Jacobs pushes the boundaries (again)

Planning Commission to review their latest request on Feb. 1

Once again we’ve been deluged with snow, and with it, some treacherous low temperatures and conditions. Please stay safe out there and look out for each other.

My last post, Casinos in Context, referred, among other things, to the frustratingly incremental nature by which Jacobs Entertainment has been seeking approvals for various parcels and permits without revealing any overall plan for the enormous amount of real estate they’ve purchased on the west side of downtown Reno. As I’ve stated, it’s a strategy that makes it impossible to accurately gauge the cumulative impact of each individual action, and it just keeps happening, over and over again.

This week brings yet another request from Jacobs to the Planning Commission, which meets this coming Wednesday, February 1. Item 5.4 on the agenda (view here) is the Jacobs Glow Plaza and Festival Area Amendment, an item that has prompted the nonprofit organization Scenic Nevada to issue a rare alert. If you’re not aware, Scenic Nevada works “to protect the scenic beauty of Nevada’s majestic landscape as well as the scenic character of our communities. This includes billboard and sign control, protecting and supporting scenic byways, advocating for undergrounding power lines, and minimizing the impact of cell towers.” They are truly the community experts on the City’s signage code and you can sign up for their alerts here.

The request that prompted this alert (please read it in its entirety here) would amend the Conditional Use Permit (CUP) approved last May for the Glow Plaza and Festival Area by adding the entire Sands parcel to that CUP. The stated intent is to allow the Sands to advertise the Glow Plaza on the massive new digital signage that will soon be installed on the Sands building. The two planned locations for that signage appear in light blue below. The ground-floor site is a “reader board” in approximately the same location as the old Mel’s Diner marquee. The second is on the side of the hotel tower facing north toward St. Mary’s and Interstate 80—it’s about eight stories high.

Images from Jacobs Entertainment CUP amendment application

The permit for the massive new digital signs was approved by staff last fall (casinos are allowed such signage by right) and the City made the parameters for that signage clear, stating, “Please note the digital displays can only advertise onsite activity.”

So here we are, months later, with Jacobs seeking to redefine the events on the Glow Plaza as “onsite activity” for the Sands by literally adding the Sands to the Glow Plaza's permitting boundary. Added conditions to the requested amendment clarify that the Sands will not share the other permitted uses approved for the Glow Plaza or vice versa, making this, on the surface at least, solely about signage. (You can view all the conditions here, including the proposed new conditions 24 and 25.)

The vicinity map marks in yellow the locations of the Glow Plaza (left) and Sands.

The Glow Plaza is, of course, already allowed signage on its own site, just not anywhere near the scale of the digital signage allowed for casinos. When the CUP for the Glow Plaza was approved last spring, Jacobs agreed to erect signage on site that would display a website address with a schedule of upcoming events (condition 22).

City staff have included a comparison of the signage allowed for Mixed-Use Districts (which is how the Glow Plaza is zoned) vs. Casinos (which have a Gaming Overlay). As the Scenic Nevada alert states, "Reno’s sign code would limit the Glow Plaza to a 35-foot tall, digital flashing and animated sign not to exceed 125 square feet. According to our calculations the Sands sign is about 33 times larger than what the Glow Plaza would be allowed under normal circumstances." Under this request, the Glow Plaza would get both.

You can watch the presentation from Jacobs Entertainment representative Garrett Gordon at the January 9th Ward 1 NAB meeting below. Unfortunately on the feed, his powerpoint slides were not moving forward as they were for the live audience.

Nothing can be done to prevent Jacobs Entertainment from erecting a massive digital sign on the north side of the Sands, a right that Reno’s casinos enjoy (no matter what impact it might have on the desirability of developing the many vacant lots in view of it, much less on anything or anyone already there). The issue here is consistency in what that signage can advertise. As Scenic Nevada explains, “An approval of the conditional use permit amendment would give the Glow Plaza advertising exposure that no one else has.  No non-casino business can advertise on a giant digital casino sign. Further, by the city’s own sign code definitions, advertising the Glow Plaza events a block away at the Sands changes the legal onsite casino sign into a digital billboard. And digital billboards are prohibited in Reno under the sign code.”

Again, to quote the Scenic Nevada alert:

“Legally established Nonrestricted Gaming Operation land uses may use Gaming Overlay district sign requirements,” in the mixed-use zones, according to Footnote 11 of the city’s sign code chart. There is no exception for any other business. The Glow Plaza is a festival venue in a mixed-use zone, not an approved gaming site and therefore by law can’t use a gaming sign to advertise.

This points to the dangerous creep of the incremental request. First, Jacobs gets an approved permit (including provisions for signage) for the Glow Plaza in a public meeting, and we think we have learned the full parameters of what that project will entail. Next, the company secures separate signage permits for the Sands parcel that clearly restrict the content of what they can display to onsite activity there—again, a known quantity. And now, Jacobs comes back with a request to essentially combine the two, altering the intent and provisions of both permits with a single trip to the Planning Commission (the item would only be reviewed by City Council if appealed).

What allows these two properties to be considered a single “site” despite their non-contiguous nature appears to be the fact that the parcels are all included in “an application for annexation or development”—presumably the highly problematic Development Agreement.

But if that’s the case, then what’s next? Jacobs owns a lot of parcels that were all designated on the map in that Development Agreement—and has acquired even more since. And since we don’t know what, if anything, Jacobs intends to build on the rest of that land, who’s to say what other amendments might be requested to further push the boundaries at a later date? What kind of precedent would this be setting, for Jacobs and for any other gaming entity with offsite, non-casino holdings?

Recall, too, that as far as we know, the Development Agreement between the City and Jacobs Entertainment has STILL not been finalized, a full fifteen months after City Council approved it. That agreement would allow Jacobs to erect three large signs advertising the so-called “Neon Line District” on West 4th Street and elsewhere and was the subject of a Scenic Nevada lawsuit that has still not been resolved.

Please read Scenic Nevada’s new alert for yourself, look through the materials, and submit public comment if you feel so inclined. I’ll paste the instructions below.

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Mini-Storage at the Reno Town Mall

Item 5.3 on Wednesday’s agenda also caught my eye. It’s a request for a Conditional Use Permit to establish a 523-unit mini-storage facility in the vacant former grocery space at Reno Town Mall (once a Raley’s, it was last occupied by Sierra Foods Market, which closed last April). Is this a compatible addition to a neighborhood shopping center? Take a look at the staff report, maps, site and floor plans, and elevations and be sure to read the public comments here for some helpful insights.

The Old Town Mall is on W. Peckham Lane just west of S. Virginia Street.

If you’d like to comment on either of these items or anything else on the Planning Commission’s February 1st agenda, here are the instructions:

Public Comment: Individuals wishing to address the Planning Commission at the meeting shall submit a “Request to Speak” form to the Staff Liaison.  Individuals not in attendance may provide public comment by: (1) submitting an online public comment form at www.reno.gov/PCPublicComment; (2) sending an email to RenoPlanningCommission@reno.gov; (3) sending a letter to the City of Reno Planning Commission, Attn. Jason Garcia-LoBue, P.O. Box 1900, Reno, NV 89505; or (4) leaving a voicemail at (775) 393-1776.  Voicemails received by 12:00 p.m. on the day of the hearing will be transcribed, provided to the Planning Commission, and entered into the record. Voicemails received thereafter and public comment received during the meeting will be provided to the Planning Commission for review prior to adjournment and entered into the public record.

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Lastly, a new Development Projects memo was issued last week, outlining several projects that will soon be on their way to meetings of the Neighborhood Advisory Boards, Planning Commission, and/or City Council. You can read it here.

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As always, you can view this and prior newsletters on my Substack site and follow the Brief (and contribute to the ongoing conversation) on Twitter, Facebook & Instagram. If you feel inspired to contribute to my efforts, my Venmo account is @Dr-Alicia-Barber and you can mail checks, if you like, to Alicia Barber at P.O. Box 11955, Reno, NV 89510. Thanks so much for reading, and have a great week.