At the first Community Homelessness Advisory Board (CHAB) meeting in 2024, County Commissioner Mike Clark called for more meetings, as did Reno at-large councilman Devon Reese, now running for election in a redrawn Ward 5.
Despite the County-run Cares Campus now being three years in operation, and multiple efforts to combat the high cost of housing, the number of unhoused locally is going back up.
The latest federal count of people without stable shelter willing to be counted put the county’s unhoused population at 1,760 in early 2024, compared to 1,690 in 2023 and 1,609 in 2022.
Many of the CHAB board members are currently running to retain seats, putting some of them on the defensive.
The most recent Point in Time count and the County’s own dashboards show homelessness is on the rise compared to last year, despite out of market articles, repeatedly pushed by elected and county officials, indicating the number of unhoused was being drastically reduced in northern Nevada.
Chair Alexis Hill, a Democrat now facing reelection as a county commissioner, started out saying there had been “misinformation” that she had been indicating local homelessness had been reduced by half, after she had exuberantly shared the out of market reports on her social media. She said numbers were being “reduced on the street,” meaning many residents remain regulars at the Cares Campus and the Our Place shelter for women and families, but not in any type of permanent housing.
Taylor said she had noticed more people looking unhoused in downtown Reno in recent days, with the costs of even cheaper apartments, such as offered by Siegel out of reach for many.
“As much as we’re doing, we still want to do more, we still need to do more,” said Kathleen Taylor, selected as a Reno councilwoman as a replacement, and now facing an election battle for a redrawn downtown Ward 1.
She said the eye test revealed more unhoused in downtown areas of late, along train tracks and on 4th street with several visible mini tent cities popping up in recent days. Taylor had concerns the emergency overflow shelter, which is used for winter months at Cares Campus, is now closed.
The number $300 million was talked both for overall northern Nevada spending over the past five years to tackle homelessness, and the needed money for effective future permanent supportive house in a presentation by a non profit called the Corporation for Supportive Housing, bringing audible gasps.
During discussions and public comment, there were also concerns about COVID funding having run out for eviction assistance and emergency shelter vouchers, as well as helping seniors specifically.
Another number discussed was 2,900 or the number of people who have reportedly gone through the Cares Campus and Our Place systems in recent years and never got access to any permanent housing.
“What more can be done, and how can we be more successful,” Devon Reese asked.
The County’s presentation showed its own month to month numbers of people experiencing homelessness have been back on the rise as well.
The initial presentation by Dana Searcy , the county’s Division Director of Housing and Homeless Services, focused on the limited permanent supportive housing which will be built on the Cares Campus in the coming years, as part of its final phases, with 152 people already signed up for those future units. The planned reopening of the now shut down West Hills Behavioral Health Hospital was also mentioned as part of helping in the future.
“There’s not been very much change over the last four years of that PIT count,” Searcy admitted, as to numbers of locally unhoused not actually dropping, since the massive Cares Campus started its operations, with case workers trying to help as best they can to get the unsheltered housed.
“We have not said we have seen a significant decrease in homelessness,” Searcy said pointing to its own monthly numbers working with different partners registering those experiencing life without their own shelter. “It might get bumpy,” she warned as the end of COVID funding fully takes effect.
Commissioner Clark, a Republican who is not in campaign mode, offered the most ideas, including trying a new safe park program on county parking lots with portable showers and restrooms, as well as more public bathrooms and trash receptacles along 4th street, where many of the unhoused both staying at the Cares Campus or not, tend to congregate.
Clark said it “wasn’t a political game” for him, but that he was “just trying to move the needle in a positive way, trying to get people more comfortable in their situation.”
Clark said within the Cares Campus there could be a senior center for the older population staying there, with craft and activities more geared toward that demographic. He also wanted more people from the Cares Campus to be encouraged to speak at CHAB meetings, and to have people living there on the board, as well as at least one representative from the 4th street business community.
Clark warned of other municipalities and out of state elected officials coming to Washoe County, as has been touted by county officials including by Searcy in today’s meeting, while so much work remains. “Copying us might not be the best,” he said.
A main point of his was that the CHAB should meet more often, even every month, he said, for a “hot button issue on everybody’s mind, to show the public we are serious.”
Reese agreed there should be more meetings, saying we are experiencing a “crisis of human scale.” The councilman also agreed northern Nevada should look into a safe parking program for people living in cars and RVs.
Towards the end of the meeting, Michaelangelo Aranda, who is running in a crowded race for the new Reno Ward 6 council seat, said while driving he had recently almost hit an unhoused man, crossing a busy street at night with his belongings.
The man told him he had been told to move from a shopping square where he wasn’t allowed. Aranda suggested a program to offer high visibility vests to the unhoused, donate luggage bags, and also follow Sacramento in setting up a model similar to Camp Resolution, a self-governed encampment community, but with access to government-run water, trash, bathrooms and showers.