ALERT! More than a dozen City of Reno citizen boards and commissions put on immediate 90-day "hiatus"

Please contact the City Manager and Reno City Councilmembers before their May 5 budget meeting to urge funding the positions that support these citizen bodies.

Today’s Brief is an urgent CALL TO ACTION for you to contact the Reno City Manager and your City Councilmembers about an item of great concern.

On Thursday, May 1st, just one day after I wrote a post called “Prioritizing Public Process,” Reno City Manager Jackie Bryant announced that she has decided to place an immediate 90-day halt on staff support to more than a dozen City of Reno citizen Boards and Commissions, including ALL Neighborhood Advisory Boards (NABs), ostensibly due to the City’s budget shortfall and staffing shortages, while the City evaluates the most efficient (and cost-effective) way for them to operate in the future.

No warning. No advance notice for the scores of volunteer members of these Boards and Commissions to discuss how they might continue to meet as scheduled while minimizing City expenditures. No presentation of any alternatives, such as how volunteers might pick up some of the tasks typically conducted by staff, or how virtual-only meetings might temporarily lighten the load.

Just an announcement that more than a dozen “Non-Mandated Boards and Commissions” will not be meeting for the next three months (or more).

Several local media outlets have picked up the story:

• Budget cuts prompt City of Reno to suspend boards and commissions operations for 90 days (This is Reno)

• City of Reno enacts 90-day staffing hiatus for many boards and commissions (2 News Nevada)

You can read City Manager Jackie Bryant’s May 1 memo here. From that memo:

And this “hiatus” may last even longer than 90 days. As the memo states, “While the initial hiatus is for 90 days, many of the listed boards and commissions may remain on hold for a longer period of time.”

City Manager Bryant blames the budget shortfall, stating:

“With uncertain economic conditions anticipated to last for several years, it is imperative that our programs are run at maximum efficiency to meet the broad needs of the community. One significant area of potential impact is how staff engage with and seek feedback from the community.”

She then explains that this hiatus is based on Council direction given in November 2024 to “examine the structure and function of the City’s boards and commissions (B&C) and provide a comprehensive overview and recommendation for updates.”

I’m not sure that Council direction could be interpreted as enabling this action.

It’s not clear why that examination and comprehensive overview did not begin sooner, or why the City Manager felt it best to just spring this announcement on residents before any of these Boards and Commissions could even hold another meeting.

In the memo, City Manager Bryant lays out how she plans to proceed:

As you can read there, the City Manager’s plan to evaluate how best to run these Boards and Commissions is not on an agenda for public discussion until the Wednesday, May 7th Reno City Council meeting (it’s item C.2 on the agenda, found here with a brief, two-page Staff Report here).

Meanwhile, the Reno City Council is holding a special workshop to discuss the budget (and its shortfalls), which includes an overview of existing City staff positions, two days before that, on Monday, May 5th (agenda here).

Here’s a direct link to the Department summaries presented among the budget materials, which list each department’s staff positions and accompanying budgetary info. The staffing of Boards and Commissions spans many departments, including (but certainly not limited to) the “Council Relations” positions listed under City Council. Depending on the meeting times, many City staff are paid overtime for their staffing of citizen Boards and Commissions, an amount that can add up over time.

I am deeply sympathetic to the precarious state of the City’s budget, which is of course not confined to our local community. However, I feel it essential to point out that this should not be posed as a choice between funding civic engagement or funding public safety. The City of Reno budget covers much more than that.

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What can we do?

I wish I had more information to share at this point. I am aware that more will be revealed in the staff presentation on May 7. But I’m troubled that a required hiatus for these Boards and Commissions is being framed as a budgetary issue, and yet it is not being discussed until after the May 5 budget meeting. If the two are related, and the future of staffing these public bodies for the next fiscal year is at risk, then we need discussion of this matter to occur DURING the budget workshop, not two days later.

The City’s budget gets adopted in May or June—before the end of this 90-day hiatus.

It makes me worry that the City has no intention of giving these Boards and Commissions the staffing they need to continue meeting in person over the next year, and that we’re supposed to just accept that, and go along with the City’s plans to somehow make these meetings more “efficient” (which apparently in large part means requiring less staff time, although I know they want to evaluate other aspects, too).

It all feels very out of sequence, sudden, and needlessly extreme.

If this troubles you as it troubles me, I recommend that you contact the City Manager, the Mayor, and our City Councilmembers before the May 5th budget meeting to convey your thoughts and concerns.

If you are a member of a current Board or Commission, do you have specific concerns about not meeting for the next 90 days or more? Do you want next year’s budget to include sufficient staff positions to maintain in-person meetings? What else do you think our City leaders need to know as they evaluate the budget and these bodies?

If you regularly attend any of these Board and Commission meetings, what concerns do you have that could be relevant to this week’s budget discussions?

I am, of course, especially concerned about the cancellation of NAB meetings, where residents have the opportunity to hear about upcoming development projects in their wards long before they are presented to the decision-making body, whether that be the Planning Commission or City Council. The City itself was promoting the value of these meetings just a few months ago in announcements like this one:

The timing of these cancellations and the imminent budget decisions has put us all in a terrible position, especially as I feel the City should have embarked upon this comprehensive evaluation long before this late stage in the budgeting process. Citizens should never be blindsided by news that affects us so directly.

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How to send comments to the City Manager & City Council

This item has relevance to both of next week’s Reno City Council meetings. For either one, the general instructions are the same:

Individuals wishing to address City Council at the meeting shall submit a “Request to Speak” form to the City Clerk. Individuals not in attendance may provide public comment by (1) submitting an online public comment form at Reno.Gov/PublicComment; (2) sending an email to Publiccomment@reno.gov; or (3) participating via Zoom.

For Reno City Council’s Special Budget Workshop on Monday, May 5

• You can find the agenda here.

• To view/participate virtually via Zoom, register here.

• You can comment under the General Public Comment (Item A.3) or if specifically related to the budget, under Item B.1 - Presentation, discussion and potential direction to staff regarding the FY 2025/26 budget; the capital improvement plan; the fee schedule; and strategic priorities.

For the Reno City Council meeting on Wednesday, May 7

• You can find the agenda here.

• To view/participate virtually via Zoom, register here.

• The pertinent item is C.2 - Presentation on current City of Reno public engagement practices, and updates regarding the launch of a public process to strategically prioritize engagement methods and practices. (For Discussion Only)​

To contact the City Manager and City Council directly:

• Mayor Hillary Schieve: schieveh@reno.gov

• Ward 1 Councilmember Kathleen Taylor: taylork@reno.gov

• Ward 2 Councilmember Naomi Duerr: duerrn@reno.gov

• Ward 3 Councilmember Miguel Martinez: martinezmi@reno.gov

• Ward 4 Councilmember Meghan Ebert: ebertm@reno.gov

• Ward 5 Councilmember Devon Reese: reesed@reno.gov

• Ward 6 Councilmember Brandi Anderson: andersonb@reno.gov

Reno City Manager Jackie Bryant: bryantj@reno.gov

Thanks to you all for your continued support of civic engagement!

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Be sure to check out my Citizen Guide for helpful resources and links to help anyone become more informed and engaged in issues related to urban development (& more) in Reno.

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