Kathleen Lang had recently moved back to Reno after visiting family in Florida last year. As the pandemic worsened, she could not find affordable housing with Doug, her partner of 24 years. Instead they moved to the growing tent city and soon had a makeshift home there with hundreds of others by the Wells Ave. overpass.
“It felt safe, it felt like everyone was getting along,” said Lang during a recent interview with Our Town Reno. “Everyone was working together and I wasn’t afraid.” This was until a group of young kids moved into the area and started harassing people, according to Lang.
“They were attacking people and doing stuff that wasn’t happening down there before, everyone was afraid of them,” she said.
Lang had lived in the area for about a year before the sweeps resumed this past summer. Her partner Doug was recently retired and the two of them were hoping to find affordable housing, but it never arrived.
Then precipitating events took place, and before she could fully understand what exactly was going on, Doug was dead.
“Doug went next door to retrieve a bike pump that these kids had borrowed,” explained Lang on the start of the tragic chain of events. “Out of nowhere he came running back to me.” His face was bloody and was hurting all over, she explained. Lang believes the kids refused to return the bike pump and beat Doug up, which would eventually land him in the hospital.
When the attack first happened, Lang said she immediately went to the police station for help. She said nearly two hours passed before a cop would arrive on the scene. Our Town Reno contacted both Reno police and Reno Direct to get information about this situation but they did not respond.
“We didn’t realize the damage that was done to Doug at the time,” Lang said, the memory bringing tears to her eyes. “But we were in such a rush, the U-Haul was there and I had to move everything myself because Doug was too hurt to help.”
This was when sweeps started taking place at the main tent city and then at other smaller tent cities. Within two weeks, Lang learned that Doug has passed away. She was not at the hospital because she says she was trying to protect her possessions. Lang believes Doug’s injuries from the attack, coupled with a broken hip, led to a blood infection that ultimately took his life. He was 67 years old.
“He was nice to everybody,” said Lang, choked up from emotion. “I was trying to run between the hospital and places to stay but I kept getting kicked out,” she said. Still unable to afford any housing Lang was running out of options. She was working with a social worker but there was no housing available that would accommodate Doug’s recovery so Lang focused on protecting her belongings, which at this point, had been whittled down by theft and while constantly moving on the streets.
Community member Ilya Arbatman, who has been helping the unhoused community for several months, watched trauma unfold all summer. He had helped Lang and Doug move belongings from the first tent city location when the sweeps began.
Once Doug was in the hospital, Arbatman offered to put Lang in a motel for a couple weeks and help her sort out all that was happening. Initially she refused.
“I’ve been off the street ever since,” she said. The motel led to stable, dorm style housing inside a container at the Village on Sage Street. Her Social Security income covers her bills. However, she says she recently learned she has cancer. To this day she feels guilty for not being at the hospital when Doug died, and for asking him to retrieve the bike pump. The thing that still upsets her the most she says is why the cops have not made any arrests with the young crowd of kids who allegedly assaulted her late partner. She says she sees them downtown and has heard of similar assaults.
“Just to make this change. These people can’t get away with this stuff because it’s people's lives,” said Lang. “Doug loved life, he had no plans on dying.”