Preview: The Sept. 25, 2024 Reno City Council meeting
Affordable housing, plans for the Truckee River, selling the CAC properties, and more
Reno City Council meets on Wednesday, September 25, with the agenda and links to supporting materials posted here. It’s a packed meeting, so be sure to scan through it for items of interest to you. You can find the rest of the City’s weekly schedule here.
Today I’ll highlight some development-related items on the Council agenda, including affordable housing fee reductions; several items related to the Truckee River and its frontage; and sales of City-owned land including the former CAC properties on Record Street and a parcel on East 4th Street. After that I have a few updates and the latest in local development news. So let’s dive in.
Support for affordable housing
At a time when the median price of homes in Reno has just soared to its second highest number ever ($650,000) it’s nice to see so many affordable housing projects underway. Reno City Council is supporting some of those projects in a few ways:
Item B.23 – This is a resolution to be provided to the Nevada Department of Business and Industry, supporting the 402-unit “Skyline Flats” affordable housing development on Dandini Blvd. This is not direct financial support but will enable the state to issue tax-exempt bonds, as you can read in the Staff Report here.
Item C.2 - Affordable housing fee reduction of up to $1,465,059 in sewer connection fees for the Stoker by Vintage Apartments at 500 Stoker Avenue (below). You’ll find the Staff Report here and a post from Downtown Makeover here.
Item C.3 - Affordable housing fee reduction of up to $21,120 in building permit fees and up to $451,186 in sewer connection fees for the Line Drive Apartments at 700 Line Drive. This is a 50-unit project intended to serve “veterans, persons experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness, and extremely and very low-income adults with physical and/or cognitive disabilities.” That Staff Report is here and you can find a Downtown Makeover post here that includes a link to a prior Washoe County presentation about the project.
Creation of a linear Truckee River Park?
Two agenda items pertain to the future of the Truckee River and adjacent land.
First, Item D.1 is a resolution to designate all City of Reno owned and/or controlled property located adjacent to the Truckee River, between Booth Street and South Virginia Street, as a City of Reno park pursuant to RMC Sec 8.23.010.
The Staff Report offers these reasons for the action:
Regulations changing along the path can cause confusion for residents and visitors as there is a presumption that the regulations are consistent throughout;
Vehicles allowed in parks and along paths differ from what is allowed along what is considered sidewalks;
Park regulations prohibit blocking paths while keeping the paths clear for transportation whereas a sidewalk can be blocked provided it remain accessible (at least 30 inches);
Maintenance responsibility would be more clearly defined and efficient with consistent designation;
Increased efficacy of Park/River Ranger position through the expansion of park boundaries;
I appreciate this list, but I’m not sure it effectively conveys the tangible implications of such a designation. For instance, what specific types of vehicles are allowed on sidewalks that would no longer be allowed were these spaces to be classified as parks? And how would the differing regulations about “blocking paths” impact the people who use them? Do these prohibitions refer to objects, people, or both? You can find the regulations governing city parks in Municipal Code 8.23 here, but it would be nice not to have to figure all of that out for ourselves.
I was also confused about what specific areas would be impacted. A map is included with the Resolution, but it doesn’t clearly depict which areas would shift from non-park to park. I wrote to Parks Planner Karina Mercier on Friday and got this response:
“The change is to ensure that there is a continuous connection along the river. But as you have observed, most of the areas are already designated as City Parks so there wouldn't be a significant change, the main difference would be the addition of APN 011-132-06 (the parcel south of the river by Booth street), and the rights of way pathways such as Truckee River Lane, which is the area east of West Street Plaza and west of Virginia Street, already controlled by the City.”
She also sent me a new map that she said she’d be showing at City Council. It’s titled “Truckee River Park,” which would ostensibly comprise everything marked in red.
This designation seems like a big deal to me, and something that deserves substantial discussion to fully flesh out its potential implications for everyone who uses these spaces now or will in the future, as well as its relationship to the Truckee River Vision Plan, which proposes the formation of a Truckee River Park District.
The Truckee River Vision Plan
Item D.3, the presentation, discussion, and potential approval of the Truckee River Vision Plan, was initially scheduled for discussion on August 28 but has been delayed a few times. The Staff Report recommends that Council approve the plan “and direct staff to pursue project opportunities outlined in the implementation plan and bring identified projects forward when action can be taken.”
You can view the 67-slide presentation accompanying the plan here and the final detailed 223-page Truckee River Vision Plan itself here.
As I mentioned above, one of this plan’s central recommendations is to partner with Washoe County and the City of Sparks to create a Truckee River Park District to help generate funds. That’s discussed in detail beginning on p. 136 of the plan and is just one of the “Next Steps” listed at the end of the presentation. Here are the others:
Complete ARPA Funded Projects (those are listed in the Staff Report)
Create a Service Plan for the Parks District
Implement Overlay Zoning District (this starts on p. 67 of the plan)
Develop Funding Plan to Complete High Priority Projects and Quick Wins
This plan is extensive, and I think most of its contents (like renderings of the various riverfront spaces) are being presented as recommendations, but it would be good to clarify what exactly Council would be approving if they approve the plan (i.e. which “project opportunities” Council would be simultaneously directing staff to pursue).
To help with that, be sure to check out pages 144-159 of the plan, where you’ll find a detailed “Implementation Matrix” that lists specific recommendations and assigns each one a priority level, timing, a “project trigger,” estimated budget, responsible agencies, and funding sources. I’ll include just one excerpt from that below.
This is a huge initiative with many parts and players, so I look forward to learning how the City will ensure that every step is community-centered as it moves forward.
Sales of City Property
The Council agenda also includes some potential sales of City-owned parcels.
Item D.6 would sell the property located at 1940 East Fourth Street to Hooten Real Estate LLC, which is currently leasing this parcel from the City of Reno and Redevelopment Agency and already owns a building on it. According to the Staff Report, they’d like to purchase it “in order to secure the land to protect their current operations.” Council approval would allow staff to proceed with negotiations, order appraisals, and return to Council with a purchase and sale agreement for approval.
Items D.7 and D. 8 pertain to the sale of the former Community Assistance Center properties on Record Street (below) to Ulysses Acquisition LLC, the developer selected in August to construct an affordable housing project there. The area consists of five total parcels (abandoning part of Record Street) with a purchase price of $3,375,000 to be financed by a seller note with 2% interest annually for a term of 15 years. Downtown Makeover wrote about this one here. Item D.7 is a Resolution determining that it’s in the public interest to sell these properties without first offering them to the public (Staff Report). That item also includes the appraisals. Item D.8 would approve an Exclusive Negotiating Agreement with Ulysses (Staff Report).
I’m happy for the City to be facilitating the construction of affordable housing, but when I look through all the materials related to these properties and recall how expensive they were to build—and how recently—my heart just sinks at the wasted expenditure and property neglect. These were state-of-the-art buildings. This is why I’m such an advocate of planning for and with people—and using public funds wisely.
More allocations of ARPA funds
Speaking of public funds, Item D. 5 proposes how to disperse more than $1.3 million in ARPA funds that were not expended toward the development of the Pembroke Flat Field Project, as discussed at Council on August 28. The Staff Report suggests allocating these funds to a combination of Reno Tennis Court Lights, a Parks Rolling Recreation Unit, Parks and Recreation Security Cameras, and outreach contract renewals for the Reno Initiative for Shelter and Equality and the Karma Box Project.
That’s it for my highlights from the September 25 Council agenda. You can attend the meeting in person or virtually by registering here. Comments can be delivered in person, by submitting an online public comment form at Reno.Gov/PublicComment; (2) emailing Publiccomment@reno.gov; (3) leaving a voicemail at 775-393-4499; or 4) participating in the meeting via Zoom.
Stevenson Street abandonment request rescheduled
In other news, the request for the City to abandon Stevenson Street, an item that was originally scheduled to be heard by City Council on August 28 (and was extensively discussed by me here), has been tentatively scheduled to return to Council on October 23, according to City planner Leah Piccotti, who told me that it had to be re-noticed as a public hearing and then was delayed further due to the applicant’s scheduling conflicts. If there are any more updates on that, I’ll let you know.
As I wrote a few weeks ago, this request and its implications seem inextricably tied to the 2021 elimination of the City parking lot on the north side of West 2nd Street, a lot that I’ve been told actually held close to 90 spaces rather than the 60+ that I cited earlier. Now that Jacobs Entertainment has filed a permit to construct yet another festival grounds on parcels north of West 2nd Street, I think the City needs to closely evaluate its overall parking plan for the rapidly developing west side of downtown.
I have repeatedly drawn attention to Jacobs Entertainment’s continued refusal to reveal its plans for the land it has acquired, and I want to be clear about why that refusal should trouble all of us, including our elected representatives—not just because Jacobs Entertainment should never have been allowed to enter into a Development Agreement with the City without actually specifying what their development would comprise; not just because they promised City Council last November to reveal their entire Master Plan “within 60-90 days,” and not just because they promised City Council that they would provide St. Thomas Aquinas Cathedral with regular access to the same number of parking spaces that were lost when they bought the City’s parking lot; but because this company’s steadfast refusal to make public its intentions for the land it has acquired makes it impossible for the City of Reno to make informed decisions regarding anything that surrounds it.
Discussion: City of Reno Sign Regulations
I mentioned the City’s initiative to revise its sign code in my last Brief, and the nonprofit Scenic Nevada has now weighed in with some of their concerns, which you can read in their new alert here. Some of those concerns include precisely where property owners have the right to erect 100-foot-tall signs without restrictions on area, lighting, or animation—whether in all gaming overlay districts, the downtown so-called “Entertainment District,” on parcels with nonrestricted gaming only, etc. See the City’s Zoning Code Clean-Up webpage for upcoming virtual meetings on this.
Update: Canyon Estates Moves Forward
As This is Reno reports, the Planned Unit Development (PUD) ordinance for Canyon Estates was approved at the September 19 Special Reno City Council meeting.
News: UNR purchases 16 parcels south of I-80
As Jason Hidalgo reported last week, the University of Nevada has finalized its purchase of 16 parcels (and the 18 houses on them) just south of I-80 between Lake Street and Evans Avenue, for a project they’re calling “University Village.” The stated plan, at least at this point, is to make the houses currently located on these parcels available to UNR-affiliated tenants. It’s very likely that this is just an initial stage of land assemblage in the area for UNR, so I’ll just ask publicly that the University keep the community apprised of its plans for the historic homes on these parcels, which date from the early 1900s to 1940s and range widely in size and condition. I haven’t heard whether any existing tenants of these houses have been or will be evicted.
These parcels are coincidentally all contained within the boundaries of the City of Reno’s current Underrepresented Communities Grant project, which focuses on the history and heritage of the African American community in Northeast Reno, a project that my consulting firm is honored to be working on. So I’ll be personally researching these parcels (and many hundreds more) in the months to come. Please visit that project’s website for more information on its goals and components, and share any information you’d like to contribute via the survey link. Have a fantastic week, all.
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