where I can go into a store and not have to add everything up, like perfectly in my mind and maybe have to return one or two things. Like it gives them that motivation as well to start moving forward.”

The wide array of blankets is for people entering the boutique to find that blanket that will make them feel more secure at night. They can also choose from different types of pajamas. There’s a table with boxes of chapstick, makeup, hair ties, earrings, toiletries including Black hair products, and travel size items. There’s a wall decorated with fancy purses.  

“For the most part, we do encourage, when they come in, like, remember that, you're sharing this with everybody else,” Gilbert said in explaining in more detail the process of when someone staying at Our Place enters the boutique. “I just ask them to be conscious of that. And we try to make sure that the amount of things that they take, isn't going to overwhelm them on campus.”

Gilbert has been in her job since November and is thrilled with this new part of her duties.  “I was essentially working on my own, working on social media and making all these fun graphics, but I felt like I could be doing so much more. And so this was like, this was just like a dream, right? Like, this is the best because, not only is it a space where people can come and find things that make them feel better, [it also gives them] some peace for a minute…”

It’s also open for community donations which also makes people giving feel better about themselves. “People want to help, but not everybody always has money to donate, but everybody always has at least like some clothing items or toiletry items or something that they can give and so that feels good for the community to be able to contribute these things to the guests that we serve that so greatly deserve it,” Gilbert said.

Our Town Reno reporting, January 2022

Shelby Lopez, Seeking Urgent Help to Avoid Eviction in Reno for Her Family of Four

Shelby Lopez, 26, a stay-at-home mother of two working part-time as a brand ambassador, is trying to raise her two small children in Reno, but now after an unexpected setback for her fiancé Jacob at his work, she’s reaching out on GoFundMe to save her family from being evicted from their two bedroom place at the Vizcaya Hilltop Apartments.

After utilities and pet fees, they’ve been paying about $1,800 a month.  When they moved there several years ago, she says their rent started out at $1580, not a huge increase, but now too high for any wiggle room. 

Shelby says her fiancé, who is 24, works for a local logistics company. A recent problem with that job cost him hundreds of dollars in pay they were expecting. “They deliver like Pelotons and stuff like that,” she explained. “And, his boss just has a contract with XPO Logistics. And so they have big box truck they drive around and his boss owns that. And the engine blew or something on his truck. And so, they were out of work. It was for four days total and it was about like $600.”

In December, the family was only able to pay about 900 dollars rather than their full rent.  “And they said it would be fine just like give 'em what we can like, try and get it paid or whatever,” she said of the apartment managers initially. But she says they then filed paperwork, setting in motion a possible eviction.   “We have a 30-day notice to pay and then we have been emailed and told through our manager that if we don't get the payment paid by the 10th in full that we will be getting the eviction, and then that will be like a 24-hour lockout. I’ve never dealt with anywhere, that's so like, doesn't care. I get that it's a corporate setting, but they're just … they don't care.”

Rent is usually paid by the family on the fourth of every month, and when it’s not paid in full they also get an added late fee of 90 dollars.  Shelby says they now owe $2,009. 

In her GoFundMe post she wrote: “We somehow always seem to figure our stuff out but with Jacob's current job wages he's just not making enough money to cover all our bills and it's finally catching up with us…. We're already doing everything we can, giving plasma, selling our TVs, and anything we have of value that we can replace, but it's still just not cutting it with having enough gas money for work and food expenses. I'm extremely embarrassed and reluctant to post this because I just feel so ashamed that we're in this position in the first place but God has put it on my heart to ask for help so here I am to ask.”  

“You know, I was desperate and so that's why I made it, but it's actually gotten a good amount of traffic. I had a few friends that donated and shared it and my one friend, in Hawaii, she has like 20,000 followers. And so I think that really helped. And so just the kindness of strangers is what is getting us through.” The GoFundMe has been stuck now at $658 of the $1,000 goal for several days.  

Previously in Motels, Thinking of Leaving Reno Eventually

Shelby says it’s been a difficult road already from her family. She says they really wanted to build a life in Reno where her fiancé is from but that eventually it might be too difficult.  Shelby is from Rockland, Califonia, where she says it’s “pretty pricey” as well. “As we moved to Reno, once we got here, it seems like the market just kinda blew up,” she said. 

They initially stayed in motels, including the Reno Royal Motor Lodge, and in a Siegel Suites. 

“We’re trying to start better habits this year and start a savings account with our tax return and get going with that,” she said of hopes for 2022. “We have a car that we only owe about a thousand dollars to a friend of ours that we have a payment plan with and it's worth a good amount of money. It's like a Toyota Land Cruiser. And so just trying to pay that off as quick as we can, and hopefully we'll be able to sell that car. And with the way Reno is, the market, I think we'll be heading out of state, but that's a whole other fun situation in itself I think, figuring that out.”

Shelby doesn’t have family that can help with the kids, and with preschools so expensive and always shutting down with the pandemic that hasn’t been an option to find more work hours for herself.  She says she’s tried getting rental assistance through COVID funding, but was denied.  

“Low cost housing is the biggest issue I think at the end of the day,” she said of people like herself.  “We’re definitely trying to get ahead in life and not let this be our situation every month.”

Our Town Reno reporting January 2022

Richard Bednarski Bids Farewell to Our Town Reno

Reflecting on stories shared

CS: What have you liked the most about being a reporter for Our Town Reno?

RB: I think just getting out there and being in the community and following the stories that happened, especially in the past year and a half. There's been so much shift in the affordable housing crisis and homelessness. Some of that was spurred on by the pandemic, but some of it's burdened by the city, the city council and developers. Just seeing all of those balls kind of roll down the hill and being right there, covering it and telling the stories of the people most impacted has been the part that's brought me the most satisfaction because I get to help bring those voices to the unheard. 

CS: Do you have a favorite story or something that you wrote about that?

RB: I was thinking, because I figured this would be a question of what my favorite story was and I thought about it. I've done a handful of stories interviewing people on the streets and learning their experience. I think all of the stories of me just going down to the Wells underpass and speaking with people who live in tents there before it was swept or see people get swept from the Gateway park a couple of weeks later. Just the idea of going down and meeting with these people and having a conversation with them on a human level was awesome. 

But I did speak to a fellow who was going blind. His name was Troy. And this was about this time last year. He was a contractor for a long time, had a back injury and one thing led to another and he was homeless. And that resonated with me because I have a bad back and I have an injury there and it's something I have to contend with. It just kind of made the point hit home that one thing can make anybody homeless, especially today. The economy where it is and what the whole country, the whole world has seen in the past year and a half with the pandemic. His story really stuck out.

Further reporting, he's now at the Cares Campus. As of probably September, I saw him there doing another story. He was waiting in line to get some food and some provisions from a community member who came down there on a weekly basis to help provide services that they're not getting, or that are not being met at the Cares Campus. So it seems like he's in good hands. At least at the Cares Campus, he's got a roof over his head, but I haven't talked to him since last year.

Another part of the reporting I've done that has stuck with me is the advocates. There's so many advocates for the unhoused here in Reno. It's crazy. It seems like they're doing so much more than other people or other entities that have the resources that aren't just putting forth the effort. Whereas these community members, just like you or me or any of our listeners, are stepping forth and using their own resources, their own time and money to help these people who have fallen on hard times. And that spurred a photo project for me kind of focusing on them as a way of promoting the efforts of what they're doing to help the unhoused. 

One of the people Bednarski wanted to mention specifically was Troy, who Bednarski connected with on a deeper level. (http://www.ourtownreno.com/our-stories-1/2020/11/26/troy-living-in-a-tent-in-reno-with-a-bad-back-and-going-blind)

Changing views on the streets of the Biggest Little City

CS: Since you started reporting, how do you think this work has changed your views on the unhoused or housing insecure people and like those issues surrounding them?

RB: I think it's made me more empathetic towards their struggles and their problems. One thing that I kind of knew going in before I started reporting on them is there was kind of a mental health issue, but it's far more prevailing than I would've ever imagined beforehand. And it's something that's not getting addressed. A lot of people that think of the homeless, they just look at them as having some sort of issue; they're on drugs, they're drunk, whatever. But, often they're in that state because of some sort of underlying mental health issue. That is something that I don't think is being as addressed as readily as it needs to be.

And then also seeing so many hotels get just destroyed and leveled by the Jacobs Entertainment company has been extremely frustrating to me. Because yeah, these hotels weren't the best living conditions, but with a little bit of investment, they could have become great transitional housing. Not only do we have more people moving onto the streets, we have empty buildings. Now if we want to create some sort of transitional housing, we have to use all those environmental resources to build something new. It's more impactful on the environment. It's more impactful on the economy because that money now has to come from somewhere and it's a lot cheaper to refabricate and renovate a building than it is to build one brand new.

I'm still upset at the hotel's getting destroyed. And there's two more on the docket and I'll probably kind of try to document them again. I documented one earlier this year, the Townhouse Motor Lodge. I'll probably continue that project as well to showcase the story because Reno is changing and it's at this point where city officials and residents can put forth effort to make Reno become a great town or a great city. But I don't know if those steps are going to be taken, and if we get too big, then the homeless issue is going to get worse and worse and it's going to be harder and harder to fix. 

It's going to be interesting to see what comes out with this, this investigative piece and what happens next year, being an election year. There's a lot of important city seats that are up for reelection, including mayor. So we'll see what happens. 

A photo Richie Bedmarski took of Carl at the Wells Ave. tent city before it was swept as people were encouraged to go to the newly opened Nevada Cares Campus in 2021.

Evolving as a Multimedia Journalist

CS: How would you say that Our Town Reno shaped your work specifically as a journalist?

RB: I came into this program hoping to come out as a stronger photographer and get a job in photography. But those jobs are unicorns and they're few and far between unless you want to lug TV equipment around and work for a TV studio, which I am not about to do.

So I fell in love with audio and it was because of the reporting and the interview style that I do with Our Town Reno and some audio classes that I've had that have really shown that audio, to me, is really fun. It's a really interactive and engaging way to produce the story. I get to think differently than I do if I'm writing or photographing the story. I never thought I'd get into audio, but now I have a podcast that I'm hoping to continue after school, and I hope to use my audio skills in the future for a job and to supplement and augment my photography. 

Bednarski closely followed Jacobs Entertainment as they bought out and then destroyed locally owned motels in the Reno area. Photo by Richard Bednarski.

Plans for the Future

CS: What's that podcast about?

RB: It's called Changing the Climate. It's a podcast that's geared towards changing the conversation around climate change with the idea that I can take the science of a lot of things and distill it down into kind of a conversational level. That will allow people to think differently about climate change so that it's not always doom and gloom. And there's some sort of positive or solutions oriented ending to my stories. The first season is all about wildfire and it's kind of what my master's project is. It’s about how climate change is shifting the fire regime across the West. I utilized a lot of the interviews I did for my masters and the research I did and built a more specific story based podcast out of it.

CS: Where did you start getting into climate change reporting? 

RB: It's something I've always been interested in. I'm a huge environmentalist and conservationist and that philosophy kind of drives everything I do. Moving into journalism, it was kind of natural for me to focus on the environment. And a lot of that comes from just love of being outside, being in nature and away from buildings and cities. I figured if I could get into storytelling about the environment, then I could have more opportunities to be outside. 

CS: What are your plans for after you graduate? Would you like to continue with climate change reporting? Stay here in Reno?

RB: I’ve gone back and forth about where I want to end up, but I know I need a job where that job's going to be, I'm not sure. Ideally, I've landed on staying in Reno initially. I thought maybe I'd move to cover something else, but as I thought about it more and more, I've been in Reno for so long. I'm really invested in this community. I know a lot of people, I have a lot of sources and I know a lot of the issues. I think having that insider perspective is going to bring something to local journalism that it is in dire need of right now to kind of help rebuild. So I'm hoping to stay in Reno and find a job. I don't know where it will be, but I do want to eventually focus on the environment, climate change and natural disasters. I think in the long-term, it'll probably be a freelance base where I can pick and choose what stories I tell. I just need to get there. Hopefully there'll be a break there. But if a job comes, the job comes, but I'm hoping to take a week or two off work.

CS: Where can people find you and find your work? 

So let's see I'm most active… in person. So that's kind of hard to find me. I have Instagram @photo_bednarski and that's not as active right now because of school, but that's where I kind of do a lot of my photography and promote my podcast. And then I have a Twitter, which @bednarskiace, and then @converseclimate is the Twitter account for my podcast. My website is just richardbednarski.com and I'm always open to talk about anything really.

CS: Is there anything else you'd want to tell people reading?

RB: No. Just keep being you and keep making humans awesome. 

Interview and Reporting by Catherine Schofield for Our Town Reno

Complaint about CHA Grant by Former Employee is Being Looked at in Washington

The email message is short but to the point.

“This matter is still ongoing. I’ll reach out to you if we need additional information necessary to advance this case,” Special Agent Ike Abanobi, from the Office of Inspector General with the U.S Department of Health and Human Services, wrote back to James Fleming in mid-December. Abanobi is part of an operation overseeing the HHS’s portfolio of programs.

The matter in question here is Fleming accusing his former employer, the Community Health Alliance, a Federally Qualified Health Center catering to lower income populations in northern Nevada, of not adequately spending $455,059 of recent grant money earmarked for COVID testing.

The Health Resources and Services Administration grant for the March 2020 to March 2021 period came with stipulations to “purchase, administer, and expand capacity for testing to monitor and suppress COVID-19.”

But documents on CHA spending that grant money obtained by Fleming through the Freedom of Information Act (including below) have no checks in the testing category. There are marks for staff and patient safety, including the purchase of dental suction systems and blood pressure cuffs, maintaining health center capacity and staffing, including upgrades to its telephone system and replacing flooring in a mobile medical unit, and expanding Telehealth capabilities, but in the delineated testing category, there are no indications of any activity.

Fleming says CHA staff could have put efforts into reaching out to the unsheltered and lower income immunosuppressed in the community, and find a way to actually protect them with testing.

Fleming says he’s looking forward to what the investigation comes up with. “They're experts and they have a very large budget and I'm looking into other fraud cases, you know, around the country that they've looked into because they publish what they've done and what they've caught people doing. And that gives me a lot of confidence,” he told Our Town Reno during a recent interview at the downtown library. 

Misspending the grant money is just one accusation he makes, as he also alleges other manipulations, including increasing the number of unhoused and agricultural migrant workers the CHA serves to get access to more funding, using Telehealth as a means to make more money, being way overstaffed with over a dozen employees for the results he saw accomplished for the CHA’s WIC outreach program and losing his job for reporting internally on activities he believes were wrong.  WIC is the government program which offers free nutritious foods, health and social services referrals, breastfeeding support and nutrition education for women, infants and children. 

Fleming says one recent goal seems to have been to repurpose money that doesn’t actually help the community, but helps the CHA itself. “Imagine like water going into a giant pool,” Fleming said as a way of explaining this. “Like if you had water in a pitcher that was just meant to water the garden, but instead you just poured it into the pool. You can't really see where the flower watering money went.” 

He also describes 2020 as a perfect storm of fewer services and more federal money. “We were closing facilities for many months the dental program, the homeless facility shut down. So a lot less services, but more money coming in because you not only do the regular yearly grants and contracts keep coming in, but the Cares Act emergency funding and the paycheck protection plan money is coming in at the same time.”

Fleming says more staff were hired, such as a chief legal officer.  Fleming has been trying to organize a meeting with Casey Gillham, listed on the CHA website as the Chief Administrative Officer, and while that seemed like a possibility at first, his recent Medium posts, where he accuses CHA of fraud, seem to have put that type of meeting off the table.

Fleming recently pointed Our Town Reno to documents (including above) indicating salaries have gone up recently, such as for  CHA’s CEO Oscar Delgado, who was listed as making $180,000 in the position in 2019, raised to $199,166 in 2020.  The previous CEO Charles Duarte was listed as making $146,264 in 2018. Fleming sees this as a disturbing overall trend of money not being used to help those most in need.

Fleming also posts his stories on Facebook, often tagging city council members including Delgado. He’s also sent versions to the Reno Gazette-Journal as letters to the editor. 

While he used to be able to tag Delgado, that option was removed in late 2021.   “I think it tells me that he's at least noticed a little bit or somebody has told him, ‘hey, some guy's airing out dirty laundry.’”

Our Town Reno reached out to several employees at CHA including Delgado for a response before the Christmas holiday season.  Megan Duggan, the Director of Community Relations for CHA, emailed a detailed response this week with Gillham cced. 

In terms of the grant for testing and Fleming’s allegations of misuse, Duggan wrote: “This belies a misunderstanding of the HRSA grant process. First, CHA had to apply for the grant. As part of that process, CHA is required to inform HRSA what it expects to spend the funding on. HRSA reviews the application and makes a determination as to whether to award the funds. Second, CHA has to provide quarterly updates and documentation to HRSA on what the funding has been spent on. At any time, if HRSA does not believe the purchases are within the scope of the award, it can prohibit the Health Center from drawing down additional funds. CHA was awarded the funding and never received any indication from HRSA that CHA somehow used this funding inappropriately.”

She also addressed his allegations of how people are categorized when being helped. “Mr. Fleming has also alleged that CHA has inflated the number of homeless people it serves in exchange for some financial benefit,” she wrote. “This is simply not true… In 2018, CHA reported serving 2,250 homeless patients. In 2019, CHA reported serving 2,257 patients, which is seven more patients than 2018. In 2020, CHA reported seeing 881 homeless patients. First, CHA does not receive some type of “yearly bonus” based on the specific number of homeless individuals that we serve. To that point, there is no incentive to inflate that number. Second, if CHA’s intention was to inflate the number of homeless people it served, why would we have reported a nearly 150 percent decrease in 2020?”

In terms of WIC she noted in part: “The National WIC Association reported that since 2017, WIC clinics across the country have reported a heightened level of fear among immigrant and mixed-status families participating in WIC services, prompting eligible families to refuse access to vital nutrition and breastfeeding support. Due to this fear, families have sought to withdraw from WIC services over the years. Hence, the decline in our numbers, though, we continue to be optimistic and ensure the protection of patient information, including one’s immigration or citizenship status. To emphasize, WIC funds are used for WIC services only. In August 2020, the State of Nevada performed an audit to ensure that expenses charged to the WIC program were in accordance with established cost principles in 7 CFR 246 and 7 CFR 3016. The audit stated that ‘[n]o findings were noted.’”

Also included in the email was explaining in person outreach and assistance for unhoused communities: “With regard to the homeless healthcare services CHA provides, we continue to provide free health services (primary care, dental, behavioral health and pharmacy) to the homeless population at our six other health centers in Reno and Sparks,” Duggan wrote.  “Additionally, CHA provides medical services on-site through our Mobile Medical Center at OUR Place weekly. Our dental team also regularly visits OUR Place to provide dental screenings and fluoride treatments to pediatric patients. If restorative care is needed, our team follows up to ensure they have access to transportation and can receive the necessary care at our Wells Ave. Health Center. Up until approximately three weeks ago, CHA had an employee serving as a homeless outreach specialist, who would routinely visit homeless camps in attempt to arrange for individuals to receive services. The individual who was serving in that role resigned to take a position with the County.” 

There was an article published by This is Reno in November which had back and forth as well between Fleming and Duggan over how the unhoused are counted. Fleming says he was happy with that article as ultimately he says he wants more discussion, openness and transparency in how the CHA operates and funds different programs.

Fleming says he worked for CHA from October 2017 through February 2021 as a “statistician.” We weren’t able to confirm the exact dates of his employment, but he says he started doing data extractions related to dental services CHA provides, and then he says when he did his job well he became “the data guy for everything.”  

“I’d be reporting to the federal program that fund CHA and also for internal internal requests, like where are our patients? Where do they live? Where's a good place to build a new clinic? Do we have people coming from Sun Valley enough that it's worth it to open up a clinic there, those kind of metrics,” he explained. “And, also like is the dental department charging out enough services and receiving enough from Medicaid to justify having a dental department, you know, internal questions like that.”

In February 2021, though, he says that after complaining to high level staff that CHA was “turning in false data,” publicly available data he says which did not reflect his own work, and then later that he was filing his complaints to federal authorities, he says he was let go from his job. 

He admits part of his current pursuit is “vindictiveness” but that he also wants to do good for the community and CHA in the long run.  He says he was complimented for how he was doing his job initially and feels he was then doing what he was supposed to do.  “Like if you see something, say something,” he said.  He says he loves the idea behind the Community Health Alliance and just wants to make sure it uses the money it gets wisely to help the people who need it the most.  

CHA’s Duggan concluded her email saying:  “CHA prides itself on serving the most vulnerable in our community. It is unfortunate that Mr. Fleming has resorted to wild, outlandish, and false allegations.”

Our Town Reno Reporting, January 2022

Agorism, What is it and could it be what Reno needs?

Rooted in Non-Violent Anarchy and Individual Counter-Economics

“It can be many things; it’s a political philosophy, it’s a form of economics, or counter-economics,” explained long-time Nevadan and business owner, Kevin, when asked to explain the concept of agorism, which was brought up on Twitter recently and piqued our interest. It can also be the pursuit of a range of lifestyles. Kevin believes it has the potential to be a form of social change. 

“It’s a form of anarchism,” he explained, one that is based on free-market forms. Anarchy sometimes gets painted as rooted in violence and riots, but the true definition is simply a society without a government and absolute freedom of the individual. Some see this as lawlessness while others view anarchy as a path to self-reliance and sufficiency. 

“The central grain of agorism is to eventually deprive the state of its source of funding,” said Kevin. This form of government has no central funding platform and fully believes in the power of the free market. “Agorism advocates non-violence,” he added.

Kevin feels that any society that does not have to deal with the surveillance and taxation of the state is more productive and can offer more wealth to all its members. “The goal is to exist without all the baggage that a state comes with,” he explained, including state-sponsored wars.

“I think agorism points to contradictions in Marxist philosophy and gives us a better way to look at it,” he added, explaining further. He feels agorism takes the better parts of Communism, anarchy, capitalism and combines these elements into a new package that embodies the spirit of the individual. 

Created by Samuel Konkin, a political philosopher, it came out of the split between libertarians that occurred in the 1970s. One group sought to seek change through political means while another group realized there was a contradiction. “Between wanting to get rid of the state and seeking political power through the state,” Kevin explained.

According to Wikipedia, Konkin rejected voting, “believing it to be inconsistent with libertarian ethics. He likewise opposed involvement with the Libertarian Party, which he regarded as a statist co-option of libertarianism.” 

Cryptocurrency is a contemporary example of a form of agorism, according to Kevin. Anyone taking means to avoid paying taxes is also an agorist in his book. The waiter who does not claim all of his tips or the driver who avoids registering her car, all agorists. These subtle steps lie in the shallow end of agorism while living fully off the grid and being completely self-sufficient occupies the deep end. 

“We all take means to evade the burdens that the state imposes on us,” Kevin said.

The Experiment of Burning Man, and the Free Market as Opposed to Capitalism

Burning Man, the arts and culture festival was founded on agorist principles but according to many has since been overrun by corporations looking to cultivate a sense of agorism, if only for a week. In a purse sense, it’s a way for the individual to reclaim a portion of their perceived lost rights by not paying taxes or acknowledging the state; by focusing on the notion that the free market is always right and can be trusted. 

“Agorism will divide the economy into three parts,” Kevin explained. Part one is the red market, the only one that comes at the expense of human lives. The other two, the gray and black market are more attainable to live under. Though Kevin did not elaborate on these two, he said the important part of agorism is to avoid the red market.  According to Wikipedia, the Counter-Economy “excludes all State-approved action (the "White Market") and the Red Market (violence and theft not approved by the State).”

“You can barter for goods, if you’re a business person, you can exchange goods and services,” he explained. There are many ways for anyone to ascribe to agorist principles. Raising your own food, providing your own power, or riding a bike. Kevin explained many of the things people already do would categorize them as an agorist. 

“I think the free market, as opposed to capitalism, provides opportunities to improve the quality of people's lives,” he explained. “It gets rid of the onerous burden the state imposes by getting rid of taxation.”

Based on these explanations, do you think agorism could be applied even more locally, how so, and would that be a good development?

Our Town Reno reporting by Richard Bednarski

A Local Farm Manager Keeps Busy in the Winter with Reno Food Systems

As the recent wave of pogonip covered many parts of a local five acre farm, the sun set on the shortest day of the year. The fields were all covered with tarps and tires as the farm manager fixed the shade structure for the goats. The farm dog, Lefty, was on guard duty as I waited.  Heavy snow was on its way.

Most food travels nearly 2,000 miles from farm to table, sometimes thousands and thousands more. Much of the food is held under refrigeration, further increasing carbon emissions. Local food rarely travels more than a few miles and does not lose quality, flavor, or nutritional value in that short distance. 

“It’s meant to be a place where a person can come and learn about agriculture,” explained Lyndsey Langsdale, the farm manager of Reno Food Systems. We stood outside of the solar powered refrigerator in the last sunny spot of the day, which was quickly fading. 

Reno Food Systems is an urban farm located on the corner of Mayberry drive and McCarran boulevard. Everything from fruit to fresh vegetables to medicinal and culinary herbs are produced on the lot during the growing season. Everything is grown organically and with sustainability in mind.  

“We have workshops, we have volunteers, we have interns,” said Langsdale. The farm has become a staple in the local food community. “We also do a lot of educational things as well.”

The non-profit began as a vision between a few friends about five years ago and this last season was the fourth successful growing season on the farm. Next year they hope to expand growing into the winter. Currently, somewhere between Reno and Iowa is a large hoop house they ordered and plan to set up during the winter. This will extend the growing season.

Reno Food Systems can be found on the web at renofoodsystems.org

“We have a very special opportunity to be able to steward this land…and make it something that’s a benefit to the community and do it in a way that makes sense to use and matches our values as humans” said Langsdale. This project allows the people behind the organization to work in a way they want to live their lives and exist as community members. “We get to create that from scratch.”

This philosophy has spilled beyond growing food, allowing Reno Food Systems to become more than an urban farm. Notably, they have a food justice program. The highlight of this program is a mobile farmer’s market. “That’s where we take our truck out to different food desert type neighborhoods,” explained Langsdale. A food desert is a place where there is no access to fresh food. These are typically lower-income areas without a grocery store in walkable distance. 

Langsdale explained there is a federal program that provides coupons for low income people to use at farmers markets, however, many times, she said, these coupons go unused as farmer’s markets are not accessible. The mobile food truck combats this by parking in these areas around town and providing fresh and nutritional food.

“We parked our mobile farmer’s market at the Reno Housing Authority’s low income senior residence this year,” explained Langsdale. This allowed the use of state provided coupons for seniors to use at farmers markets. 

Another way Reno Food Systems stands out in the community is by donating food. This year alone, Langsdale estimates they donated about 1,000 pounds of fresh vegetables to people experiencing food insecurity, including the unhoused. They do this by working with many of the community partners and advocates.

As a non-profit the organization must stay funded. They accomplish this through a three-tiered funding model: sales of produce, grants, and memberships. This requires everyone at the farm to wear many hats in order to grow the food and earn the money to stay afloat. There are a few local community grants they receive and these required diligent reporting and management. 

Ways a community member could support the farm is by shopping there during the growing season or purchasing seedlings for a garden. However, they also have a membership program which allows people to create a recurring donation. 

“Finding the funding and staff to maintain grant writing and all of the fun little details in writing grants and reporting on them,” has been the largest challenge Langsdale explained. This year they ran into many overwhelming moments as a team as they are pushing capacity. “I think all of our team members are the type of people who want to do everything.”

With the sun long set and the temperature dipping, Langsdale was optimistic about the farm and the value it is providing the community. “Our goal is to be an asset to the community, but we don’t expect to plop a farm in the middle of a neighborhood and think that everybody is going to understand what we’re doing,” she said. It is a two-way street they are working through together with the community around them.

“Definitely being conscious of how we affect the neighborhood, both the positives and the negatives and really working with our immediate neighbors to be an asset and teach about the realities of growing food,” Langsdale said.

Our Town Reno reporting by Richard Bednarski

JP Harvey with Helping Hands Loving Hearts in Reno

Imagine a storage unit stocked with jackets, boots, hand warmers, and blankets where anyone in need of an item can walk in and take what they need. Free of cost. What if this resource was made available to the most vulnerable, the unhoused.

“Our goal someday is to have something like that,” explained JP Harvey, a Reno resident who has seen the city change from okay to worse in regards to housing insecurity in her lifetime. The mother of three, she wants to make the world a better place, to change it. 

That is why she first started volunteering with the Reno Burrito Project earlier this year. Working with the founder of that group Blaize Akanaab Abuntori and watching other volunteer advocates give their time, energy and ideas, inspired her to do more than just roll burritos.

“I saw all the work that, not only Jessica [Castro] and Bill [Simms], but everybody in the community has been doing more hands on and I decided to take that leap and do more hands on work,” explained Harvey on a chilly morning. She currently is working towards continuing her education at the University of Nevada, Reno and studying sociology in order to better understand what challenges people face to provide better advocacy. “I’ve been in Reno a really long time, I grew up here, and I just want to help as much as I can.”

Currently, Harvey is focusing on building a better bridge between advocates, community members, and officials. “I think it seems everybody is overwhelmed,” she said. She explained that the pandemic and raising rent costs are all compounding to create a situation no one has seen before. “A lot of the people I meet doing outreach, have jobs,” she explained. Yet they are still living on the streets. The main issue, Harvey believes, is that there is not enough affordable housing.

Harvey has joined forces with Simms and Castro and formed a group known as Helping Hands Loving Heart. Castro, formerly unhoused, understands the plight of living on the streets and has been providing food and essential items to anyone wiling to take them for a while now. Simms, who currently lives in low-income housing, understands the stress and concern of being on the brink of living on the streets. Nonetheless, the three have pooled together their time and resources to spend nearly every day of the week conducting outreach and providing resources for anyone in need. Be it food, a blanket, hand warmers, or boots. 

“Honestly, it is probably just being out,” explained Harvey about her niche of advocacy. “I am probably out seven days a week.” When she gets word about someone needing something, she make it a point to procure those items and hand deliver them. Whether it is through donated items, monetary donations, or her own money—Harvey makes sure boots are on cold feet. Especially as we enter the coldest part of the year. 

“Just making sure everyone has what they need,” she said. 

This is not easy work and takes a toll on the mind. But Harvey keeps pushing ahead knowing that her work is impactful and helps ease the strife of living on the streets. Recently, she learned that some she helped were able to get housing and this encouraged her to carry on. The single thing that keeps her moving ahead is allocating a bus pass for someone so they can get to work. “I mean it’s so easy for me to do but it makes such a huge impact.” Harvey is the middle woman, helping convert cash into donations and connecting these donations to those in need. The best way to provide a donation, be it a jacket or tarp or tent or cash, is to reach out to Helping Hands Loving Heart on Facebook. She said one of the three will make it a point to connect. 

“The biggest thing right now for the wintertime is just jackets, and blankets, and tents, and shoes, and boots,” she explained. “If [anyone] reaches out to us we can figure out a place to distribute that to the community. 

“A lot of the unhoused people think they are forgotten about,” Harvey said was the most challenging aspect of her work, along with the sadness and grief. “They just feel like people don’t care about them or there are stigmas attached to people being unhoused.” We talked a lot about this stigma and it is something that pops up on social media a lot. People pointing the finger and looking down upon the unhoused; when in reality, the majority of American citizens are one calamity or paycheck away from joining the ranks of the unhoused. 

One thing Harvey talked about is the fact repeated sweeps of encampments are detrimental to her work. When she saw that an encampment by the university was recently being swept, she was aghast. The day prior she was down there talking with the folks and passed out goods to many of the unhoused. Some of these newly purchased items were just gathered and tossed into a dumpster by city officials and will be hauled out to the landfill.

As winter is with us, Harvey and the others are assembling bags equipped with blankets, socks, undergarments, and food. As she has done in recent weeks, she will spend the next few weeks as 2022 begins, driving around looking for encampments and passing out goods to anyone in need. Harvey will be thinking about how to expand Helping Hands Loving Hearts into a storage unit lined with provisions.

“With the city and county displacing more people…I want to save the world,” she said. “If this is what I can do, to put my little hand in there and do that, that’s what I’m going to do.”

Our Town Reno reporting by Richard Bednarski

Tuesday Nights at the Believe Plaza with the New Family Soup Mutual Aid Group

Family Soup Mutual Aid started just over a month ago as a leaderless group to help support the unhoused population and others in need in Reno. As of right now, this group is run entirely on donations from the community and has seen great success since starting.

Nicole Anagapesis, 28, moved to Reno in June of 2019 and immediately felt unhoused individuals weren’t being treated well in our city. With the change in weather, Anagapesis and a group of her friends decided it was time to take matters into their own hands and began searching for winter gear to donate to people weekly.

“I think that the whole concept about mutual aid is that if there is need you can try and help out and do everything you can within your own power to try to remedy horrible situations that people are living under,” Anagapesis said. “Especially right now with the aggressive gentrification of Reno that we’re seeing.”

From lack of affordable housing to a decrease in public space, Family Soup Mutual Aid wants to advocate for people who are often left behind.

“We’re doing what local government won’t. Distributing necessities to the community who needs it the most,” Anagapesis said. “This is a community space and we want to keep it that way.”

Sienna Russell, a member of Family Soup Mutual Aid, helped a woman find clothing that fit her from the dwindling pile that had been brought. People were coming up to Family Soup members in the Believe Plaza for an hour before they ran out of food and winter gear.

So far, their Tuesday night distributions have been increasingly attended. Anagapesis said that Family Soup has hopes to increase people’s awareness of the program.

“I recognize them, they don’t always recognize me,” Anagapesis said. “I think what’s important and what we would like to do is have people recognize us and have them know that, yes you’re a part of this community, we care about you.”

Right now the group is small, but mighty. Family Soup totals six consistent members including Anagapesis. But people are always welcome to help through donations or attending the weekly distributions.  “I think that anybody who can do, whatever they can do, is doing enough. That’s really where our heads were at when we got together and decided that this is a project that we wanted to work on,” Anagapesis said.

These people were sorting through donations looking for clothing for winter. All the present members of Family Soup said that winter gear and blankets have been the most requested items by unsheltered people.

Family Soup will be collecting clothing donations at the Matador on December 22. Your donation gets you $2 off the cover charge for the 6:30 p.m. show.  Distributions take place every Tuesday at 5:00 p.m. at the Believe Plaza downtown. You can reach out to Family Soup through their Instagram @familysoupmutualaid.

Reporting and Photos by Catherine Schofield for Our Town Reno

From Unhoused to Hemorrhaging Finances and Run Arounds, Students Face Massive Rent Challenges

A Student Quits Due to Lack of Housing

During the Fall semester, on a Monday afternoon as I walked into the class that I was a Teaching Assistant for, one of the students wanted to leave the classroom early. The Professor excused him. The following class the student requested the teacher that he wanted to leave early again. He said: “I am homeless and it is getting cold, I want to enroll into a shelter facility before they close for the day.”

The following week, he emailed, informing us that he was taking the semester off and expressed his hopes to return in the Spring.

Such is the story of one of the many students who are facing the housing affordability crisis full force in Reno. The prices of apartments are continuing to rise and students are struggling to make ends meet.

Many students who are able to find housing facilities are also faced with additional troubles of allotment and move-in date deferment because the builders are unable to hand over the apartments on the stipulated time. This problem doesn't just affect undergraduate students but graduate students through limited state-funded stipends that haven't been increased since 2018.

Not As Expected at Park Place

Katelyn Counts is a pre-nursing student enrolled in her second year of college with the University of Nevada, Reno.

She had signed a lease with Park Place (above on Virginia Street north of campus) in April of 2020 and was told that her move-in date would be on August 15th. However, she could not move into Park Place until October 1st. She says she also did not get to choose her roommates, paid an additional $25 to the existing $825 of her rent and got allotted a totally different apartment than the one she was initially promised. She had to take it. However, the living conditions were not as expected.

After moving in she was living underneath construction as the floor above her was not done yet, according to her. This was not the only ordeal Katelyn had to go through. Before officially moving into the complex  she was constantly receiving uncertainty from the management over the actual move-in dates. She was asked to stay temporarily at the Circus Circus casino and hotel in Downtown Reno. Katelyn was paying the same rent amount ($825/month) to stay there without any amenities on a floor that also hosted strangers and not just students. '“Coming home late at night to a casino hotel was a little scary as a young woman,” she remembers.

In terms of food, they were also promised free “breakfast” which consisted mostly of granola bars.

“I think the biggest part was mostly just like trying to figure out what to do for food. Because there weren't microwaves in any of our rooms,” she said. “We only had a mini fridge and they said like, oh you can use the microwaves downstairs. But then the store wasn't open for a lot. Like it closed at 8:00 PM. So I had to work until like one a.m. and wouldn't be able to get food unless it was in my fridge. So I had Starbucks food for most of the time, which I worked at Starbucks and at the time they were doing a free meal every day.”

Katelyn also adds that she was lucky enough to have her family just hours away from Reno but realizes that it is a lot for a student to deal with housing issues, figure out their food, walk to school as well as deal with midterms and submissions all at the same time. She also says grades are everything for a student and research students should not have to deal with the added stress of finding housing. 

A Mess of “Clerical Errors,” Noise and Bad WiFi

Nathan Noble, a current Park Place resident, a sophomore at UNR and an elected senator with the Associated Students of the University of Nevada, Reno (ASUN) had no different experience.

He was tired of living in the overpriced dorms and was excited to be able to choose his roommates before moving into Park Place. As a person who loves to cook his own meals, he was also elated to have a kitchen. However, he too faced constant delays for his own move-in and could not do so until November 12. His initial move-in date was July 30th.

While waiting for his apartment to be ready, he too had to put up with residing at Circus Circus. He was paid back in installments of $500 as he had a roommate.

“The common feeling was that it was hush money really to stop anyone from filing action against them or from  trying to do something about it,” he said. “But basically that money only went so far because it didn't even compensate for rent. Also when I moved out, they still charged me for Circus Circus rent. Their accounting structures are very bad. They were scrambling and it's not the fault of the front desk workers or the Park Place workers. They were honestly doing the best they could in a terrible situation. It's really the fault of management for not handling this very professionally. I know people who never got their checks, I know people who never got their prorations, people who ended up paying for parking for two months when they were living in Circus Circus, where parking is free, just a bunch of very serious clerical errors.”

Nathan describes his Circus Circus experience as a deeply unpleasant one. They did not have amenities, noise control and the wifi kept going out which made it impossible for students to do school work.

Additionally, Nathan went to his friend’s house to be able to cook and bring food back for storage for the rest of the week. Nathan was thankful to have a vehicle that helped him in this but expressed his concerns for the many students he represents.

There was the emergence of an idea to craft a housing resolution for students. ‘The most important thing that we can do with our voice is advocate on behalf of students who are suffering from a lack of basic necessities,” he said. “And as I painfully discovered over the past few months, housing is certainly one of them, usually the emphasis is put on food, water and all that stuff. But housing is a key one. Especially if you're going to school the next day. I believe that a resolution will not only allow the university to take some form of broader action to adjust their process for dealing with housing complexes off campus but I also believe that it's important for the student body to stand up and claim control over what's going on because it affects students and there should be some kind of student oversight.”

Not Quite “Awesome Apartments”

Another student who prefers to remain anonymous about his Park Place experience says that the place dubbed itself as ‘awesome apartments’ made him hemorrhage his finances. The website states: “ Park Place is designed with the needs of today’s college student in mind. Experience the difference in Reno’s new definition of luxury student living.”

“The entire time they had no intention of letting anyone out of their lease, so I made contact with the company that owns Park Place at Reno directly to be let out of my lease,” he said. “I had had enough of being told one thing and then having the rug pulled from under my feet at the last minute. The leasing office kept stringing the students who were stuck at the casino along for a long while. Luckily, I was able to be released, but a majority of the other students were landed with the hotel room. Any who asked to be released from their leases were turned away (sometimes rudely) because they had given ‘alternate accommodations’ as stated in the lease. Clearly, this did not mean ‘equal’ accommodations. Some who were paying for separate rooms in an apartment with a roommate were given a room at Circus Circus with two beds. Their accommodations at the casino were in no way proportional to what the students are/were paying to an unfinished apartment complex. Because there are no kitchens, the students had no choice but to hemorrhage finances even further on expensive meals or choose to eat cheap unhealthy alternatives. I do not know if what they are doing is legal, i.e., to not even give the choice for tenants to break their leases in order to search for homes. But I do believe something must be done to rectify what it is that they have done, which is to take advantage of students by giving false promises that they were unable to fulfill,” he said in a lengthy explanation of his frustrations.

One student, Eli Denmead, struck out on the sunny looking Ponderosa Village, which was just the beginning of his problems.

A Long Run Around to Find Housing

Eli Denmead, a second-year Master’s student in History, has been through a long run around himself, which has seen him bail on two places. Denmead initially applied to Ponderosa Village, a housing complex located on campus only available to graduate students, professional students, & faculty and staff.

He says he did not receive any correspondence from them for about four months. On contacting them again Denmead learned that the apartment complex had undergone a change of management and he was not placed on the waiting list at all.

The person from the office then placed him on the eighth position of the waiting list. He was assured that he would not have an issue getting in for the Fall. However, a few months had gone by and he had heard nothing from the administration on his allotment. He sent a few emails that never got answered. On calling the apartment complex directly he learned that the leases were sent out and was also informed that if he had not received one, he would not have secured a place. Denmead was angry.

Being a few weeks away from the start of the semester, Denmead contacted Park Place to find a place there.

He says he was offered a spot in the three by three units. In utter desperation, he jumped at the opportunity. His application was quickly pushed through and the lease was signed in a few days. He faced a similar fate to the students mentioned above though. A week before classes, he received emails regarding lodging preferences and amenities at Circus Circus.

On contacting Park Place he was informed that the apartment was not ready for move-in and the students would have to reside at the casino for a few weeks.

“I was frustrated, but they promised a number of amenities and to reimburse portions of our rent to make up for it. I moved into the Circus Circus, under the assumption that the move in date would September 15th. As that date approached, they told us that the new move in date was actually October 1st. They again promised to reimburse portions of rent for us. Once that date approached, another bombshell dropped. Building One was ready to move in, and the bottom two floors of building two would be ready the next week, but the top three floors (including my unit) would not be ready until November 12th. I was now looking at another month and a half in a hotel, without access to a kitchen, and only a small portion of the rent for the next month and a half would be reimbursed,” he said.

Our Town Reno contacted Park Place to get a reply on these multiple situations we have recounted but did not hear back by time of publication.

Because of the trouble that he was facing, Denmead decided to discontinue living with Park Place at this point when his friend mentioned a room available was available for him at a shared house they were renting. Sadly he is paying double rent now, $580 at his new place, and $925 at Park Place which he is trying to get out of as soon as possible.

“I quickly jumped at the opportunity, as I was tired of living without a kitchen in a hotel. I contacted the complex to let them know I would not be moving in, but was told that I was still responsible for the lease and would only be let out if I could find someone to replace me. I have spent the last two months attempting to find someone to take my space to no avail, despite the fact that I was not made aware of construction issues before signing my lease and the fact that I have never stepped foot in the unit,” he said.

My Own Predicament

I, as an international graduate student from India, battled similar issues while searching for an affordable student apartment in Reno. I was 7800 miles away from this country on a different time zone, calculating the currency exchange to be able to understand if I could afford living and studying in Reno for 18 months, with the amount of stipend I was being offered.

Houses rented out by families were way above my budget and Ponderosa Village facilities (which looked like one of the best options available) were not answering any of my emails. Cheaper housing options were already filled up.

Tormented by the situation, I started emailing and connecting with other international students who were currently living here. Finally, with the help of some kind Indian students on Facebook, I was able to secure a place in an off campus apartment.

My rent is $665 and I barely make a little more than $1000. I belong to a middle class family in India where my mother is the only other member of my family. I do not have a father. My visa does not permit me to work more than 20 hours as per the federal stipulation for International students. I work 15 hours/week currently. I have managed a one room apartment here in Reno with a shared kitchen area with four other flatmates. I walk to school and curtail grocery shopping in order to avoid a hand to mouth situation.

In part two of this series of articles I will explore the recent actions taken by the Graduate Student Association in order to draw attention of the higher authorities to help solve this problem.

Our Town Reno reporting by Kingkini Sengupta

Ben Davis, A Local Photographer Documents the Changing Face of Reno Nights

A pandemic project that is turning into a historical document on the shifting face of Reno is nearly a year old. For local photographer Ben Davis, he sees his work becoming a medium to educate Reno about what downtown is and as a tool to promote improving the downtown corridor.

“I came out one evening, figured out that Reno’s got a lot of bright lights and the town sort of comes alive at night,” said Davis. He is the person behind the Instagram account Reno After Dark. At the encouragement of his wife, he began spending evenings downtown a year ago and creating images at night. Over this time he has seen people throw things out the window from the former Harrah’s casino, a near riot and tense conflict between a large crowd and a handful of police officers under the Reno Arch. He’s seen more and more motels get demolished and replaced with empty fenced lots. 

For Davis, whose bread and butter photography is corporate, commercial and event based, this is a way for him to push his creative skillset and improve as a photographer. 

“My dad bought me my first film camera when I was 10 and that sort of laid the foundation for photography,” he explained. He quickly realized the analog format was too slow for him and without the instant gratification, moved onto graphic design. A quick look into his photography shows his background as a graphic designer. He would return to photography when he purchased his first digital camera in 2005. 

“Street photography is probably one of the harder genres of photography because you’re trying to take something that in of itself might be boring,” he explained. It is a process that he constantly finds a challenge in and by getting out one or two days a week to create these images continues to grow creatively. “You’re trying to make it interesting for people and look for the art in it.”

“I wanted to show the world a little bit of the things that make Reno unique,” explained Davis. 

He spends usually a Friday and or Saturday evening roaming the streets of the downtown corridor, looking for ways to make the normal interesting. To get people to look at scenes they take for granted in a new light. Some nights he tries to tell the story of what Reno is on that particular evening. Other times he challenges himself to make images of only red subjects. It is a scavenger hunt for him each night. 

“The other interesting thing too is a lot of locals don’t come down to downtown,” Davis said. He treats his work as a way to illustrate what locals are missing by not visiting the heart of town. He hopes his work can serve as a method of advocacy for improving what downtown is and making Reno a better, safer, more enjoyable place. 

“I don’t think most locals appreciate how much of downtown Jacobs [Entertainment] has purchased and that there hasn’t been a whole lot of public debate about it,” he said referring to the ongoing acquisition of property by the Cleveland-based company. He is concerned about the process of having that much land in a developer's hands and not having an open and valuable public conversation about the goals and vision for the future. “I think that’s kind of scary a little bit.”

As night photography project continues into a second year, Davis is hopeful his body of work will serve as a historical document of what Reno was and is becoming. He remembers snapshots he created over seven years ago that showcase a far different Reno. He has no plans to wrap this project up and looks forward to getting out there each night and creating color-rich images of what Reno is becoming.

Being a street photographer, Davis also faces ethical challenges. The lifelong debate about creating a photograph of a person in a public space is something he thinks of every time he presses the shutter button. He acknowledges that it is not okay to photograph people in a vulnerable state, such as the unhoused, but understands that we live in a surveillance state. By walking in a public space, people agree to be photographed. 

Legally, under the First Amendment, photographers can create images of people without their permission. It is when the photographer becomes obnoxious, confrontational, or creates the images with bad intent the ethics are challenged. 

“I try to be respectful to people that are out and about,” he said. “I want to be out of the way.” As a documentarian, he wants to observe and be a fly on the wall of what is happening downtown. “I try to represent them [people] fairly.”

Davis’s work can be found online at www.RenoAfterDark.com. His work is defined by vibrance colors and bleeds neon. “I feel like I have a good pulse of the city,” he explained. “I like to advocate for the city,” he said.

Reporting and top photo by Richard Bednarski for Our Town Reno

RoMar Tolliver, Giving What He Didn't Get as a Kid with Black Wall Street Reno

Black Wall Street Reno is a nonprofit organization spearheaded by its two founders Donald Griffin and Romar Tolliver, going stronger and stronger in its second year of existence. Both men hope that their organization can be one that steers local teens away from the adversity that they faced as youths and young men.

“This organization is to provide preventative measures for teens,” Tolliver said during a recent interview with Our Town Reno. For him, Black Wall Street Reno is a way for youths to channel their energy into productive learning and enrichment activities instead of being out on the streets.

“I got in trouble as a kid,” Tolliver said, referring to the time he spent in the Nevada Youth Training Center (NYTC) when he was younger. His experience at NYTC was an eye opening one, and it’s marked in his memory as eight months of his youth that could have been spent doing something better.

The Nevada Youth Training Center is a you correctional facility in Elko, Nevada that has appeared in the news multiple times for wrong reasons. "It was a lot of discipline-- things of that nature," Tolliver said. "But it kind of helps you prioritize and focus on the things you need to do in life."

As a Reno native, Tolliver has experienced what it’s like to grow up as an at-risk youth in Reno, but he doesn’t see his ordeals as a purely negative experience.

“It’s kind of a give and take,” Tolliver said. “We wouldn’t have created [Black Wall Street Reno], if I hadn’t gone through those hardships.”

As a non-profit organization, Tolliver believes that it’s important to connect with the youth community. “You have to have, you know, some empathy to where you can kind of put yourself in their shoes and kind of understand what they're going through.”

Tolliver gave out lunches at a recent outreach event.

Pulling from his own experiences and feedback from the kids, he is able to plan programs that cater to their needs.

“When we are passing out lunches, we interact with them, you know. Ask, what are they learning in school ... You know, how would they give back to the community?” Tolliver said.

Over the summer, Black Wall Street Reno took 75 kids to Project Discovery on Mount Rose Highway. Project Discovery offers dynamic learning programs and child-focused summer camps.

“There were a few at-risk kids that came along with us, and we could tell throughout the day that they were slowly opening up-- coming out of their shell,” Tolliver said about the day they went to Project Discovery.  “Learning social skills, kind of questioning their upbringing and, you know, the habits that they're developing. None of these kids knew each other. So to see them in their shell and uptight at the beginning of the program, to supporting each other by the end of the program-- it was a great experience,” he said.

More recently, Black Wall Street Reno hosted a Thanksgiving food drive, partnered with Reno/Sparks Mutual Aid to provide a free community narcan training, and currently pass out after-school lunches outside their office on Wells Ave. on a weekly basis.

As the organization continues to grow and learn, they hope to provide more outreach programs that include financial literacy workshops, and food and clothing drives for the community.

“We've grown tremendously from the community support,” Tolliver said. “That grassroots support kind of keeps the ball rolling.”

Their next event will be a holiday toy and shoe drive on Saturday, December 18.  “I’m trying to give away a hundred pairs of shoes and a hundred toys,” Tolliver said, adding that shoes will go to teens aged 12 to 17, and toys will go to kids younger than that. They are looking for donations, which can be dropped off at their office between 3pm and 5pm, Monday to Saturday.

Reporting by Lynn Lazaro for Our Town Reno

Perla, Evicted as a Child, Now Organizing to Give Gifts at Our Place

Crystal Gomez, who works at Our Place, was asking friends and family if anyone knew any businesses they could contact to participate in the family shelter’s holiday gift giving program. 

“Usually a lot of of businesses put up a tree and people, their customers, will buy a gift for somebody in the tree,” Perla Gomez said during a recent interview from the checkout room at the Reynolds School of Journalism at the University of Nevada, Reno.

“So my sister’s like, do you guys know any businesses that would be interested because it's been a rough couple years? And I was, I kind of was like, well, I don't really know a lot of business owners, so I kind of stayed quiet. And I was like, ‘could we do it like as a school? Like maybe we could do it at the journalism school?’ And she said as long as families are getting presents, you know, it doesn't matter. It doesn't have to be a business, but that's how it's been done previously.”

It was worth a shot. Perla emailed her colleagues, hoping a few might be willing to participate.  She says she got five responses in the first ten minutes.   “So I was like, okay, we'll do a family. And then I had like another five and then three more. So I was like, we have 13 and my sister's like, oh, okay, then you could probably help two families.”  She added a few friends to the initiative to where she’s now buying gifts for four families.  As part of the program the families have written Christmas lists for their kids to get special presents. 

She’s happy she went ahead and did the group email. “I was a little bit shy to put it out there at first because I wasn't sure how to word it. So I wasn't sure if people would take me seriously, but I was excited. I think this is special because when people ask for help, they usually ask for the necessities, like just food, shelter and things to help them survive,” Perla said. “So when you give them something out of their way, it just helps people restore their humanity. The real gift is giving.”

Perla, born and raised in the area, and a graduate of North Valleys High School, speaks from a lived experience of hardships growing up.  This included moving repeatedly and several evictions.

“The first time I was evicted, I was in sixth grade, I think. I had moved out, my parents separated in fourth grade, but then they got back together and right when they got back together, we got evicted and then my parents separated again. So it was just a lot of moving and I didn't really realize like why we got evicted. It was just like, oh whatever, I'm moving again.”

She remembers being upset and confused even though others in her family helped. 

“We didn't get to take a lot of our stuff. We had to leave a lot of our stuff there.  I was just like confused. Like why, you know, why do we have to leave? That was like the house I grew up in. We had an apartment before that, which I was too young to remember. Before that we had a little apartment, then we lived with our aunts. It was like 10 people in one house. And then we moved into this place and this is where I called home. I had a slide in the backyard. So when we left I was very upset because that had felt like hope. And I feel like I haven't felt at home since that place because we were moving back and forth.”

Her own father has been unhoused, as even though he works hard and makes ends meet usually, he has suffered from alcoholism.  Perla says this has increased her empathy for the unhoused.  

“One time we got evicted when I was like 15 and my dad stayed at that place,” Perla remembers, of her father surviving as best he could.  “So he'd hop in through the window and we'd follow him and he was in that place, but he didn't like to ask for help.”

Perla finds rising prices alarming.  In addition to her UNR job, she’s been a server at a local chain restaurant, and now a bartender at a nightclub.  

Perla is not surprised it’s often those who have struggled who are the most generous to those in need. 

“I feel like because you know what it feels like to feel hopeless,” she said.  “It’s easy to empathize with people to understand where they're coming from. Even if it's not the same story, you know like how hard it is to feel hopeless or sad or heartbroken.” 

“I think it's awful,” Perla said of rising rents. “I think a person with a regular salary it's hard enough for them. And most people don't have a regular salary. I'm single and it's hard to afford a place by yourself. I can't imagine with having kids or just not having a consistent job, especially during these times.”

She said she was inspired by an Our Town Reno article once on the importance of just talking to people who are unhoused.  She goes by the area behind the Peppermill Casino, where just next to a park with tents, there are some new luxury apartments.  “I see a lot of people working. I see a lot of people reading, like educating themselves, people with cell phones, they just can't afford a house. I’m like, like what is going on? Like we all see have a problem right here,” she said of the juxtaposition. 

“These studios go for 2000. So I think it's just very ridiculous. Our priorities are not focused on the right things in Reno.” 

She recommends others to do what she’s done with their own workplaces. “I feel like it's worth it. I think it's important to ask and even if you're feeling nervous, it's really nice to give back and the worst that can happen is people say no and that's it. Like, nothing else can happen, but nobody's gonna beat you up for trying to help anybody. So I think just go for it. And there's somebody that's in a tough situation right now that you could help while you're okay.”

Our Town Reno reporting, December 2021

Savannah, Feeling Squeezed and Facing Debilitating Move due to Jacobs Buyout Spree

Deferred Agenda Item with Looming Sale

Savannah, a resident of the Gibson apartments, has heard the building’s sale to Jacobs Entertainment will be finalized before the end of the year. This means she has no idea how long her convenient and cozy apartment which costs her $970 per month with utilities will still be an option for her. She decided to speak out at the most recent Reno City Council meeting, even though the agenda item concerning her future, C1, with Jacobs Entertainment requesting the abandonment of a right of way in the Church Lane, Stevenson Street and West Second Street area , was then pushed back to the next meeting on January 12th.

That might be too late for her at that point, though.

“I had a lease all the way until August of next year, and then just like a month ago, they sent us all these letters to sign to take the lease to month to month,” Savannah explained. “And then we found out that, yeah, they're selling the property, it's set to close, and we're probably gonna be offered eviction notices on the first of January telling us to leave.”

She’s trying to see if she can get any help from lawyers pro bono or empathy from city council members. She wonders if there could be a zoning issue due to part of the plan being the expansion of a so-called entertainment district.

“We've kind of been looking at laws and seeing if there's anybody who could do like pro bono work and help us kind of figure out if there's any route we can take to protecting our home,” Savannah said. “For the most part, we haven't gotten any solid information about what we can do. So we're just kind of talking to the city council members and seeing if they can do anything from their end to stop the sale.”

With city council members and Mayor Hillary Schieve posing with casino mogul Jeffrey Jacobs at different events including on bulldozers set to demolish motels, as well as approving without barely any conditions what the developer keeps on seeking before the council, that seems like a long shot.

“I really like my apartment. It's my home. This is the first apartment that I've lived in by myself,” Savannah said. “Before this, I had roommates and lived with family. It’s really significant to me personally. Also, it's just a great building and the fact of the matter is in Reno, we don't have a lot of housing options that are inexpensive. My rent is 875. And then with utilities it's 970. So I don't know where I would live and, you know, I wouldn't wanna live too far away from my work or too far away from school. So yeah, I don't know what's gonna happen.”

Fearing for Her Future and for Her Neighbors

The Gibson apartment are also part of Reno’s history, more and more of which seems to be discarded during this current gentrification push.

“It’s definitely an older building,” Savannah explained. “I think it was built in like 1910 or something like that, so like a prewar building, and on the inside it's very cozy. It has like a really homey feel to it. Everybody kind of knows everybody else too. Like, we all have our neighbors that we hang out with and, you know, everybody talks, there's only like maybe 15 of us who live in the building. My apartment specifically is actually pretty big . It used to be from what our landlord told us, it used to be like a boarding house for a school, and then it got converted into singular apartments.”

She said some other residents don’t even know what’s happening while others are already trying to find new places.

“My one friend who lives down the hall, she has been like trying to find another place. And she's like, I don't know. She's like, ‘I'm gonna give up, I'm gonna live in like a house with five other people because there's no other options.’ A lot of the people who live here are families.  I know the lady who lives down the hall from me, she has two babies. And they only live in one bed. And so I don't know, how would she be able to find a two bed, you know, you just won't and you know, a lot of the people here work downtown and it's convenient because it's right there. So I just don't know where all these people would go or, you know, how they would commute or anything.”

Savannah works six days a week, up to 40 hours at a downtown motel, in addition to being a student, and she only makes $13.25 an hour, meaning her relatively cheap rent already eats up half her income.

“If I do get kicked out of here because it gets sold honestly, I'll probably have to like find two or three roommates and move further out of town, which I really don't wanna do,” she said. “I hate driving. I'm terrible at it.”

“The Gibson apartments that I live in are actually connected kind of to this other building that is registered as a historical landmark and that was built by the guy who actually lives in here, his family built it. And so it's been like passed down through the generations. But if this plot of land sells, then they're gonna have to move the house,” Savannah said of a cute home in the same area, pictured above.

Not a Fan of the Jacobs Plan

Savannah, who comes from Fernley, and has lived some in Los Angeles, is not a fan of the Jacobs plan and its already built Glow Plaza with giant animal statues and a cemetery of motel replica signs.

“They're gonna buy out this whole entire area and expand the Glow park, which is that little strip on Fourth. I see absolutely no reason for that. First of all, Reno isn't Vegas. I don't see why we need to keep trying to be like Vegas. We're different. I think the people know that and honestly, we've had a lot more people moving here. So I just don't see why we have to keep like commodifying our town to make it more palatable to tourists when it's like, there are real people who live here who need homes. And if we just keep bulldozing them, where are we all gonna go?”

From what she’s heard of it and seen so far, she feels the Jacobs plan is a mismatch for what Reno is.

“I think a lot of people from Reno are more focused on like being outdoorsy or like having like a community. I really feel here in Reno, that's what we value most is our sense of community and our sense of togetherness. That's why I just don't feel like this whole Jacobs thing really plays into this. I feel like Vegas, you know, it's very flashy and like exciting. And it seems like it is the type of place that just wants to have people brought in, you know, for the sake of it. Um, and so I feel like, you know, even if you're just looking at like pictures of Vegas, like it has this very eye catching look, candy colored, you know, like basically like cocaine but I feel like Reno is like almost the exact opposite. It's like, everybody here wants to be mellow and live their lives and kind of go about things together, you know? I feel the Jacobs Entertainment thing just doesn't go with this. Like every time I drive past the Glow park, it seems like somebody literally just lifted something up, plopped it there and was like, have it, enjoy this. So it's like, so mismatched, it doesn't fit in with anything. And I just don't see why that has to be a part of this area specifically. It's vintage, it's old and we all like that. And you know, if you want that type of thing, go downtown, go on Virginia Street, where there actually are tourists, you know? “

Savannah’s apartment is across the street from the Castaway Inn which was recently boarded up by Jacobs Entertainment.

Feeling Sad for the Sudden Closure of the Castaway Inn Across the Street

Savannah lives across the street from the now boarded up and already bought out Castaway Inn. It also sits next to the now also boarded up 7/11 Motor Lodge.

She’s heard people including politicians call these places seedy and dangerous but she doesn’t share that sentiment.

“I think it's relatively safe. I mean, I've never had any issues. I don't tend to walk around at night just because, you know, I'm 21 that seems unsafe. But in general, it's you know, it's relatively quiet around here. I mean, I haven't had any issues,” she said. “The Castaway Inn seems like it was just kind of a place where people lived.  I mean, it was pretty packed and then just like randomly one day it was like closed up nobody's there and everybody got kicked out. So that's kind of what I'm worried about happening here. I don't want it to be like one day we have a house then the next day it's just, everybody's kicked out, and I'm gone.”

For the longer term, she still believes in the election process, always pushing her friends to register and to vote, having worked herself on national campaigns in the past. This issue is local though, she says, and local elections coming up in 2022 are crucial.

“It’s really going to be those elected city officials who are making the decisions that are going to impact us the most. You know Joe Biden isn't gonna get across his desk and say ‘Oh, look at that 441 West Second Street is getting sold, you know? But Mayor Hillary Schieve she is, you know, and that's something she might care about and actually might be able to do something about. So I hope that she does. And obviously I encourage anybody who cares even a little bit to vote.” 

In the meantime, she is going to continue to speak out now that she’s started and will encourage others to do the same.

“I definitely think more people should speak up,” Savannah said. “I really feel like if we don't speak up people aren't gonna really realize how important it is. I mean, specifically at the city council meeting, we went to, I mean, it was every pretty much every single comment was about the housing crisis and about gentrification. I just feel like everybody should speak up when they can.”

Our Town Reno reporting, December 2021

A Local Author Seeks Better Promotion Possibilities Against the Amazon Tide

“I moved [to Reno] in ‘95 and you know, the food wasn't as good then but the eclecticness of the people and the culture was great,” Thomas Lloyd Qualls, a local Reno author, said in our interview, “I'd love that it was a small town and it was close to a lot of cool stuff. In a few hours, I could be in wine country or San Francisco or in less than an hour, I could be in Tahoe. So I thought ‘This is perfect. I'll just stay a while.’ And here I am 25 years later.” 

After leaving law school in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Qualls followed a few friends out to Reno and searched for freelance jobs to bulk up his portfolio. He landed a job writing up appeals and doing research for a few lawyers, “but the writing was still going on in the background the whole time.” Once his first book Waking Up at Rembrandt’s came out in 2009, it gained a lot of attention as the ‘Best Novel’ three years in a row in the Reno News and Review’s ‘Best Of’ section.

The attention was so massive that “Oliver X (with RenoTahoe2Nite), who was one of the first people to review Waking Up at Rembrandt's, invited me to submit a piece whenever I wanted. So I started doing that. And then he gave me a regular column and then the column went from 500 words to 1000 words and they moved me up to the front of the magazine and we just did that for I think like between six and seven years. I started in January of 2012. And then I stopped doing it so that I could focus on getting Painted Oxen out the door.”

While working on that novel, Qualls conducted interviews in Reno based on his own perceptions of the Tarot. He used these interviews as a “literary vehicle” and even rewrote his own descriptions of the 22 Major Arcana of the Tarot. He then “took those descriptions which are part of the thread that runs through the novel. And I would assign a character to those so, we would pick four people to interview and assign each of them a card. And then I asked them questions that were all pulled out of those descriptions that I had written to see how much their personality or their life story matched that card and they were always spot on for some reason.” Interviews he recorded included some with local artists and the mayor.

Qualls remarked that in Reno, “there's a higher mindedness and a really cool artistic spirit here. I think it's great that we're the gateway for Burning Man because the town became an infusion of all of that creative energy and a lot of that art has ended up here. All of that has really contributed to life here.” He goes on to say that Reno is similar to a magnet that pulls people back. “I would watch people try to leave and then they just end up a year later back here. For whatever reason, Reno just called them back because they couldn't find that same thing, that same electricity and community in other places.”

Artists come in several different categories from painters to graphic designers to authors. The Reno community has art shows and galleries appearing all over the downtown area. “I think Reno is more art friendly,” Qualls said, “I am fortunate to have a pretty good network and community here but when COVID kept people from rolling out, there were over 80 people that showed up to Sundance for the launch of Painted Oxen.” The closeness of the community and the familiarity from the public made him feel at home since “the feedback that I got when I was writing the column for Reno/Tahoe Tonight magazine, I would just be in a restaurant. One of the servers or somebody that I didn't know would come up to me and say, ‘Hey, I really love your work, or I really loved your piece this month.’”

However, an artist is not an artist without their struggles. Qualls said that “most people think writing a book and getting a book contract is like ‘Oh, that's it. I'm golden now, right?’ And 20 years ago, you could make a decent living. If you were able to get a publisher and get a book out on the shelves, it was going to sell and you were going to make at least something. Maybe that's not the only source of income you can have, but you're gonna do okay as an author, and then the internet changed everything.”

With the convenience of Amazon and online ordering, being an author is harder than it seems. “There's way more books being published and it's way harder to rise above the noise and the vast amount of authors out there are actually on bookshelves in bookstores. Sundance has an online system where you can just order your books. So they don't even have to carry it in order to sell it, they just go out and buy it from where it's available,” Qualls said.

His most recent book, Happiness is an Imaginary Line in the Sand, didn’t start out as a book at all. Qualls states that he “didn't set out to write a book when I was doing it. It just turned out that I had something like 75 essays that I had written between the magazine and there's a few other online forums that I wrote for. It was a way to make them available to a broader audience. My audience was mostly local, so I thought this would be a way to get them out to a broader world.” 

Using a similar approach to Painted Oxen, Qualls planned on doing “a lot of small, intimate gatherings and two Oracle readings basically. I created an Oracle deck with one card for each of the essays and had someone pull a card and then I read the essay where we kind of talk about how that relates to their life. So it's an idea that could go in backyards and living rooms. Whoever wants to host could invite their own people.”

Unlike the title of his newest book, Qualls says that “ I don’t pose myself as someone who's enlightened or who is even happy all the time. But as someone who has slogged through the mud of life, you know, there's a lot. Up until six months ago, I was a criminal defense lawyer for a big chunk of my adult life. And so I'm used to seeing the ugliness and the muddiness of life.”

“But it's like everything,” Qualls remarks as he thought back on the difficulties he had gone through over the course of his career, “It's like podcasts. Podcasts are everywhere. How do you rise above the noise? How do you hear the signal above the noise? If you're a reader who wants to read good books or if you're a writer who wants to get your book out there? What do you do to make a difference?”

Reporting by Sol George and Henry Stone shared with Our Town Reno

Dr. Sherilyn Duckworth, Helping Teens Locally with a Friend of Mind

From Her Own Experiences

After surviving an impulsive suicide attempt as a teenager and ten years of untreated depression, Dr. Sherilyn Duckworth realized there were major cracks in the health system. Particularly, more effort and care was needed addressing the mental health of the youth. Over the course of her education, she began collecting pieces she hoped would fill the cracks. 

Now in Reno, she is working to help others and there’s lots of work to be done. Nevada ranks in the top third for teen suicide. In the past ten years, the average rate of suicide amongst teenagers in Nevada doubled.

Duckworth recently completed her doctorate program in Health Education and Promotion with an emphasis in behavior from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. During her education she created a yoga meditation program.

“One of the things that I put together is I need to be there for adolescents who may not have the help that I needed at the time,” said Duckworth. After her suicide attempt, her mother did not allow her to take anti-depressants and could not afford the time off needed to take her to therapy. It was, and still is, a major hole in the system affecting both lower-income and people of color across the nation. 

Duckworth was awarded the Albert Schweitzer Fellowship, which addresses the social determinants of health. With this opportunity, she created a program that helps adolescents struggling with mental health issues. 

“I thought it would be cool to use yoga to help youth with their depression and anxiety and stress,” explained Duckworth. During the fellowship she created a program that utilizes yoga meditation to help adolescents living in a public housing community in Birmingham, AL. After seeing the impact of her work and completing the year-long fellowship, Duckworth could not see herself just walking away from the program. 

Recent screengrabs from the project’s affiliated Instagram.

Reducing Stigma, Normalizing Conversations

A Friend of Mind was born. Her non-profit helps youth battle depression. It provides access to yoga and mediation to anyone experiencing anxiety or stress or depression and serves as an affordable and accessible tool. The organization was created in 2018 and has four chapters, one in Birmingham, AL, another one in Atlanta, GA, and one in Duckworth’s hometown, Demopolis, AL, and most recently, Duckworth began a chapter here in Reno. 

She relocated from the south to Reno earlier this year and Duckworth fell in love with the people. “Everyone has been so welcoming...I have just gotten so much support,” she explained about her short time in town. She has been able to use this support to help grow the local chapter of A Friend of Mind. 

“There is definitely a need to for adolescents to get access to mental health and suicide prevention resources here,” explained Duckworth. Since opening her organization she has received many calls from parents of teenagers. She has found that her work is not only needed but being well received. 

Currently she is also in the process of working with local school officials to create an afterschool program and getting connected with local detention centers.

“Mental health is just as important as physical health,” she said. “It is really important to remember that we can’t see our mental disorders.” She emphasized the importance of being nothing but supportive of those experiencing mental disorders, especially those who may not have the best quality of mental health. She understands the conversations that need to happen can be difficult, but nonetheless, they are important. So important, she said, that they need to happen with the youth from an early age. 

“We need to have a conversation about mental health like we do about football,” Duckworth explained. She understands, from a first-hand experience that adolescents need a safe haven and in order to get there, the conversations need to happen, and useful programs need to be put into place .

“I don’t think people realize how common mental disorders are among adolescents,” Duckworth said. These include everything from depression, anxiety, PTSD and attention behaviors. She said not being able to identify these common behaviors as part of mental health, is a disservice to the youth. “If we don’t recognize how common they are we are not able to recognize how quickly they need help.” 

While A Friend of Mind is in its infancy, the impact can be far reaching.

“Providing these outlets, normalizing these conversations and being aware how common suicide and mental disorders are among adolescents,” Duckworth explained are the strongest assets everyone has at their disposal to help alleviate the mental health struggles of the younger generation. “It’s going to take a village to decrease the suicide rates of adolescents.”

Our Town Reno reporting by Richard Bednarski

A Sister's Relentless Push to Clear Her Late Brother's Name and Help Others

A Battle Going on For Decades

Later this week, on December 9th, Tonja Brown, who signs her emails as an advocate for inmates and the innocent, will be back at it. She has cleared out that day to speak in Carson City on behalf of her brother Nolan Klein at a Pardons Board hearing. Klein died in 2009 at the age of 54 in the infirmary at the Northern Nevada Correctional Center. He never wavered from saying he was innocent.

Brown will take part in the public comment sections, “to ask them to set aside one hearing per year to allow those who've been wrongfully convicted and passed away [for] their families and their loved ones, the opportunity to continue to exonerate their names,” she explained to Our Town Reno in a recent phone interview.

Her prepared statement begins: “I am here to ask this Pardons Board to place on the Agenda of their first Pardons Board hearing set for in the year 2022, to have an open discussion with its members to allow the Pardons Board to hear Factual Innocence Posthumously cases once per year, until a law is implemented to allow the courts to hear them. “

The opening of the statement for this week above.

Clearing an Entire Family’s Reputation

This effort she said is not only to clear her brother’s name.

“That stigma still is attached to the person's name and not only the name, it's the family for many years,” she said. “I was called the sister of a rapist and you know, things like that. And it's very hurtful. And then the truth is, when you have law enforcement and district attorneys who would hold exculpatory evidence from cases and innocent people are wrongfully convicted, family members, the victims, those wrongfully convicted, they are all victims of the system. Even to this day, I still get called out by people, even from law enforcement who don't even know the facts of this case, and I'm done with it. And just like everyone else who's been in this situation, you hear all these people who've been wrongfully convicted, who are being exonerated. Their families never gave up on them and they would never want to give up on them even after death.”

The March 1989 conviction was for two counts of robbery with use of a deadly weapon, burglary and sexual assault with a deadly weapon. It was never overturned.  In his 2019 letter, Washoe County District Attorney Christopher Hicks wrote the Nevada Supreme Court rejected appeals in 1993, 1994, 1998, 2002. and 2009. Klein’s death came just a week after the Director of Corrections at the time ordered staff to begin preparing paperwork for a compassionate release due to his failing health, including pneumonia and liver failure from Hepatitis C.

From the Nolan Klein Says Facebook page, one of many documents highlighted, this one related to confusion on the amount of facial hair the perpetrator allegedly had, and differences in Klein’s lineup and arrest photos.

Fighting for Others as Well

Our Town Reno first met Brown at a yearly protest for families of those killed by local law enforcement. Regular participants also follow the Nolan Klein Says page.

“I think a lot of them feel that they're not getting the justice and you have to look at who's behind all of this too, because when you're dealing with officers, and then you have them policing their own, it's an issue,” she said of having empathy for fellow protesters and one of the main problems they see in how the system is set up. “It shouldn't be policing your own. And now they changed it to where it's a different department. Sparks is now looking into Reno or whatever the case. They don't want them policing their own. And I agree.”

Documents from those who oppose her actions have labelled the Reno Cop Watch Facebook page where details of the Klein case have been outlined as well as “cop haters.”

“We don't all start out hating cops,” Brown wanted to clarify. “I'm not a cop hater, but I certainly support these people at the protests because I have personally seen bad cops and not all are bad cops, but when the good cops keep quiet, it reflects back onto them as well.”

Even if her brother isn’t cleared before she dies, Brown says others will take over.  “I have people lined up,” she said near the end of our interview, which also went in detail on what she hopes the board will finally see as requiring the conviction’s review and overturn. Many of those details can be found on the Nolan Klein Says and Reno Cop Watch Facebook pages and some of this will be repeated on December 9th.

“What I'm trying to do is to help, not just my brother, but I'm putting Nolan’s case on trial before the Nevada Pardons board in an effort to get them to look at factual innocence, posthumously, hold hearings and exonerate them, give the families what they want, give them some peace and closure,” she concluded. “And again, if these people are innocent, the real perpetrator is out there committing more crimes.”

Our Town Reno Interview in late November 2021

Cowboy Tom Preparing a Record Thanksgiving With the Help of Donors

The name Cowboy Tom and his business Cookies for Kindness are becoming more and more well known in the Reno community. We first featured him in December 2020.

This year, the former cook in the Air Force, is preparing to serve over 1500 families with dinner kits during the Thanksgiving period, more than double his number last year, and he wants to keep growing, as currently there are many challenges due to the lingering pandemic.

“I am looking at 2022 being a banner year,” he said.

Each kit this year will have enough food to feed a family of six with leftovers. Included in each is all of the Thanksgiving essentials, including a turkey, pumpkin pie, coffee, spice packets, gravy, produce, butter, cranberries, stuffing, hand sanitizer, and cooking instructions. 

The refrigerator truck donated to Tom, has 22,099 lbs of turkeys and 1500 pumpkin pies. Photo taken by Maggie Durling

These kits are going to community members in need. Most will go to families who are struggling financially, including some National Guard families who weren’t able to work because of the pandemic. The rest of the kits will go to local non-profits who will distribute them to the communities they serve. 

The first 125 meals kits went out to non-profits on November 18. The rest of the kits will start to be distributed on November 22, with already 500 people signed up for the first day.

Private donors and non-profits are the reason Tom has been able to make this happen. Some donate money and others donate resources like folding tables or a massive refrigerator truck. He was able to collect $90,000 this year. 

Between his holiday meals and his own business Cookies for Kindness, Tom has a lot going on. He says he maintains his energy in a few different ways.

“Coffee and just helping all of those people,” he said while at work. “I can whine about my pain, or I can feel the joy of giving to my community. Joy wins every time.”

As a disabled veteran, Tom knows what it is like to struggle. He said several times that if it wasn’t for his cookie business and community supporters he too would be homeless. 

The brand new van that Tom was able to buy and insure with the help of private donors has changed the way he is able to run his business. Photo taken by Maggie Durling

The involvement from the community is what makes Tom’s work happen. This summer Tom was able to buy a new van for Cookies for Kindness, also financed by donors. 

The support has also made his services and cookies more widely known.

“Every detail is super important,” says Tom. “I want them to see my heart coming out of that.”

Tom also uses the help of the Bridge Church, right across the street from Reno High School, where the bags will be distributed. He also relies on the help of volunteers and is always in need of more helping hands. 

Reporting by Maggie Durling for Our Town Reno

Rachel Jackson Provides More Visibility for Reno's Queer Community

Rachel Jackson is a junior at UNR majoring in journalism and minoring in photography. After they graduate Jackson hopes to become a photojournalist. *Please note: Jackson uses they/she pronouns and will be referred to as “they” in this article.

Rachel Jackson, 20, is a University of Nevada, Reno junior who recently started Pride of 775, a student-run reporting initiative that focuses on queer experiences here in Reno. Jackson describes Pride of 775 as a photography and podcast based project that looks at both the good and bad experiences of identifying in the LGBTQ+ community.

Jackson currently identifies as a non-binary lesbian, meaning they don’t identify with either the male or female gender, and they are attracted to women. Jackson came out in high school as bisexual and has gone through many iterations of their identity before landing on what they use today.

Jackson said that they are wanting to make friends as restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic are being lifted, and meeting queer people through this project was just the way to do it.

“I feel like a lot of people have come into their identities over COVID, and now that we’re slowly inching our way out of it, it’s just fun to talk about,” Jackson said. “Like, ‘What’s your favorite part about being gay? What’s your least favorite part?’”

You can find Pride of 775 at its website (https://prideof775.wordpress.com/) or on Tik Tok (https://www.tiktok.com/@prideof775?lang=en), Twitter (https://twitter.com/Prideof775) and Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/prideof775/) @Prideof775.

Jackson’s first feature on Pride of 775 is about Cora who also identifies as a non-binary lesbian. A podcast episode features discussions about being lesbian in Reno, the differences about living here compared to living in Las Vegas, and current queer discourse on Tik Tok.

But Jackson is still on the search for people who want to participate in the project.

“I’m just trying to find people who want to sit down and talk about being gay because it’s one of the most fun things to do,” they said.

Jackson said they hope to provide a resource for queer people to listen to other people in the LGBTQ+ community and find comfort knowing that other people are going through the same experience. Though Jackson does say that people who don’t identify as a part of this community are more than welcome to tune in as well.

So far, Jackson said they have gotten a positive reaction about Pride of 775 online and doesn’t expect to get much hate in the future.

Reporting and Photo by Catherine Schofield for Our Town Reno

Adam, A Free Barber with a Prayer for Unhoused Brothers and Sisters

The first time I met Adam was on a sultry September Sunday afternoon. He was in a grey vest and shorts walking the streets of downtown Reno handing burritos and water to the houseless population who were interacting with various volunteer groups. Adam was then serving as part of the Reno Burrito Project.

Months earlier, an Our Town Reno photographer took pictures of him being handcuffed outside the temporary 4th street shelter. Adam has been upset for months now at conditions inside local government-run shelters, has been vocal about it, and says he’s been thrown out too. He says conditions inside are not sanitary enough.

Adam has been unhoused for over a year now himself and lives in his Ford Taurus as best he can. He says he was working at a furniture store near Plumb Lane before he decided to quit that job and look for other paid work. Adam once received burritos from the outreach group, before being one of those helping.

Blaize Akanaab, the founder of the RBP, remembers Adam from one of his earlier Sunday handouts and says it’s yet another indication of the unhoused community coming together to help each other. 

Over the Fall, Adam helped with the Reno Burrito Project. Photo by Kingkini Sengupta.

Adam now often pulls over opposite the Nevada Cares Campus on weekdays in the morning. He parks his car, unmounts a black and steel hydraulic chair, lays out his trimmers and scissors and waits for people to seek out his free service.

Within minutes a line forms of people waiting to get their hair trimmed by Adam for free. Adam is not a barber by profession but says he does this for the love for his unhoused brothers and sisters and for the glory of God.

“When you give them a haircut, they feel better, their confidence is built up, they are more eager to go out and get a job,” he said. After the haircuts Adam gives them a quick prayer and tells them, “Jesus Christ loves them, always has and always will.”

A happy recipient of a free haircut smiles with Adam into the morning sun outside the Nevada Cares Campus. Photo by Kingkini Sengupta.

‘Do you want all off or …,” Adam was discussing lengths of the cut with someone sitting in his chair when Aubrey and her husband Vincent were leaving the shelter to get a job for the day. Vincent immediately decided to queue in the line to get his hair and beard trimmed. 

“Look at this guy, he is getting a haircut, which is awesome,” Aubrey said as she stood teary-eyed watching Vincent get the trim.

“It definitely helps the way people look at you, if you are presentable or not,” Vincent said. “God is using Adam to do his work in the best way possible. It’s a great way to give back to the community.”

In the summer, Adam did not have a place to shower after his haircut sessions and often cleaned himself up in the Truckee River before trying to go find a job. He says life gets tougher when one does not have much money or a home. Adam has a small child, he says, who has been adopted from him against his will.

Adam has various ideas about helping those in his predicament. He  believes that the closed Santa Fe Basque restaurant could be reopened and converted as a cafe for the unhoused so that people could come and drop off the unused food resources provided to them.

He also believes a nearby downtown Reno barber shop could be used as a base for free haircuts for the unhoused. He often discusses these ideas with the people he provides haircuts to. On the day I met him outside the Cares Campus, he said a prayer for Aubrey and then packed up for a new job he had at a gas station.

Our Town Reno Reporting by Kingkini Sengupta