A Campus Tour with More Answers Forthcoming, Last Motels and Sightings of Hostile Boulders

Our Town Reno got its first approved visit on the inside of the Cares Campus and a demo ModPod earlier this week.

The County has now taken over regional homeless services, saying it will work to improve some of the compound’s obvious initial shortcomings, such as poorly thought out or inexistent permanent laundry, bathroom and shower facilities.

The sprung structure looks drab, with little color or effort to cozy up what is a massive dormitory with bunk beds and single beds crammed next to each other. The highly touted ModPods for the safe camp feel like tiny suffocating cells, replacing unreliable tents which were even smaller. The pet area with crates on top of each other looks barely used.

So-called Phases II, III and IV hold many promises of better services, more intimacy, green and recreational spaces, and supportive housing, with construction and lot expansion churning along, but for now Phase I remains very much a work in progress as well.

We put forward a list of questions coming from contributors on our social media channels, which were received and should be answered by email soon. We will update with a new report when we get those answers, as we must not just get visits for future plans but also County reassurances that urgent inadequacies are being worked on now and then fixed.

In other reporting this week, we started a new series with photos and essays called Last Motels Standing, with an initial entry on the Swan Inn.

As we wrote in the disclaimer, “we previously had a series on the last motel residents of Reno. Motels, initially conceived for tourists, increasingly became a last housing option for many, due to bad credit, not enough money for deposits, or not wanting to deal with a multitude of bills and complications, or a first housing option for residents coming out of homelessness. Many motels are now being torn down, after being bought out and razed by slow to act developers, with many vacant lots now dotting the downtown landscape.”

We featured ACCEPT Reno which started during the AIDS epidemic, still exists to this day, and is now extending its services of substance abuse prevention, support and care, to the community at large.

The Our Town Reno recommended read this week is Haunted Reno.

Our podcast begins a summer music series with Jaden Urban and skateboarders from Seven Ply Mag who issue new editions with a community concert.

@ourtownrenoNew hostile architecture in #Reno on Eighth Street? These rocks were recently placed in an area where some unhoused have been sleeping and /or hiding during the day discreetly for years. The City of Reno Public Works Department placed the rocks as a clear hindrance for this, deeming the area unsafe for people. We've long advocated for more safe camps and not just the ModPod Cares Campus area which even with new efforts will only reach 50 spots. What are your own thoughts? #hostilearchitecture

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Our TikTok above showing a new set of “hostile” boulders on 8th street has gotten over 30K views and hundreds of comments. We followed up with photos across our social media channels of more hostile boulders at the Booth Riverside turnoff where people who lived in their vehicles used to park.

On Facebook one reader wrote: I thought a "Hostile Boulder" would be flying towards you at some velocity, to which we wrote back: It's a reference to hostile architecture. It's there to prevent people from parking so definitely not an accommodating boulder.

This has prompted new conversations of establishing more safe camps and also safe parking spaces beyond the collection of ModPods at the Cares Campus, which Washoe County says it will cap at 50.