September 2022 (Best of Northern Nevada)

2 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com

The only people who believe that rent control is useless are the folks that don’t need it. Drive by 5599 Quail Manor Court, and ask the seniors in the community why they are getting 60-day notices to move. It certainly isn’t for not paying their rent every month for the last several (some for 25-plus) years! Our complex was purchased by a California LLC, which took over in March 2021. We were previously a 55-plus 2022 | Vol. community. (The property owner) immediately changed our community to come one, come all, without advising the current residents, and raised the rent for newbies exponentially. This past January, we only saw a rent increase of $100 without renewing the lease. Starting in March, they handed out eviction notices. It wasn’t just to raise the rent, but clearly by design, it was to remove the old and rent to the new. Rent control/affordable housing is an absolute must until a long-term solution is achieved; gov ernments need to put a stop to evictions! Neither of the Reno mayoral candidates is interested in rent control, so the situation will get worse. The “affordable housing” under construction is too late for many. We can only (blame) the mayor and City Council for their inaction. It’s a damn shame.

Tsk, tsk to have overlooked such an important actor and singer in this play!

—FRANK X. frankm@renonr.comMULLEN

EDITOR'S NOTE

28, Issue 4

The cost of living, the median income and the inflation rate should dictate the price of housing. Having a place to sleep that is safe and sheltered from the elements is a basic human need—not a playground for investors who see tenants as eminently exploitable.

I have to say that the review of Reno Little Theater’s Putnam County by Jennifer Santina (RN&R, August 2022) was a bit skewed. I agreed with many of her comments but was totally upset by the fact that she left out the amazing singing and acting performance by Edison Garcia, who played the part of Mitch Mahoney. Garcia’s singing was by far the best and most professional of the cast—no false notes and great vocalization. His acting of an ex-con in repentance mode, was hilarious and very well performed.

Penalize greedy developers

Mailing address: 31855 Date Palm Drive,

Email letters to letters@renonr.com No. City, CA 92234

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 3 LETTERS

Andrea Daerice Reno Applause for Edison Garcia

775-324-4440 • RenoNR.com Publisher/Executive Editor Jimmy Boegle Editor Frank X. Mullen Photo Editor David Robert Cover and Feature Design Dennis Wodzisz Contributors Wishelle Banks, Alicia Barber, Cheree Boteler, Owen Bryant, Brad Bynum, Max Cannon, Bob Grimm, Michael Grimm, Janice Hoke, Matt Jones, Matt King, Maggie Nichols, Steve Noel, Dan Perkins, Pax Leigh Robinson, Jessica Santina, Kingkini Sengupta, John L. Smith, Todd South, Jesse Stone, Kris Vagner, Robert Victor, Madison Wanco The Reno News & Review print edition is published every month. All contaent is ©2022 and may not be published or reprinted in any form without the written permission of the publisher. The RN&R is available free of charge throughout Northern Nevada, limited to one copy per reader. Additional copies may be purchased for $5 by calling 775-3244440. The RN&R may be distributed only authorized Thedistributors.RN&Ris a proud member of the Association of Alternative Newsmedia, the Nevada Press Association, and the Local Independent Online News Publishers.

Rent control is not a solution

Phyllis Beverly Sparks

These aren’t your daddy’s school board elections

Rent control (RN&R, August 2022) is only a short-term cure to higher rents. In the medium and long term, it stifles investment in new and existing rental units, thereby eroding the quality and supply of the hous ingThestock.solution to higher rents is for the city to support the building of more rental units thorough streamlining the development pro cess, reducing entitlement fees, increasing density and reducing parking requirements. Rent control has never worked in the long run. George Graham Reno Rent control stops gouging

One way to regulate the (rental) market might be increasing tax rates on landlords where there are high vacancy rates and high homeless rates. There should be a penalty for developers who build things no one can afford. Any developer who doesn’t want to give back to the community, who doesn’t want to pay taxes and operate respectfully, should be called what they really are: parasites.

3-263, Cathedral

| September

Ted Green Reno

When I covered a Colorado school district as a cub reporter, board meetings were a natural alternative to sleeping pills. And school board elections, tucked away at the bottom of the ballot, garnered little interest among voters. But if you’ve haven’t paid much attention to a school board election before, this is the year to start. In Washoe County, a slate of critics of the school district is challenging three incumbents. In addition to traditional issues like test scores, staffing shortages and budgets, those contests have become skirmishes in the nation’s culture wars. The challengers are frustrated and angry, echoing a small but vocal group of protestors who often attend board meetings. They decry what they see as the “liberal indoctrination” of students by an alleged far-left cabal. Their rallying cry is “take back our schools.” They have declared war on district policies that address equity, diversity and inclusion. They worry about transgender kids using bathrooms. They fret that talking about systemic racism may make white kids feel guilty. The challengers are allied with trustee Jeff Church, who shares many of their views. You may agree with those folks. Or not. But be aware of the massive sea change that will roil the board—and the schools—if those challengers win board seats. Voters must understand each candidate’s position in order to make an informed choice. School-board trustees work long hours and deal with complex matters while being paid just more than $700 a month. Many candidates want to serve because they have a passion for public service (while some also see it as a stepping stone to higher office). It’s hard work; it’s a serious job for serious people. On Nov. 8, you will decide who those folks will be. If you’ve never paid much attention to a school-board election, it’s time to start.

4 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com

Prevent wildfires—and stay safe when they spark

What’s the best thing about being in Northern Nevada?

Asked at Pignic Pub & Patio, 235 Flint St., Reno

Research analyst Will Curtis Military Faith Spampanato

The bad part is the homeless hanging around and leaving a mess. The small-city vibe, and the closeness to the beautiful countryside. Even though we have traffic, it’s still better than San Francisco or Chicago. The construction business is doing very well. Rebuilding America! The heat can be bad in the summer. Winter is my favorite season. The positives outweigh the negatives. The diversity. The different parts of the city. The river down town. We came here today and didn’t even know that there was going to be a Hawaiian festival going on. There were food trucks, and we put our feet in the river. This morning, we rode our bikes, zipped around and saw a sunflower festi val. There’s a lot to do here. Traffic can be a problem, and so can the homeless; that’s sad.

BY DAVID ROBERT COMMENT BY SEN. CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO

In the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, I worked to secure more than $3.4 billion for wildfire prevention, suppression and restoration, including a provision I authored that allocated $10 million for the kind of wildfire-detection equipment developed at the University of Nevada, Reno. This cutting-edge equipment can detect fires sooner, giving Nevadans across the state more time to prepare and evacuate if needed. All together, the infrastructure law contained $8 billion in resources to combat wildfires. Some of that funding—$1 billion of it—is now available to communities in Nevada and all over the West. The law also increased the pay for all 16,000 federal firefighters through 2023.

Northern Nevada has four seasons. The best part about the winter season is that the snow melts by the afternoon. The culture here is very diverse—a lot of different ethnic groups. People are friendly and helpful. If you get strand ed with your car, someone will stop and ask if you’re OK.

GUEST

Sole proprietor Terence Spampanato

I’m leading legislation to make sure that small business owners can get disaster relief if they are forced to close or limit hours due to wildfire smoke and unhealthy air quali ty. And I’ve also introduced legislation to strengthen the federal government’s research into wildfires and improve technology to monitor and control them.

I’m proud that I’ve fostered conversations among community leaders at every level, and I’ll keep working to make sure that Nevadans have what they need to prepare for fires, and recover after they hit.

STREETALK

Construction project manager Corrinne Wallace Escrow officer

The access to all the beauty of Tahoe, Donner Lake, Pyr amid Lake, etcetera. I love being in the forest and being near the high desert, too. The people of Northern Nevada are very friendly; like, when hiking in the mountains, peo ple will say hi to you. I love Nevada Pride and the Nevada Day parade in Carson City. But the worst thing is the cost of living. The rental market is priced very high, and legit locals are having a hard time living here. The weather here in Northern Nevada is wonderful. The people are friendly. The gambling is good here; I play video poker, jacks-or-better. I’m up three bucks as of this afternoon, but that’ll change by tonight. It’s very easy to meet people here. I love hiking, and the scenery is beauti ful—the openness of the desert. I hike out by Fallon, and I go up the hills to look at the vastness of the desert.

I’m also continuing to work to pass my Western Wildfire Support Act, a compre hensive bill to help communities in Nevada and across the Western U.S. acquire the training, equipment and funding they need to handle the dangers posed by rangeland fires. My bill would put a focus on preventing wildfires, from helping homeowners create defensible space to ensuring communities have easy-to-follow plans that will help seniors know what to do in case of emergency.Thereisalot you can do on your own to prepare for wild fires. You may already have a plan to evacuate, but if not, now is the time to make one, as well as to prepare a “go bag” with everything you need in case of disaster. The University of Nevada, Reno, Extension runs a program called Living With Fire (www. livingwithfire.com) that provides extensive resources. In addition, many other entities, including the Federal Emergency Manage ment Agency, provide guidelines, checklists and advice on disaster preparedness. Everyone in the West needs to work together to cope with the increasing threat of wildfires as the climate continues to heat up.

As a third-generation Nevadan, I’ve seen our wildfire seasons get longer, hotter and more dangerous. I’ve made it my mission in the Senate to get our state what it needs to fight back—from pay raises for fire fighters and additional funding for wildfire prevention to resources to help Nevadans keep themselves safe. I’m especially committed to ensuring that all our communities have key support during wildfire season. Wildfire smoke can be especially harmful for children, seniors, people with pre-exist ing conditions and people who work outdoors. That’s why it’s so im portant for Nevadans to be as informed and prepared as possible. And that’s why I’m continuing to work to do everything I can at the federal level to help us prevent wild fires, respond to those that spark, and restore and recover after a fire.

Elizabeth Linn

The ‘RN&R’ welcomes a diversity of viewpoints—as long as those viewpoints are grounded in reality

I’ve been asked a lot of questions and gotten a lot of suggestions since the Reno News & Review returned to print. Will you ever go back to being a weekly? (Alas, no. There are no commercial newspa per printers left in Northern Nevada, making weekly publication cost-prohibitive.) You should bring back the horoscope! (The horoscope column we ran for a couple of decades is written for a weekly cycle, not a monthly cycle, so it wouldn’t work.)

CALL KEVIN STERN 760-250-1977 TownCA.com CalDRE #01376548 You Need a Home in Palm Springs you know you do. MoveToPalmSprings com Sat. September 17 at 8 p.m. & Sun. September 18 at 2 p.m. PioneerCenter.com 775-434-1050

Since you brought back the Best of Northern Nevada readers’ poll, will you be bringing back the BONN party? (It kills me to say it, but not this year. We’re still getting back on our feet after reviving the paper following the post-pan demic shutdown. That, combined with the fact that this is an election year, means Frank and I lack the bandwidth to put together a Best of Northern Nevada party that’s worthy of the name. It’ll be back next year—I promise.)

“When people like Jim Marchant have a very real chance of becoming Nevada’s secretary of state, our state, our institutions and our democracy are in jeopardy.”

However, one question/suggestion has come up more than any other: You shouldn’t be as political as the old RN&R was Translation: They did not like the RN&R’s “old” “politics.” To hone that in even further: They thought we were too liberal. Full disclosure here: I am a pretty liberal person, as are many of the RN&R’s staffers and contributors. That said, I don’t con sider the RN&R to be a “liberal” pub lication. All po litical viewpoints and opinions are welcome here, as long as they’re based in facts. Let me repeat that last part: as long as they’re based in facts. The problem is, far too many politicians and their followers these days— most of whom belong to the Republican Party—are choosing to disregard or flat-out deny proven facts. Here are just a few examples of facts: Manmade climate change is real, and it’s kicking our butts right now. COVID-19 vaccines, while not perfect, saved a whole lot of lives. There is no credible evidence that the 2020 election was anything but fair and legitimate. All of statementstheseare verifiably true. The scientific consen sus on climate change is over we’rewhelming—andseeingthe effects of climate change play out in real-time, with ter rible, planet-chang ing consequences. The statistics on vaccine effectiveness couldn’t be clearer. And despite the best efforts of many—re member that Arizona audit, performed by a group hellbent on finding some shred of evidence of ballot-tampering, that ended up being a complete failure?—each and every indication shows that the 2020 election was fair, honest and legitimate. If you’re coming to the RN&R with a view point or opinion which I, or Frank, or anyone else involved with the RN&R disagrees with, it’s still welcome here, as long as it’s based in something resembling facts. But if you come to us saying something that’s verifiably, provably false—such as a would-be RenoNR.com commenter who tried to claim the “science” behind climate change is faulty, and that the powers-that-be are simply trying to “use climate change as a way to lock us down and restrict us”—we don’t want you here. Look at how many people died because they got swept up in vaccine skepticism. Witness the harm being done by forces invested in cli mate-change denial. And when people like elec tion-denier Jim Marchant have a very real chance of becoming Nevada’s secretary of state—a topic John L. Smith eloquently breaks down on Page 11—our state, our institutions and our democracy are in jeopardy. Facts and dissenting opinions have always, and will always, be welcome in the Reno News & Re view. But mistruths and lies have no place here.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 5 Facts matter | BY JIMMY BOEGLEA NOTE FROM THE PUBLISHER

| BY FRANK X. MULLEN

Although it’s technically a nonpartisan board, politics regularly rears its head. Some of the critics who attend the board’s meetings present their views in a civil manner; others interrupt discussions with shouts, and scream at panel members during public comment pe riods. That’s a national trend, experts say, and it’s organized at a national level.

6 | RN&R | September 2022 |

—Pax Leigh Robinson

NEWSRenoNR.com

For decades, Jacobsen said, school boards have sometimes been a venue for conflicts about social and political issues, including sex education, school prayer, evolution, federal testing requirements and busing. Culture wars issues have occasionally flared up, instigated by both the left and the right.

Photo/Eric Marks

With election season under way, in dustry experts forecast a significant in crease in both legal and scam robocalls. Even if a recipient is immune to scams, getting the frequent calls is annoying.

The con games are designed to scare or trick people into disclosing personal information or sending gift cards to pay some a fake bill. The Silver State receives the sixth-highest number of automated calls in the country, according to estimates based on TrueCaller survey data. In 2021, Nevadans received about 460 million robocalls, nearly 200 million (42%) of which were from scammers. That’s between six and seven calls for each Nevadan per month, although some folks report that many per week. More than a quarter-million Nevadans lost money to scam calls in 2021.

Our children’s future

Voters in November will decide if the Washoe County School Board, under siege from “culture wars” protestors for the past two years, will take a political right turn. Protestors flocked to board meetings to oppose COVID-19 mask mandates, as well as the remote and hybrid learning models that replaced in-person classes during the height of the pandemic. Some attend the meetings to air grievances against the district’s equity and diversity programs, the way the history of racism is discussed in classes, sex education and LGBTQ issues. Their rallying cry is to “take back” the school board. Outspoken critics of the panel have sometimes created a threatening atmo sphere at the meetings, according to some trustees and other attendees. Passions run high in what has been an often-chaotic two years, as board members navigated the effects of the pandemic—and the divisive political landscape. The panel weathered the resignation of several members, including former trustee Kurt Thigpen, who left his seat in July 2021. Thigpen has said he was facing death threats and felt that his life was in danger from some of the more vehement board critics. An activist in 2021 mounted an unsuccessful recall cam paign against board president Angie Taylor, who said in October that the district now has a “safe room” in its headquarters building for the trustees and staff. Teachers who attend board meetings have complained that protes tors photographed their license plates and ID badges, a tactic they said has a chilling effect on their ability to make public comments at the meetings.Thisyear, nine candidates under the banner of “Save Washoe County School District” challenged four board incumbents in the June primary. Three incumbents and three challeng ers advanced to the general election; the fourth incumbent retained her seat after getting more than 50 percent of votes in the primary. The SaveWCSD website, now taken down, alleged that the district has “an ultra-left curriculum that ignores academics, promotes propaganda over objective instruction, derides traditional moral values and parents’ roles, and encour ages racism and a distorted view of America’s history and accomplishments.”

Right-wing candidates run for the school board to “take back our schools”

Organizations like the conservative Heritage Foundation, the Manhattan Institute and others have put together “slick packets” and templates for proposed laws for local activists. “They tell them what to say, how to say it, and really gave them play books,” she said. “They’ve also been really successful with getting the word out on social media with groups like Moms for Liberty and No Left Turn in Education.”

“It’s getting kind of wild,” said Rebecca Jacobsen, an associate professor of education policy at Michigan State University who stud ies national education issues. A national rage machine Washoe County’s experience isn’t unique, Johnson said. The nation’s school boards, for merly known for tedious meetings about bud gets and conducting sleepy election campaigns, have become battlegrounds in the culture wars. Boards have become steeped in partisan politics—and that’s no accident. It’s part of a national conservative—and often, Trumpist-re lated—strategy, some experts conclude.

“What’s different now is the combination of well-organized national interest, and it can be from either the left and the right. This time it happens to be coming from the right,” Jacobsen said.

Jim Tyrrell, a vice president at Transaction Network Services, a company that collects data by routing more than a billion and a half calls a day over its network, said although it may be hard to believe, scam robocalls decreased slightly in the past year, and were down about 6%. “Still, (more than) 5 billion scam calls get through every month,” he said.

Repelling an invasion of robocalls In the war between robocalls and humans, the robots are winning.

When recruiting candidates, some national groups aren’t interested in people who say they will weigh the evidence and examine both sides of issues, Jacobsen said. “What happens when these national groups enter, and money becomes a real big issue, is that the politics becomes what we see at the national level,” she said. “We heard candidates tell us over Members of the public protest the Washoe County School Board.

UPFRONT

“It’s a moment or a flicker out of life. It’s a fishhook that takes you out of the moment,” said Dean Hinitz, clinical psychologist and professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. “… These calls take away a micro bit of my autonomy. I want to be the author of my day, and this takes away from my own authorship.”

“I’ve gotten scammed before, and I felt really embarrassed that I got … got,” said Danielle C. Smith of Reno, who said she receives six to 10 robocalls daily, often back-to-back. “I feel really bad that this is happening to older people, disabled people and the most vulnerable among us.” She’s right. According to data from the National Consumer Law Center, Americans currently receive more than 1 billion of those calls each month, more than 33 million daily. Seniors are fre quent targets. Robocalls are generated by computers and can be legitimate, but many are the work of scammers.

Focusing school board campaigns on hot-button partisan issues isn’t always a win ning strategy, some research shows. A study by Ballotpedia, released in May, identified 141 school districts in Missouri, Oklahoma and Wisconsin that held elections in April, where candidates took a position on COVID-19 responses, racial issues in education or sex/ gender in schools. In those “conflict races,” Ballotpedia reported, two-thirds of the incum bents kept their seats. When school boards become a battleground for partisan politics, school districts can seesaw back and forth across the national political divide, Jacobsen noted. In Denver, she said, factions from the left and right of the political spectrum have had majorities on the school board at different times, creating a chaotic situation.

‘Blowing up’ the school system

Critics of the school board have consistently voiced their anger and frustration during the panel’s twice-monthly meetings. School Board candidate Melanie Sutton, who has attended the meetings for more than a year and is facing incumbent Joe Rodriguez, frequently addresses the trustees. “We’ve been calling on all parents to pull their kids out of

The district, Church said, has taken a politi cal left turn; he and the challengers want to im prove the schools, not tear down the district. “I just think we can do better,” Church said. On a scale of 10, where 1 is extremely leftist and 10 is the right-wing fringe, Church considers himself “about a 7.”

Some critics want to return to an idyllic bygone age that never existed, she said, and the hopelessness of that goal, along with the litany of grievances fanned by national conservative groups, breeds fear and anger.

School Board Trustee Jeff Church at a recent meeting. He said that neither he nor the School Board challengers are radicals. “I think we’re very mainstream,” he said. Photo/David Robert government schools, because it’s no longer a public school system. … They are indoc trinating our children. We need to blow up this school system and then rebuild, because you guys suck,” she told the panel during the Oct. 12, 2021 board meeting. Sutton did not respond to the RN&R’s interview request.

Placing an item on the board’s agenda requires the support of at least two trustees, and Church often stands alone. If one of the challengers wins, he banks on having more clout and getting some of his proposals on the agenda. If all three win and support Church’s positions, they will have a majority on the seven-member panel. “If we had four … then we really change the direction of the school board,” Church said. “(With) two, we can get stuff on the agenda.”

“What’s at stake in this election is our children’s future—our future doctors, lawyers, mechanics, carpenters and business owners,” said Jay, a Republican. “One hundred percent of our future is at stake.”

The groups sow the seeds of dissent and support local activists and candidates, even pro viding funding. “You add social media to that, and it really took off like wildfire,” Jacobsen said. Opposition to “critical race theory,” a the ory about systemic racism becoming self-per petuating that is taught in graduate-level classes (and never in K-12 schools), was a “purposeful creation” by a scholar at the Manhattan Institute. “He’s said on Twitter that he’s going after that term and redefining it to mean everything that’s making people feel angry … gender issues, bathroom issues, books—you name it.”

Beadles moved to Reno from California in 2019 and first attended a Washoe County School Board meeting on Oct. 25, 2021. That was a special session to discuss the possible censure of Trustee Jeff Church, an effort Beadles called a “kangaroo court.” “God has blessed me,” Beadles told the panel during the public comment period. “I have a shit-ton of money, and I’m going to do everything I fucking can to remove all of you.” Beadles, who did not respond to the RN&R’s request for comment, subsequently contributed to the campaigns of several board challengers, according to state campaign-finance reports. He also paid for the unsuccessful recall effort against Taylor and a recall effort against Wash oe County Commissioner Vaughn Hartung, which was withdrawn. Beadles’ political action committee, The Franklin Project, paid for a recount in the state GOP primary, funded an unsuccessful lawsuit by failed gubernatorial candidate Joey Gilbert, and produced di rect-mail attacks on local incumbents, includ ing School Board Trustee Elizabeth Smith.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 7 and over that … nobody wants candidates who say they want to compromise. (These groups) want candidates who will ‘pound your fist for this thing, or pound your fist for that thing.’ So it’s causing school board members to take stronger, more polarized stances.”

The line between national and local politics has been blurred, Jacobsen said, because “ev erything is moving so quickly. … You can look like you are local, but really be coming from that national interest.” Washoe County’s school board challengers say their concerns are organic. They say they are thinking for themselves, and no one is pull ing the strings of their campaigns. They have a well-financed ally, though, in Robert Beadles, who has pledged to replace the board members he considers to be liberal. He is a propo nent of a national “precinct strategy” that’s seeking to dominate local politics one county at a time, according to one of his websites, operationsunlight.com.

Smith, who won her seat outright by getting more than 50 percent of the vote in the June primary against two challengers, said the mail er was bizarre and historic. “I’m the first Wash oe County School Board trustee candidate to ever have a PAC go after me,” she noted.

‘Domestic terrorists’ The mailer accused Smith of supporting “to talitarianism and enlisting the full might of the U.S. surveillance state on parents who exercise their right of free speech to voice their displea sure of far-left indoctrination of public schools, labeling them as potential ‘domestic terror ists.’” The mailer accused Smith of supporting critical race theory, which is not taught in K-12 classrooms, and “radical sexuality and gender identity theories taught to our children.”

Trustee Jeff Church, who is two years into a four-year term, supports the three challengers. The SaveWCSD site was his idea, he said, adding that neither he nor the challengers are radicals. “I think we’re very mainstream,” he said.

Reno resident Richard Jay, who has been active in local boards, service groups and civic associations for 30 years, has been the self-appointed “Jeff Church watchdog” since 2020. Jay, who has written guest columns for local media outlets, said Church has flooded the public with misinformation and fans the flames of political partisanship at the board. He supports the three incumbents, all dedicated people who are serious about improving the district, he said. Church and the challengers, he said, are bent on politicizing the panel and creating chaos.

“Why are (critics) so angry?” asked Washoe County School Board Trustee Ellen Minetto, who is facing challenger Colleen Westlake in the November election. “I think it’s because they are afraid, afraid of change, afraid of the future.”

“There have been these wild swings back and forth,” Jacobsen said. “… The effect on the teachers and the district, trying to handle this agenda that swings back and forth every couple years, doing these 180-degree turns, is really harmful to the employees and ultimately to the students.”

| BY

The three hopefuls—Colleen Westlake, Graeme Reid and Melanie Sutton—were among nine primary candidates endorsed by a group called “Save Washoe County School District.” That group’s website stated those candidates opposed “critical race theory,” a graduate-level course that is not taught in Washoe classrooms (or any other school district), and other hot button issues embraced by right-wing groups.

“Some of (the protestors) have been really scary,” Minetto said. Candidates who echo critics’ concerns about COVID-19 masks, alleged “indoctri nation” of students to socialist views, the way history is taught in schools, and other complaints would create “mayhem” at the district if they were elected, she said. Minetto noted she and other incumbents have been verbally attacked in public comments and subjected to what she said was a deluge of misinformation from opponents during the primary election. She said critics’ vitriol—rather than solutions—is their only motivation.“Theyhate us,” she said. “They have such anger about everything; they want to dismantle the school board.”

Colleen Westlake, challenger: Westlake, 60, works for a Reno orthodontist and has been employed in the dental field for 30 years. She served on the Sierra Youth Football League board for more than a decade, but hasn’t served on any boards or as an elected official.

Three incumbents face challengers in Washoe School Board races FRANK X. MULLEN

Minetto praised the district teachers and staff, but she said if the panel’s incumbents are re placed with people who have no experience with the district and seek to tear it down, she predicts a “mass exodus” of employees. The district, she said, must support every aspect of students’ development —not only academics, but the stu dents’ social and mental health needs as well.

Opposition to CRT has become a cause ce leb among critics of public schools nationally. Their opponents say the complaints about the theory are shorthand for favoring a sanitized, white-centric version of American history, and a catch-all phrase for other conservative causes.

According to the Nevada Secretary of State’s campaign-contribution reports, last updated July 15, Minetto reported a total of $500 in contri butions and $540 in expenses. She received a single $500 contribution from Irish Capital LLC, according to the report. The state’s next reporting period is in October.

DISTRICT F An at-large seat that covers about half of Washoe County Adam Mayberry, incumbent: Mayberry, 51, was appointed to the school board in November and has served on the panel for about a year. Mayberry, the communications officer for Truck ee Meadows Fire and Rescue, also has served on the Reno-Tahoe Airport Authority Board, Secret Witness Board and Sparks Citizens Advisory Committee, as well as other community boards and committees. He has two children in local schools. Mayberry said he wants to stay on the panel for the same reasons he ap plied for the post last year. After seeing the negativity and conflicts that have recently plagued the board, he said, he wants to serve as “a voice of reason” on the panel. He opposes the distraction of political ideology that often is injected into board meetings and “the weapon ization of students themselves,” who can become pawns of critics’ political agendas. Board policies, he said, should be centered on improving students’ academic performance, and hiring and retaining excellent teachers and staff. The district, he said, needs appropriate resources and policies that keep students safe and secure.

Westlake objects to some district policies including “equity and diversity,” which she says is lowering educational standards. The district’s website explains the “equity and diversity” policy as: “Equity means that every student is provided the support and resources they individually need to accomplish the same end goal: graduation and college- and career-readiness. The end-goal for all students is the same, but the process of getting thereWestlakediffers.”said she has a different definition: “I’m all for equality,” Westlake said. “But the way ‘equity’ is used in schools is treating all stu dents the same, no matter how much work they put into it. We don’t want little Johnny to fail, so we lower the bar.” Westlake said that the schools also shouldn’t be concerned with “social and emotional” platforms. “The parents should provide emo tional support; the responsibility of the school is education.”Although Westlake has not sat in on any classes in local schools, she bases her criticism of the district on low student test scores, even before COVID-19 disruptions hit the district. She said test scores have been “declining for years.” (Ed itor’s note: An assessment by Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, released in August after Westlake was interviewed by the RN&R, shows that Washoe County School District students this spring earned high scores in English language arts and Accordingmath.)to the July campaign contributions report, Westlake had $2,774.06 in contributions and $4,266.26 in expenses. Her contributions came from three donors, with the largest contri bution coming from Sparks residents Greg and Sharla Gerhardt, who donated $1,000. Westlake said supporters have encouraged her to solicit contributions from Robert Beadles, who is back ing other board challengers, but she has declined. “I don’t want to be beholden to him,” she said, adding she also won’t accept contributions or endorsements from unions.

The district has big challenges going forward, she said, including recovering from the effects of the COVID-19 restrictions; dealing with staffing shortages among teachers, bus drivers and sup port personnel; and crafting policies that better serve teachers, students and parents.

DISTRICT B Covers Sun Valley and parts of Sparks, including the new Hug High School Ellen Minetto, incumbent: Minetto, 62, was elected to the board in 2018. She is a retired teacher with 31 years of service, including 29 in the Washoe County School District. Minetto’s three children graduated from district schools. Minetto said her main motivation in serving on the board is a love for the children. She decided to run for re-election, because candidates who were running against incum bents in the primary election seemed bent on tearing down the educational advances made in recent years. She noted that protests at board meetings during the last two years have centered on divisive political and cultural issues that have little or nothing to do with the board’s responsibilities.

Elizabeth Smith, the incumbent in District D, received more than 50 percent of the vote in the June primary and will retain her seat automatically. The other three incumbents, who also had faced multiple challengers and finished first in the primary, will face the can didates who came in second in those races.

8 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com NEWS Meet the candidates

Staffing problems at the district, including a shortage of bus drivers and teachers, is a national issue, she said, and education budgets are set at the Legislature, not by school districts. Most members of the current board are working hard to solve problems, she said, but critics complain without proposing solutions.

“We need a good, solid school board,” Minetto said, that is focused on real issues and not a national culture war. “We can do better, of course, but we won’t get anything done if we’re looking through some cultural or political lens.”

It’s the first time she has run for office. She entered the school board race, because “I’m passionate about kids. I feel it is time for me to give back to the community and to serve,” sheThesaid.school district, she said, is “not doing our kids justice, because they have gone so far astray from teaching the basics. I’d like to get the ship turned around.” She said the district’s emphasis should be a rounded education of reading, writing, arithmetic and other traditional subjects. “They need to get their eyes back on the ball,” she said. The children, she said, need to be prepared for a fu ture “that is not just bright for them, but a future where they can give back to the community and contribute to their community.”

Parents, he noted, have many avenues to get involved in their children’s education, including parent-teacher groups, volunteering at schools, participating in the Washoe County Parent Uni versity, communicating with teachers and board members, and sitting in at classrooms to see what goes on Somethere.critics accuse the district of indoctrinat ing students with “leftist” ideas, teaching them that white people are oppressors and equating policies about transgender students to pedophilia. Those “false narratives are set up as bogeymen. … They want to instill fear so that they can take a wrecking ball to public schools,” Mayberry said.

The “diversity, equity and inclusion” policy that is often a target of critics, he said, is about creating a level playing field, not moving the educational goalposts. “Students learn at different paces,” Mayberry said. “Some need more support than others. It’s based on what the student needs, not on just promoting students. … Some may need tutors, or after-school programs, or summer school. If a student needs more help, they should get it. That’s the role equity plays.” Mayberry said he is running a positive cam paign about the issues, not false narratives. “We need to hire and retain good teachers and staff,” he said, and state government needs to restore educational funding that was slashed in recent years. “The next (legislative) session needs to be the educational session,” he said. Mayberry’s other priorities include teacher and staff recruitment and retention, helping

Three seats on the Washoe County School District Board of Trustees are up for grabs in the Nov. 8 election.

Westlake has no children attending school in the district, but has seven young grandchildren who presumably will enroll in Washoe schools.

He said school curriculum is set by the state, not the district, and that teaching basic subjects—reading, writing and math—are at its core. He agrees that “the basics” are especial ly important as the district recovers from the disruptions caused by the pandemic. “We need to get our kids back where they need to be (ac ademically),” he said. “… We need to give our students the cutting edge education they need to meet the challenges of the future.” Teaching history accurately is part of that quality education, he said: “We need to teach accurate history, our failures included,” he said. Part of that, he said, “is that no race, gender or religion is being shamed. It’s just history.” Attempts of a vocal minority to take over the school board and remake it in line with their political ideology is a “power grab,” Rodriguez said, that has nothing to do with educatingRodriguezpupils.reported a total of $8,042 in contributions and $11,560.79 in expenses in his July campaign report, including a total of $2,000 in contributions from the Washoe Education Association’s Together in Politics; $1,000 from the Nevada State Education Asso ciation and $250 from Reno City Councilman Devon Reese.

Sutton was in the news in June 2021, when school district police told her to remove her vehicle from district property, because she had a gun in the back seat of the vehicle. She did so and wasn’t cited for the incident. Sutton didn’t bring the gun into the building. The Reno Gazette-Journal, which reviewed video of the incident, reported that Sutton told police she needed the firearm for protection from “Antifa and the Black Lives Matter movement.”

Sutton wrote that she removed her children from school and is home schooling them because “of the way our District was handling COVID as it pertained to the schools.” She wrote that the mask requirement, the district’s online-learning model and the “hy brid” system the district adopted in August of 2020, which allowed kids to be in school halftime, “was a disaster. I knew what the masking combined with the dismal education would do to my kids, and I have now witnessed the results. … Now our kids have lost a year and a half of proper education, and test results and grades clearly show the decline.

Partisan politics should be left out of those discussions, he said. “It’s not an objective form of teaching,” Reid said. “It’s meant to get an emotional response from the child. It’s a subjective form of teaching.”

“As concerned as I am about our children’s education, I am equally as concerned about their mental and emotional well-being. I believe the school closures, hybrid learning model and two years of masking has been devastating to our kids.” She objected to there being no exemptions available to children for medical reasons, in cluding students who suffered “panic attacks.”

Graeme Reid, challenger: Reid is a 20-year resident of Reno, where he has owned and oper ated a law firm since 2015. He has two sons in elementary school and a daughter who will soon attend district schools. Reid said he is running because he is not happy with the direction of the district, which he said has allowed education to be politicized. “Politics should be kept out of ed ucation,” he said. “… The schools should be neutral. Children should be taught to think critically and not (taught) with critical theory.”Hedefines “critical theory,” including critical race theory, “as a form of conditioning minds.” CRT classes, which are a way of understanding how American racism has shaped public policy, are taught at the university graduate level. But Reid said its principles are being applied in K-12 level classes in Washoe County. “(The district) is applying those principles to classes, manipulating the children to comply with that agenda,” he said. Diversity, equity and inclusion policies are the “enforcement arm” of CRT, he said. Those policies are causing a lot of the older teachers to quit the district, he said, although he was unable to cite any data in support of the statement. If The district gets rid of those policies, he said, more teachers can be retained. Reid said there are marginalized groups in the U.S., but the diversity, equity and inclusion policy isn’t the way to resolve that problem.

Rodriguez said the best way to counter misinformation about the schools is to get parents more involved. “There always will be an element of the community which will never believe anything we say,” he said. “One way to build trust is to get parents in the classrooms as volunteers, join parents’ groups, come to the classrooms and see what’s going on.”

The board, she wrote, “allowed discrimina tion to go on, and kids to be masked for two years without listening to what the majority of parents were begging for. That is why I chose to homeschool my kids, and that is why I am running for School Board. I would like my kids to be able to go back to school in Washoe County. I want them learning math, English, history and how to balance a checkbook while breathing oxygen and not being discriminated against for our family’s medical decisions.”

On the other hand, Reid said, “history is an ugly subject, and teachers need to be able to talk about all of it, but viewing it through a critical race theory lens is problematic.”

On his July campaign finance report, Mayber ry listed a total of $32,588.62 in contributions and $23,829.33 in expenses, including many monetary contributions that exceeded $100. His biggest contributions include a $5,000 donation from Reno resident Sandy Raffaelli; a $2,000 donation from Grand Sierra Resort and Casino; $1,000 from the Washoe Education Association; $1,000 from Peppermill Casino Inc.; and $500 from Reno Councilman Devon Reese.

“But I think that’s behind us,” Rodriguez said. The newer board members, including Mayber ry, Smith and himself, he said, “really bring a fresh, new perspective. … We’re not politi cians or looking to run for higher office; we’re just parents who really care about the students and the schools.”

Melanie Sutton, challenger: Sutton, 43, did not respond to the RN&R’s request for an inter view. According to information published by the Reno Gazette-Journal prior to the primary, Sutton graduated high school in 1996 and is, or has been, a supermarket worker. Her profile page on the now-inactive SaveWCSD site and her current campaign site described her goal as to “dismantle the current dysfunctional School Board and rebuild it. We know our kids are not receiving the quality ed ucation they need and deserve and I intend to bring our focus back to improving academics for every child in the Washoe County School District and ensuring we graduate students capable of becoming productive, successful adults in our community.”

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 9 students catch up after the disruptions caused by the pandemic, making sure teachers have the resources they need, keeping class sizes down, and maintaining the student meal program.

In an interview with the RN&R, Rodriguez said the district needs to prioritize its recovery from the effects of dealing with the COVID-19 pandem ic. The district, he said, is using the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSR) to pay for tutoring and summer schools. The Legislature, he said, must make increased funding for schools a priority. Rodriguez said he wants to remain on the board, because he has been involved in jobs that serve the public since he was 18, including as a firefighter with the Bureau of Land Man agement, serving in the National Guard, and being in law enforcement, where he came into contact with a lot of at-risk children.

The following statements are from her cam paign website and were posted in advance of the June primary. Some of her comments cen ter on the district’s COVID-19 mask require ment, which was discontinued in February: “I need your vote this June. Here’s why: First and foremost, I am a devoted wife and mother of three children. Having been born and raised in a small farm town on my grand parents ranch, I am most at home in the coun tryside. I have lived in Reno five years. My children are 10, 1, and 18. They are my world. I coached Babe Ruth softball for 3 years. I was the chair at Relay for Life Cancer Society for two years. And to my children’s delight, I currently own and run a traveling petting zoo.”

“I came across kids who had no place to go, where the only safe place (they had) was the schools,” he said. “I can’t think of a better board to be on,” said Rodriguez.

Reid said he district also is collecting an inordinate amount of data about students through its Infinite Campus databank and other means, which could create privacy problems for students. “I think the board is not taking those risks seri ously enough,” he said. Student discipline, Reid said, also is a problem at local schools and that the “restor ative justice” policy used by the district isn’t working. That process, in use at schools around the country, is based on bringing students together in peer-mediated small groups to talk, ask questions and air their grievances, according to Edutopia.com. He’s not sure what should be done to tighten up discipline in schools, he said. Reid supports school uniforms, but isn’t making it a campaign issue.

In the past year on the panel, he said, “I have seen some things that were frustrating, but I’ve seen a lot of successes, too.” He noted that the board has had a lot of distractions, including COVID-19 disrup

tions, controversies over masks in classrooms, distance learning, CRT debates and other “culture wars” protests. In addition, the board weathered the attempted censure of one panel member, the failed recall effort of another, and the resignations of others for various reasons.

Although Reid said he has been called a “rightwing extremist” candidate, he takes offense at the term, which he said is “a popular slander” by opponents. “I would say I’m more in the middle” of the political spectrum, he said. Reid’s July campaign contributions report showed a total of $10,315.02 in contributions from seven donors and $9,934.15 in expenses for the reporting period. His largest contribution of $5,000 came from Robert Beadles. Aguirre Riley of Reno and Valerie Fianacca of Sparks each donated $1,000 to Reid’s campaign. District C Covers Spanish Springs and North Valleys high schools; Cold Springs middle school; Desert Heights and Lemmon Valley elementary schools; Gerlach K-12 School and others Joe Rodriguez, incumbent: Rodriguez, 38, a 22-year resident of Washoe County, was appoint ed to the District C seat a year ago. He works for the Nevada State Police as an assistant state fire marshal for the State Fire Marshal Division and has three children attending local public schools.

| BY JESSE STONE

10 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com NEWS

For decades, Burke was able to stand in front of her house, almost directly across Jones Street from the new development, and look straight down the road lined with elms. When crews were in the process of cutting the trees in May, Burke called the city and a councilmem ber got involved. The developer agreed to save a few trees, if possible. It wasn’t possible, according to city officials. But Burke believes that more careful—but presumably more ex pensive—construction techniques could have saved the trees.

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The city of Reno couldn’t save 100-year-old elm trees from an apartment development

“It’s not a requirement,” Duerr said. “I went out onsite and called the developer and told him the value of those trees in sense of place, value in the new development in sense of per manence, and stability that it brings.”

Cut down

In May, she and other area residents were upset that the long row of elms near the apartment project at 700 Riverside Drive was being mowed down. Burke and three neighbors filed an appeal of the building permit for the development, but construction continued apace.

Burke wants the city of Reno to take action under a section of the city’s Land Development Code, which is designed to preserve landscapes that are affected by specific types of devel opment projects in historic districts. Burke believes that process would give the public and the neighborhood more opportunity to interact with the project. Burke said cutting down the trees was an example of bad faith between the developers and the neighborhood.

“People say there aren’t many people who live (near the development) and are affected,” Burke said. “That’s not true. Everybody who goes to the farmers’ market; everybody who goes downtown, parking, busi nesses. It’s a public right-of-way.”

The owners of the development, Urban Investments, could not be immediately reached for comment. The Powning District is classified as one of the city of Reno’s Conservation Districts, marking it as a neighborhood that deserves special attention to maintain its historical character. Cassie Harris, a city spokesperson, noted that the development is private property and that experts evaluated the trees.

“The trees on Jones Street, located adjacent to the Riverside development project, were evaluated by an arborist and, in consultation with the city of Reno urban forester, were Lori Burke points to the stumps of the few remaining elm trees that she and other residents tried to save. The trees were cut on Aug. 15. Photo/David Robert determined to be structurally compromised,” Harris said. “They presented a risk to struc tures, pedestrians and vehicles, and were removed.”Councilmember Naomi Duerr, a self-de scribed tree advocate, said that after residents complained in May, the developer agreed to save as many trees as possible. Duerr noted that although she wasn’t familiar with the spe cifics of this development, other sites and a few other companies around Reno had seen success in preserving trees by using techniques such as building sidewalks that use thinner materials, or building sidewalks above ground.

“We always knew there was (going to be) development and had no problem with that, absolutely none,” Burke said. “I don’t think anybody doesn’t recognize that (building more) housing is a clear issue. But not every project is good, and this is a bad project. It doesn’t fit.”

One August morning, Lori Burke, a resident of Reno’s historic Powning District, woke up to the sound of a chainsaw and watched as the 100-year-old trees that neighborhood residents had tried to save fell prey to a new apartment development.

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Neva da’s own political history has seen races for U.S. Senate decided by a few hundred votes without the losers sniveling about being robbed. March ant’s whiny claim wasn’t true, but that hasn’t deterred him for a moment from repeating it.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 11 NEWS

It’s almost too easy to write off Republican Secretary of State candidate Jim Marchant as Nevada’s political Gump. Marchant has found a way to rise in a state GOP under the spell of Donald Trump, largely by never wavering from the former president’s every deception—especially his big lie about widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election. When it comes to carrying out ever-more-elaborate conspiracy theories about spooky voting machines and deepstate Geppettos, Marchant is so far down the rabbit hole that he can see the Queen of Hearts, and even Joey Gilbert. And yet, as the namesake implies, when it comes to promoting the big lie, Marchant turns up in the oddest places—long after most, well, reasonable people have returned to reality. Look closely at photos taken during the Nevada GOP’s scammy alternate elector signing ceremony in December 2020 in Carson City, and you’ll see Marchant stand ing to the side, beaming with pride. The audacious attempted end run on the peaceful transfer of power was a dud, but has drawn intense interest from the FBI in its ongoing criminal investigation.

Translation: His beliefs may be unhinged, but he’s tougher than he looks, and he has no plans to ride off into a QAnon sunset. If you think his fellow Republicans appre ciate the trouble Nevada’s Gump represents, think again. In August, Marchant received the endorsement of the influential Keystone Corpo ration, which boasts former Nevada Gov. Robert List on its board of directors. As I write this, it’s unclear whether March ant’s name will surface in connection with a brewing scandal first revealed by The Wash ington Post, exposing an attempt by Trump acolytes to collect ballot information and spin it into false voter-fraud claims. Part of the alleged scheme included a Nevada connection with voter data obtained from Clark County that was later presented at a 2021 election-fraud symposium in Sioux Falls, S.D., sponsored by conspiracy theorist and MyPillow chief execu tive Mike Lindell. County officials said the data gathered contained no sensitive information, The Post reported.

Some candidates consult with their families and political advisers before embarking on a run for office. Perhaps Marchant did all that. But he also has said that he decided to run for secretary of state after receiving encouragement from QAnon conspiracy influencer Juan O Savin. It wasn’t happenstance.

Marchant’s role, if any, remains to be seen. But it’s hard to ignore his Aug. 10, 2021, tweet: “Couldn’t be happier to accept the invitation of Mike Lindell to look deeply into election integrity. Sioux Falls, here I come!” He not only promotes the falsehood about the 2020 election, but has loudly embraced the idea of overturning future ones. That’s not a person Nevadans should want anywhere near the office constitutionally dutybound to ensure fair, accu rate and secure elections. When the head scratching, raised eyebrows and nervous laughter finally subsides, try to re member that Jim Marchant is a genuine danger to fair elections in Nevada.

In the Nevada Republican Party’s fiercely competitive race for greatest fealty to Trump, Marchant ranks with the front-run ners. On his campaign website, he touts his endorsement by Trump—the P.T. Barnum of corporate self-promotion—as a “brilliant” businessman. Marchant moved to Nevada from Florida in 2005 and was elected to a single-term in the state Assembly in 2016. He ran unsuccess fully for Congress in District 4 in 2020 and, you guessed it, claimed he was “a victim of voter fraud” after losing to Steven Horsford by more than 16,000 ballots—around 5 percent of the vote. In that race, he touted endorsements from Trump and congressional election deniers Andy Biggs, Paul Gosar and Jim Jordan. Let’s set aside the fact that such a fraud, if it were true, would rank among the larger election deceptions in the history of the republic.

| BY

Those who attempt to marginalize Marchant do so at their own peril. He was among several Republicans leading the “America First Secre tary of State Coalition,” a collection of big lie true believers. It was Marchant who led a “strat egy session” in May 2021 in Las Vegas and has become a go-to talking point on the subject on Steve Bannon’s popular podcast. Last year, Marchant was among the speakers to appear at the Patriot Double Down in Las Vegas, an event presented by a QAnon-linked group. But when asked by a Las Vegas Review-Journal reporter about the QAnon con spiracy—which, among many deceptions, posits that Democrats are pedophiles and participate in child sex-trafficking—Marchant claimed not to know much about it. Then he continued to circulate among his fellow conspiracy theorists. Marchant has been a steady presence in rural Nevada, where belief in the big lie and vot ing-machine voodoo appears strongest. In Nye and other counties earlier this year, Marchant led a parade of election deniers and those who believe Dominion machines are not only unreli able, but so easily hackable that they should be decertified in favor of paper ballots counted by election officials. Paper ballots. Counted by people who might share the same worldview as Jim Marchant. Marchant claims without any proof that Jim Marchant, at left, with the six fake electors who signed a certificate in December 2020 falsely certifying that Donald Trump had won the presidential election in Nevada. Marchant, who was not among those who signed the document, is the Republican candidate for Nevada Secretary of State. The state GOP posted the image on social media. Photo/Nevada GOP Nevadans’ votes have been manipulated for years, and officials haven’t really been elected, but “installed by the deep state cabal.” In a primary debate in February, he out-crazied several opponents and proclaimed, “Your vote hasn’t counted for decades. You haven’t elected anybody. The people that are in office have been selected. You haven’t had a choice.” It’s also true he finished first in the primary despite taking hits from more than $2 million in attack ads, by his own campaign’s count.

News analysis:

Jim Marchant’s secretary of state candidacy is no laughing matter JOHN L. SMITH

Nevada voters were fortunate to have strongwilled professionals guarding their interests and protecting the election process in 2020 against a firestorm of disinformation, vexatious litigation and even physical threats fomented by Trump’s big lie. It’s been often reported, but bears repeat ing, that much-vilified Republican Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske played a pivotal role in preventing those who would win at any cost from doing so. For that, she paid the price in the form of censure by her own party. May she wear it like a badge of honor. Now Marchant wants to replace her. As a candidate for secretary of state, he’s piled on the prevarication about election secu rity and has promoted a lineup of pseudo-ex perts who have spent the better part of two years vilifying those who protect the election process, as well as the use of Dominion Voting Systems machines.

A serious threat

His concern and empathy for the inmates rubbed off on his daughters. It made an impres sion on prisoners as well. Lisa-Marie Lightfoot attended the sisters’ talk and was moved by their story. “What I left thinking about was those prisoners, how they responded to having purpose and family,” Lightfoot said. “They contributed to their com munity and touched Marcia and Patti’s life, mostly in a positive way.” Her father’s interest in one woman inmate, Emma Jo—whom he thought had been unjust ly convicted for murder—brought Erle Stanley Gardner into the case. Gardner, who would later become famous for his Perry Mason mys tery novels, founded The Court of Last Resort, an initiative similar to the modern Innocence Project.Gardner’s investigation found that the wom an whom Emma Jo had allegedly killed had a history of heart problems and had suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. Not only was Emma Jo innocent; no murder had been committed.

Patti and Marcia Bernard had an idyllic Nevada childhood, living at one of the state’s most historic sites, riding horses amid the sagebrush—and hanging out with murderers. Today, Patti Bernard of Reno and her sister, Marcia Bernard Cuccaro of Carson City, say the experience of growing up at the Nevada State Prison in Carson City was a strong influence on their lives and careers. Their dad, Arthur Bernard, was ap pointed by Gov. Charles Russell as the state prison warden in 1951 and served until 1959. When the family moved into the only residence on the grounds, Marcia was 7, and Patti was 5. Their brother Don was 15 and left after high school to attend college. Their days were filled with normal activities, like making their own beds, a formal dinner every night, and attending school a mile away in Carson City. Patti rode her horse, Twilight, through the fields of sagebrush and rabbit brush outside the walls. Don received a learner’s permit to drive before he was 16 and drove his sisters

“Our father had an affinity for murderers,” Marcia said when she and Patti spoke at a fund raiser luncheon for the Nevada Women’s History Project. “He said that they only murder once.”

12 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com NEWS

Patti remembers Teresa, known as “Tessie,” who was the sisters’ baby sitter for a time. She was a 37-year-old war bride charged with strangling a boy for whom she was caring. A budding writer, she composed original poems to the warden on her birthdays. Florence, a Northern Paiute from Pyramid Lake, craft ed beautiful buckskin Native American doll clothes for the girls. Knowing Florence was the genesis of Patti’s interest in indigenous people’s history, traditions and culture. “Knowing her influenced how I taught histo ry,” said Patti, a middle- and elementary-school teacher who became a principal in the Washoe County School District. Now retired, Patti does historical research and is chairperson of the Nevada Women’s History Project. The group collects and shares narratives about Nevada women through its website, publications and events such as the sisters’ presentation. Some of the project’s profiles have been published in the Reno News & Review Learning each inmate’s story

“Emma Jo was freed and married the man who had waited for her while she was in prison,” Marcia said. “Uncle Erle” Gardner be came a friend of the Bernard family and chose to have his wedding in their Washoe Valley home after the family left the prison residence, Marcia said. Prison tours slated for fall The old state prison is now closed, but tours will be available starting in the fall. After their talks in July, Patti and Marcia revisited the prison for a tour led by Glen Whorton, who was director of Nevada prisons from 2005 to 2007.

For years, Patti wondered why her father would go back to his office in the prison every evening to work alone for an hour or two after dinner. When she reviewed inmate files sent to the Nevada State Archives, she discovered that her dad had been poring over the files for every inmate in the prison to understand their lives and reasons for incarceration. He realized, she believes, that “a single event altered their lives forever.”

Ophelia, the family’s first housekeeper, shot a man who had stalked her. “She was the first Black person I’d ever met,” Marcia said.

| BY JANICE HOKE

The friendship and empathy the young girls developed for their inmate friends influenced Marcia’s career in social work, working in rehabilitation services and at the state Division of Aging Services. Hamel said the girls “lived in an interesting crucible that caused them to be acutely aware of how people behave under duress and stress.”

Photo/Janice Hoke

Growing up among killers in a prison molded two sisters’ lives to school. It seemed a privileged life. They were sur rounded by cooks, gardeners and housekeep ers—all inmates working in their home. Some were convicted of murder, but Warden Bernard trusted them with his children.

Sisters Patti and Marcia Bernard, inset on left, as girls, in a portrait drawn by a state prison inmate in 1957. Marcia Bernard Cuccaro and Patti Bernard, their positions reversed, are shown at the prison in July. They grew up in the warden’s residence in the background of the photo.

Historic prison preservation

Christianne Hamel, a history project mem ber, said she learned that the inmates, called trustees, “truly looked out for the two girls, and at the same time the girls were given interest ing skills, such as how to pick a lock.” On one occasion, trustees rolled back the odometer on the family’s 1955 Chevy and fixed the car’s damage after one of the girls had a fender bender. Their parents were never informed. (No one likes a snitch.)

The Fair Housing Act protects families with children under the age of 18 from illegal housing discrimination.

The prison had a mattress factory and a book bindery

The tour highlights the history of different buildings erected over the 150 years that the prison was operating, from its founding as a territorial prison in 1862 to its closing in 2012.

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Nevada State Prison Preservation Society volunteers, some of whom will be conducting the fall tours, posted photos on the chamber walls of all inmates executed there, along with photos of their victims.

The tours were developed last year by vol unteers as part of repairs and improvements by the Nevada State Prison Preservation Society. That group began in 2012 under president Myron Carpenter, a Douglas County teacher. Whorton, the current president, said the pres ervation included roof repairs, power resto ration, installation of handicapped-accessible restrooms and the paving of walkways. The prison has applied to be designated a National Historic Site pending approval by the State Historic Preservation Office. Ghosts also attract visitors. Paranormal investigations at the facility have been conducted by Preservation Society member Susan Bernard, a great-granddaughter of warden Matthew Penrose. She leads groups of 20 people from all around the world on tours during the twilight and evening hours. Bernard also is planning ghost walks in the fall. All tour fees go to the preservation of the prison. The society’s work is funded through tour fees, donations, membership fees. More tour guides are needed (no prison experience required), and the society is soliciting stories from past employees and inmates. Whorton edits a monthly newsletter that is posted on the group’s website, nevadastateprison.org.

The prison industries were self-funded and offset some costs, supplementing the inadequate state funds earmarked for the facility. Over the years, inmates quarried sandstone and stamped out license plates. The main industry in the 1880s, Whorton said, was making shoes to be sold in Carson City.

“We only allow families with children to live in ground floor units”

A unique feature of the Nevada prison was a gambling casino called The Bullpen, established by Warden Matthew Penrose in 1932, when gambling became legal in Nevada. The inmates, including Joe Conforte, who once owned the Mustang Ranch brothel in Storey County, ran the games and reaped the profits. No legal tender was wagered. Instead, brass tokens, which are now collectors’ items, were stamped with denominations from a nickel to $5. The tokens had value only inside the prison.

This material is based on work supported by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and is being used to promote fair housing rights under a Washoe County Grant. Any opinion, findings, conclusions and recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of HUD.

The famous Western artist and writer Will James, who was serving a sentence for cattlerustling, used his prison term of 18 months from 1914 to 1916 to develop his talent for drawing. His work now hangs in museums, and he later wrote and illustrated books, including the children’s tale Smoky the Cowhorse

The exception was working in the guard tower, he added, which was “the most boring job in the world.” Whorton said that inmates Glen Whorton, in the red shirt, talks about the Nevada State Prison execution chamber during a tour of the prison in July. Photo/Janice Hoke were generally not fearful of the guards, but wary of other inmates. “The (cliché of a) brutal warden is a myth,” he said. Prison conditions worsened in the 1970s and 1980s, he said. “It was a difficult situation with more violence, the rise of gangs and racial tension.”

“These are our rules for children”

The original prison was built by Abraham Curry, the founder of Carson City and the first warden. He also established the sandstone quarry that provided the stone for the prison, the state capitol, the U.S. Mint building and many structures and residences in Carson City.

The prison baseball team was, for years, “the team to beat,” Whorton said. Warden Bernard coached the prison boxing team and also was a mentor for parolees on a San Diego boxing team. An inmate named Clark was a master mechanic, Patti said, and built a sports car from salvaged parts for her brother, Don. Other inmates created the artwork that tour goers may view in the visiting rooms today.

The Warm Springs Hotel that Curry built on the prison grounds was used by the first Leg islature until the capitol building was finished in 1871. Most of the oldest buildings have been razed, and the tour visits those built in the 1920s and later. The prison has been used for movie sets “because it really looks like a prison. The directors love it,” Whorton said. An Innocent Man, a 1989 movie that starred Tom Selleck, was filmed there. The Mustang, which featured inmates training wild horses, was released in 2019. Earlier film credits include State Penitentiary in 1950 and Deathwatch in 1965. Tour-goers experience the loud clangs of heavy steel cell doors that Whorton said “can take fingers off” and get a taste of the claustrophobic atmosphere of the various cells. One wing of the prison housed older inmates who made their two-person cells homier, Whorton explained. Those cells, made into two-room “apartments,” were assigned to inmates who participated in the “puppy program,” raising and training stray dogs to be offered for adoption. One stop on the prison tour may be the most memorable. The glass-enclosed execution chamber, which was a gas chamber later modified for lethal-injection executions, has a gurney equipped with leather straps. The chemicals used for the executions travel in tubes from behind a wall and into the condemned inmate’s veins. The room is chilling, Wharton said, “because it is so foreign to people’s experience.”

It was not unusual for prisoners to develop interests and talents to make their time in prison go faster, Whorton said. Some honed skills as upholsterers, furniture-makers, painters, leatherworkers and woodworkers. Some worked at the governor’s mansion.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 13

*Be aware there is an exception for qualifying senior/age-restricted housing communities Recognize possible signs of discrimination: “No kids”

“The prison was a great place to work,” Whorton said. “There was something funny, exciting, interesting, sometimes scary every day.”

| BY

the date of the summer solstice, when the midday sun was highest of the year. Expect the waning crescent moons in the eastern sky in morning twilight Sept. 20-24 to be oriented like an upright bowl, holding its contents. Follow the moon: Evenings an hour after sun set, find the moon near Antares Sept. 2, 3 and 30; and near Saturn on Sept. 7 and 8. The Full Har vest moon occurs on the night of Sept. 9-10, rises in twilight the next three evenings, and appears near Jupiter nearly all night long on Sept. 10-11 and Sept. Mornings11-12.anhour before sunup, find the moon 5 to 6 degrees south of the Pleiades star cluster on Sept. 16. That morning, the waning gibbous moon forms an attractive triangle with Mars and Aldebaran, 6 to 7.5 degrees on a side. On Sept. 19 and 20, the waning crescent moon forms attrac tive patterns with Pollux and Castor. On Sept. 23, find a thin crescent moon 5 degrees to the lower left of Regulus. Look a half-hour closer to sunrise to catch Venus rising within 20 degrees below the moon. Venus rises a full hour before the sun on Sept. 1, shrinking to less than a half-hour by month’s end. Although Venus shines at magnitude -3.9, it doesn’t seem impressive. The lineup of planets Venus-Mars-Jupiter marks well the ecliptic, or plane, of Earth’s or bit—the centerline of the zodiac—through our morning sky. Note the brightest star, Sirius, the Dog Star, is well to the south of that plane, and Capella, the Mother Goat Star, is well to the north. These stars mark the southern and northern vertices of the Winter Hexagon In clockwise order, its stars are Sirius, Procyon, Pollux and Castor, Capella, Aldebaran, Rigel, and back to Sirius. Betelgeuse, Orion’s shoulder, is inside the polygon. On Sept. 2, Spaceship Earth, in its motion around the sun, is heading in a direction 5 degrees north of Aldebaran. Autumn begins in Earth’s northern hemisphere on Sept. 22 at 6:04 p.m., four days before our home planet overtakes Jupiter. Also on Sept. 2, Earth is moving away from a point 5 degrees north of Antares in the eve ning sky. A line from Jupiter to Saturn extended westward across the sky passes not far north of Antares and Spica and closely marks the plane of Earth’s orbit. Note the Summer Triangle of Vega, Altair and Deneb nearly overhead, and the star Arcturus in the west, are well north of the Earth’s orbital plane. Sky Calendar includes illustrations of many of the events described in this article. To subscribe or to view a sample issue, visit www.abramsplanetarium.org/skycalendar. Robert Victor originated the Abrams Plane tarium monthly Sky Calendar in October 1968, and still produces issues occasionally, including the October and December 2022 editions. He enjoys being outdoors sharing the wonders of the night sky.

14 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com ASTRONOMY

As Earth closes in on Mars, try to spot Syrtis Major, the first surface feature of another planet ever recorded (in 1659). Using a 6-inch telescope at 150-200x, observers can note it as a dark triangular marking near the center of the tiny Martian disk, on Sept. 20 at 1:22 a.m., and about 39 minutes later on each successive morning for the next week, through Sept. 27, at 5:55 a.m. Mars’ south pole is now tipped about 20 degrees into the sunlit side, but only slightly toward Earth, so the remnant mid-summer cap may not be visible. Mars’ disk will grow in apparent size to 17 arcseconds by its closest approach to Earth, within 51 million miles, on Nov. 30. In evening twilight in September, the south ern half of the belt of zodiac constellations is on display, from Virgo setting in west, through Libra, Scorpius with Antares, Ophiuchus, Sagit tarius low in the south, Capricornus with Saturn, Aquarius with Neptune, and Pisces about to rise or rising in the east, containing Jupiter. When the moon is near first quarter phase in Ophiuchus on Sept. 3 and Oct. 2, it’s close to half full and about 90 degrees, or one-quarter of a circle, east of the sun’s location. The moon’s location one-quar ter of the way around the zodiac from the sun previews where the sun will be in a quarter of a year, or three months later. Those dates are close to the winter solstice, Dec. 21, the date of the lowest midday sun of the year. So expect the evening half-moons of Sept. 3 and Oct. 2 to be low in the southern sky at dusk. Also expect the waxing crescent moons in the western sky on the evenings leading up to Sept. 3 and Oct. 2 to be tipped over, like a bowl spilling its contents. In September’s morning twilight sky, the belt of the zodiac is steeply inclined to the horizon. The northern half of the belt is on display, from Pisces and Jupiter setting in the west; through Aries with Uranus; Taurus, with Mars and Al debaran high in the southern sky; Gemini with Pollux and Castor; Cancer with the Beehive cluster; and Leo with Venus and Regulus low in the east. Regulus in the first week of September is just emerging from the far side of the sun. Using binoculars, watch for a few days around Sept. 5, when Venus passes 0.8 degrees north of the star. When you see the moon near last quarter phase (about half full) high in the southern sky in morning twilight on Sept. 17 and 18, it will be in the northernmost part of the zodiac, in Taurus and Gemini, among the same stars the sun appeared near three months earlier, in June, not far from

On Sept. 26, Earth passes between the sun and Jupiter. The giant planet, shining at mag nitude -2.9, then rises at sunset and appears at opposition, 180 degrees from sun, and is up all night: low in the eastern sky at dusk, high est in the south in the middle of the night, and low in the west at dawn—setting at sunrise.

Jupiter is as close to Earth as it’s been in decades—and our planet is closing in on Mars ROBERT VICTOR

For September, 2022 This sky chart is drawn for latitude 40 degrees north, but may be used in continental U.S. and southern Canada. D. Miller

Evening mid-twilight occurs when Sun is 9 below horizon. Sept.1: 44 minutes after sunset. 15: 43 " " " 30: 43 " " " NSE W15 22 29Jupiter 1 8 15 22 29 Saturn Spica Arcturus Antares VegaDenebAltair Fomalhaut

Jupiter is closer to Earth this month than it has been in 71 years—and it won’t be this close again for 107 years!

Stereographic Projection Map by Robert

September’s evening sky chart. Illustration/Robert D. Miller Planets and Bright Stars in Evening Mid-Twilight

On the night before, Sept. 25, Jupiter makes its closest approach to Earth since October 1951, at a distance of 367 million miles. Not until October 2129 will Jupiter come closer! Mars now rises in the east-northeast late in the evening, by 11:30 p.m. on Sept. 1, and around 10:15 p.m. on the 30th. Watch for it rising far to the lower left of Jupiter, by 60 degrees on the 1st, and by 77 degrees on the 30th. Best seen in the morning, before dawn, Mars flares up from magnitude -0.1 to -0.6 this month while Earth closes in, from 89 to 73 million miles. Mars gleams against the spectacular back ground of Taurus, the Bull, and passes within 5 degrees of Aldebaran, the Bull’s eye, from Sept. 2-12. The minimum distance apart (4.3 degrees) occurs on Sept. 7, slightly closer than the 4.5 degrees separating Pollux and Castor, in the neighboring zodiac constellation to the east, Gemini, the Twins. Mars remains in Taurus through late March 2023, a total of 7 1/2 months! Mars lingers here, because our planet Earth will overtake Mars in early December, causing the red planet to appear to retrograde, or go backward, in Taurus, for about 11 weeks. Mars goes past the Pleiades only once, but will pass Aldebaran, the Hyades star cluster and the horns of Taurus three times each—all triple conjunctions!

September skies

On Sept. 1, Jupiter rises in the east a bit more than an hour after sunset, some 46 de grees to the lower left of Saturn in the south east. Jupiter rises just more than 4 minutes earlier per day, and first appears on our eve ning twilight chart during the second week.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 15 HIKING

While not always available, REI occasionally offers outdoor climbing trips and workshops as well. Check the schedules at other REI locations (such as in Folsom or Roseville) if you’re willing to travel a bit for an educational crusade.

Truckee-based Battle Born Prodigies offers personalized mountain-biking lessons in Tahoe. Whether you’ve never been on a mountain bike before, or you’re looking to improve your form, Battle Born Prodigies has customizable clinics to fit your needs. If you’re looking for a group to ride with and learn through osmosis, the Tahoe Area Mountain Bike Association (TAMBA) often organizes mountain-bike day trips. They also frequently host bike tune-up days at Bijou Bike Park in South Lake Tahoe, where you can learn to maintain your bike before joining TAMBA members for a ride in the park. Have you ever wondered how to get into climbing or bouldering? Numerous climbing gyms around Reno offer classes to help you learn to climb and belay, including Basecamp, Mesa Rim and North Peak. And if you’re already familiar with the basics, there are opportunities to dive deeper still, with leadclimbing classes or crack-climbing workshops.

As kids head back to school, it’s natural for our minds to meander toward education. Outdoor education has gradually made its way into more and more classrooms across the nation—but what about adult learning? It can feel daunting to pick up a new hobby or new activity, but if you want to learn to, say, knit, you can watch some videos or sign up for a class. Did you know you can do that to learn outdoor activities as well? Opportunities abound to help you safely explore the varied and exciting outdoor playground in the Reno-Tahoe area. If you’re unsure where to go or how to get the most out of your time in the wilderness, consider a guided hike. The Tahoe Rim Trail Association offers many guided hikes around the Tahoe area throughout the spring, summer and fall—many for free! Depending on what you’re interested in, you could join an outing to learn fall photography tips, enjoy spring flowers in the mountains, or visit a gushing waterfall in early summer. The Tahoe Institute for Natural Science also offers specialty guided hikes that introduce people to topics like birding, native nocturnal creatures, local scientific research and even explorations of dragonflies. Nevada State Parks hosts a diverse range of events, from history hikes and meadow yoga, to ranger chats and hunting for scorpions after dark—armed with black lights! Are you interested in giving back while you get out? The Sugar Pine Foundation provides plenty of educational opportunities to replant trees in burn scars, and weed out both overgrown vegetation and water-sensitive new growth during drought years. If you’re ready to take the next step in your outdoor adventures and learn some new skills, many local organizations can help you. Learn to backpack through a multiple-weekend-long guided backpacking workshop with the Tahoe Rim Trail Association, where you learn the skills you need—and then practice them by backpacking with a skilled local guide. Dive deeper into specific skill sets, like map and compass navigation, through an REI workshop; or wilderness medicine, via Lake Tahoe Community College’s Connect Community Education programs. Perhaps mountain biking piques your interest.

NICHOLS

Education, naturally

| BY

While warm weather is still with us, why not get out on the water for a guided paddling excursion? Clearly Tahoe offers one of the most unique ways to see Lake Tahoe—from the comfort of spacious, clear kayaks. They lead trips all around the lake, including some that are pet-friendly; they even have afterhours glow tours to see the lake and enjoy the stars after sunset. The Tahoe City Public Utility District has night SUP (stand-up paddleboarding) paddles and evening sailing clinics on its roster. Learn how to confidently sail a boat with classes from Lake Tahoe Sail or Sail Tahoe Blue; you can even enroll in a four-day course leaving from Tahoe City with Cruisers Academy. Right here in town, Sparks Marina Paddle can help you learn to SUP. Take it up a notch by registering for an exciting SUP class on the Truckee River with The River SUP Guy. Or find a new way to challenge yourself and relax by learning how to merge yoga with paddleboarding at Tahoe City Kayak. If motorized boats are your jam, check out the many boater-education courses offered by the Nevada Department of Wildlife. Beyond boater education, the Nevada Department of Wildlife also has a plethora of other outdoor-education courses for adults. Learn about hunting, fishing and archery, or go out with a ranger to observe Nevada’s diverse wildlifeAlwaysfirsthand.wanted to try fly fishing? Matt Heron Fly Fishing in Truckee can take you out, teach you the basics, and help you improve your craft along the Truckee River. Recon Fly Fishing also has guided trips and personalized clinics for the aspiring fly fisher. Great Basin Guide Service offers fishing tours on Pyramid Lake, while Current Fly Fishing runs catch-and-release guided fly-fishing journeys as far south as Mammoth Lakes. The dwindling summer is no reason to stop learning how to get outside, either! While fall hikes, rides and paddling trips are wonderful, with Tahoe on our doorstep, winter recreation opportunities abound! Most local ski resorts offer lessons, for beginners through advanced skiers and snowboarders. Get away from the crowds by learning to snowshoe at an REI clinic, or even by taking an overnight snowcamping course through the Tahoe Rim Trail Association.Theinternet is full of information to help you learn a new skill or better prepare you for your next outdoor adventure—yet for most of us, hands-on learning is hard to beat. There is no shortage of opportunities to get outside with an outdoor specialist in Reno-Tahoe. With often small group sizes and many personalized lessons available, why wouldn’t you want an expert to support, guide and teach you new skills?

A variety of organizations offer a plethora of outdoor-learning opportunities, no matter your interest MAGGIE

16 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com Open 24-7 • Free Pool 715 S. Virginia www.sheastavern.comSt. Dining on Gar Woods thanks the Reno News & Review readers in naming us Reno’s #1 Lake Tahoe Restaurant! “To breath the air angels breath, go to Tahoe” –Mark Twain www.garwoods.com | 530.546.3366 Voted #1 oVer 10 times s pa r ks Wa ter Bar 3 2 5 Har bo r Cov e Drive, Sparks | 775.351.1500 www.barofamerica.com530.587.2626 www.calientetahoe.com530.546.1000 www.rivagrill.com530.542.2600

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 17

As a result of this disorienting reality, the Best of Northern Nevada poll— the area’s largest, most accurate, and most generally amazing survey of read ers in all the land—took an unplanned slumber in 2020 and 2021. But we’ve finally awakened from that most curious dream, and in 2022, we’re back in a big way. Some 5,800 of you voted in the final round of our readers’ poll—thank you, by the way—and here are the results of all of those individual votes, nearly 180,000 in Congratulationstotal. to all the winners and finalists. From those of us here at the RN&R—thank you for making Reno, Sparks, Carson City, Minden, Gardnerv ille, Truckee, Tahoe City, Incline Village and South Lake Tahoe such wonder ful, whimsical places to be.

Welcome to the Best of Northern Nevada 2022.

—The Editors CASINOS & GAMBLING 19 CULTURE 20 FOOD & DRINK 22 GOODS & SERVICES 28 GREEN THUMBS 34 KIDS & FAMILY 37 NIGHTLIFE 38 OUTDOORS 41 PERSONALITIES 43

It feels like we’ve all gone down some sort of rabbit hole in recent years, doesn’t it? Strife. Economic debacles. An insurrection, even—and a plague that got curiouser and curiouser, and continues to trouble us to this day.

18 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com

—Jessica Santina

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 19 BEST CASINO Peppermill 2. Atlantis 3. Grand Sierra Resort 4. Eldorado 5. Rail City BEST CASINO BAR Peppermill Fireside Lounge 2. Peppermill Terrace Lounge 3. Atlantis Bistro Napa 4. Atlantis Sports Bar and Lounge 5. Rail City Casino Ale House Bar BEST CASINO BUFFET Toucan Charlie’s Buffet and Grille at the Atlantis 2. The Grand Buffet at the Grand Sierra Resort 3. The Buffet at the Sands BEST CASINO RESTAURANT Western Village Steak House 2. Atlantis Steak House 3. Bimini Steakhouse at Peppermill 4. Roxy at Eldorado 5. Manhattan Deli Atlantis 6. Anthony’s Chophouse at the Nugget BEST CASINO HOTEL Peppermill 2. Atlantis 3. Grand Sierra Resort 4. Eldorado 5. Nugget BEST CASINO-HOTEL FOR A ROMANTIC GETAWAY Peppermill 2. Atlantis 3. Grand Sierra Resort 4. Eldorado 5. Nugget Casino Resort BEST ECO-FRIENDLY CASINO Peppermill 2. Atlantis 3. Grand Sierra Resort 4. Silver Legacy 5. Eldorado BEST POKER ROOM Peppermill 2. Atlantis 3. Grand Sierra Resort 4. Silver Legacy BEST SPORTSBOOK Peppermill 2. Atlantis 3. Caesars Race and Sports Book at the Eldorado 4. Rail City Casino

NIGHT

BEST WAY TO WARM UP ON A COLD WINTER’S

Midtown’s

cold to go out

Lime,

bitterly cold evening on which

happened to have free child care. (Thanks, Mom.) We braved

The Hot Buttered Rum at Rum Sugar a my husband and I the for a cocktail, and headed straight to Rum Sugar where my eyes lit up when I saw the night’s special: the Hot ButteredFriends,Rum.my life was forever changed. This rich, butterscotch-y, creamy concoction was like nectar of the gods, utterly warming and comforting to wrap my hands around and savor slowly. Owner Loren DeVincenzi explained that the proprietary batter, which he’d made himself, was stored in mason jars and for sale in limited quantities; he’d been getting requests from folks who wanted to buy the jars—while begging for the recipe. In 2020, RSL began selling Hot But tered Rum take-home kits, and yours truly was one of the first in line. My homemade version was only OK—a pale imitation of the real thing, the incomparably creamy, perfectly proportioned, toe-warming delight, prepared at Rum Sugar Lime. Each winter, its availability is like Pavlov’s bell to me, a siren song. Try it; you’ll thank me later.

Lime 1039 S. Virginia St., Reno It was Dec. 26, 2019,

date-night

20 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com BEST ANIMAL SHELTER Nevada Humane Society 2. SPCA of Northern Nevada 3. Canine Rehabilitation Center and Cat Sanctuary (CRCCS) 4. Catmandu 5. Washoe County Regional Animal Services BEST ART GALLERY Nevada Museum of Art 2. The Holland Project 3. Sierra Arts Foundation 4. Stremmel Gallery 5. Artsy Fartsy BEST CHARITY RACE OR WALK Moms on the Run 2. Reno-Tahoe Odyssey 3. Reno Wine Walk 4. Walk MS 5. Biggest Little Half Marathon BEST DOG PARK Rancho San Rafael 2. Hidden Valley 3. Link Piazzo Dog Park 4. Cyan Park 5. Fuji Park BEST LOCAL BAND Buffalo Moses and His Ex-Wives 2. Greg Gilmore & The Fever Dreams 3. Nevada 445 4. First Take featuring Rick Metz 5. Nevada Hazzurd BEST LOCAL DANCE COMPANY Reno Dance Company 2. Ballroom of Reno 3. Forever Dance 4. Lavish Vaudeville BEST LOCAL PODCAST Worst Little Podcast 2. Our Town Reno 3. Renoites 4. Up in the Mix 5. A Book and Its Author BEST LOCAL THEATER COMPANY Good Luck Macbeth 2. Reno Little Theater 3. Brüka 4. Western Nevada Musical Theater BEST LOCAL TV NEWS 2news (KTVN) 2. KOLO Channel 8 3. KRNV Channel 4 BEST MONTHLY EVENT Food Truck Fridays 2. MidTown Reno First Thursdays 3. Reno Wine Walk BEST MOVIE THEATER Galaxy Theatres Legends 2. Century Summit Sierra 3. Galaxy Theatres Victorian, Sparks 4. Century Riverside 12 5. Century Park Lane 16 BEST NONPROFIT GROUP The Eddy House 2. Nevada Humane Society 3. The Holland Project 4. Trauma Intervention Program of Northern Nevada 5. Reps4Recovery 6. Headlock on Hunger BEST OPEN MIC Polo Lounge 2. Open Spike Night 3. A To Zen Nevada Museum of Art. Photo/David Robert

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 21 BEST RADIO STATION K-Bull 98.1 FM 2. KWNK 97.7 3. KUNR Public Radio 4. Alice 96.5 5. 105.7 KOZZ 6. Willie 96.9 BEST SPECIAL EVENT AT LAKE TAHOE Lake ShakespeareTahoe Festival 2. American Century Celebrity Golf Championship Tournament 3. Fourth of July 4. Lake Tahoe Concours d’Elegance BEST SPECIAL EVENT IN CARSON CITY Nevada Day Parade 2. Ghost Walk 3. Taste of Downtown 4. Capital City Brewfest BEST SPECIAL EVENT IN DOWNTOWN RENO Artown 2. Hot August Nights 3. Northern Nevada Pride 4. The Great Italian Festival 5. Fourth of July BEST SPECIAL EVENT IN DOWNTOWN SPARKS Best in the West Nugget Rib Cook Off 2. Hot August Nights 3. Sparks ChristmasHometowneParade 4. 39 North Pole Village 5. Star Spangled Sparks BEST SPECIAL EVENT MINDEN/GARDNERVILLEIN Genoa Candy Dance Arts and Crafts Faire 2. Parade of Lights 3. Carson Valley Days 4. Aviation Roundup at Minden-Tahoe Airport BEST COVERAGE OF THE HOMELESS Our Town Reno www.ourtownreno.com Our Town Reno is a hyperlocal, socialmedia-driven reporting initiative from the Reynolds Media Lab at UNR’s Reynolds School of Journalism. Since 2016, the student-run project has focused much of its reporting on the plight of unhoused people in Northern Nevada, including families living in the city’s (fast-disappearing) weeklyrental motels. Its reporters tell stories about people living on the banks of the Truckee River, in shelters, and in “last resort” housing. The work can be found at www.ourtownreno.com and on social media; hashtags include #helpeachother #heroesofreno and #keeprenorad. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Our Town Reno reported on the growing number of unhoused people in the Truckee Meadows, the policies that affected them, police “sweeps” of tent cities and camps, and the new ”super shelter” now run by Washoe County. The young reporters talk to folks whose voices often are ignored—and tell stories that would not otherwise be told. —Frank X. Mullen

Reno

Pub

22 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com BEST BAGEL Truckee Bagel Company 2. My Favorite Muffin 3. Einstein Bros Bagels 4. Rounds Bakery 5. Desert Sun Bagels BEST BAKERY Perenn Bakery 2. Josef’s Vienna Bakery and Café 3. House of Bread 4. Rounds Bakery 5. Homage BEST BASQUE RESTAURANT Louis’ Basque Corner 2. JT Basque Bar and Dining Room 3. Villa Basque Cafe BEST BARBECUE RESTAURANT BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company 2. Brothers Barbecue 3. Butchers Kitchen Char-B-Que 4. Carolina Kitchen and BBQ 5. Famous Dave’s BEST BLOODY MARY Two Chicks 2. Stone House Cafe 3. PJ’s 4. Squeeze In 5. Noble Pie Parlor 6. BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company BEST BREAKFAST Two Chicks 2. Peg’s Glorified Ham n Eggs 3. Stone House Cafe 4. Squeeze Inn 5. BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company BEST BRUNCH Stone House Cafe 2. Two Chicks 3. The Shore Room 4. Peg’s Glorified Ham n Eggs 5. Squeeze In 6. Noble Pie Parlor BEST BURGER In-N-Out 2. Juicy’s 3. Royce Burger 4. Beefy’s 5. Ryan’s Saloon and Broiler 6. Two Chicks BEST CARSON CITY RESTAURANT Red’s Old 395 Grill 2. Sassafras Eclectic Food Joint 3. San Marcos Grill 4. Z Bistro 5. Piazza BEST CATERING COMPANY Roundabout Catering 2. Cherry Bomb Catering 3. BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company 4. Big Blue Q 5. Fig Tree Catering 6. Blend Catering BEST CHEAP EATS Gold N Silver 2. Noble Pie Parlor 3. Bully’s 4. Big Ed’s Alley Inn BEST CHEF Mark Estee, various 2. Brett Moseley, Washoe Public House 3. Sean Munshaw, The Shore/ Renaissance Reno Downtown Hotel 4. David Holman, Atlantis 5. Jonathan Chapin, Reno Recipes BEST CHICKEN WINGS Noble Pie Parlor 2. Slater’s Ding-a-Wing 3. Wingstop 4. Bully’s 5. BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company BEST CHINESE RESTAURANT Kwok’s Bistro 2. Palais de Jade 3. CJ’s Palace 4. Chin Chin 5. Shanghai Bistro BEST PLACE FOR A GRADUATION PARTY

When we called Steve back in February to inquire about a May party, he thoroughly answered our questions and made helpful suggestions about food, beer and nonalcoholic beverages based on the number of normal adults, new college graduates (who obviously need more beer—they’re celebrating) and under-21 guests we were expecting. The party went off better than expected; Steve even lit a bonfire for us in the outside fire pit. The graduate and his friends polished off many pitchers of beer in the beer garden—and, to add to the fanfare, the graduate even drank beer out of a shoe. A shoey, they called it. Disgusting traditions aside, Pub N’ Sub was THE best place to hold a graduation party.

Pub N' 1000 Ralston Street, Hosting a college-graduation party can be a pain—but for my family, N’ Sub owner Steve Mathers made it super-easy.

Sub

—David Robert

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 23 BEST COFFEE The Human Bean 2. Coffee Bar 3. Bibo Coffee Company 4. Hub Coffee Roasters 5. Old World Coffee 6. Magpie Coffee Roasters BEST COFFEE ROASTER Hub Coffee Roasters 2. Old World Coffee Lab 3. Bibo Coffee Company 4. Magpie Coffee Roasters 5. WoodFire Roasted Coffee Co BEST DESSERTS Josef’sTIE Vienna Bakery and Café Perenn Bakery 3. Black Rock Desserts 4. Homage 5. Cheesecake Factory BEST DOUGHNUTS/PASTRIES DoughBoys Donuts 2. Perenn Bakery 3. Jelly Donut 4. Donut Bistro 5. Rounds Bakery 6. Homage BEST FINE DINING Western Village Steakhouse 2. Beaujolais Bistro 3. Atlantis Steakhouse 4. Johnny’s Little Italy 5. Brick’s 6. Twisted Fork BEST FOOD TRUCK Slater’s Ding-A-Wing 2. Hey Hey’s Fried Chicken 3. Kenji’s 4. The Fix 5. La Barca BEST FRENCH FRIES Noble Pie Parlor 2. GourMelt 3. BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company 4. Two Chicks 5. Slaters Ding-a-Wing BEST FRENCH RESTAURANT Beaujolais Bistro 2. Z Bistro 3. Le Bistro BEST FROZEN YOGURT Yogurt Beach 2. Honey Treat 3. sweetFrog Premium Frozen Yogurt 4. Everbowl BEST GLUTEN-FREE DINING Great Full Gardens 2. Two Chicks 3. Noble Pie Parlor 4. Haven on Earth BEST GREEK RESTAURANT Niko’s Greek Kitchen 2. Nick’s Greek Deli 3. Wrap It Up 4. The Shore 5. Lucky’s Sparks BEST HAWAIIAN RESTAURANT L&L Hawaiian Barbecue 2. Aloha Shack 3. Kenji’s 4. Loco Ono 5. Lili’s BEST HOT DOG Costco 2. BamDog 3. Sinbad’s 4. Taste of Chicago 5. Coney Island Hot Dogs BEST INDIAN RESTAURANT India Kabab and Curry 2. Taste of India 3. Thali 4. Barwatchi 5. Royal India 6. Cafe Masala BEST ITALIAN RESTAURANT Casale’s Halfway Club 2. Johnny’s Little Italy 3. Zozo’s 4. Mario’s Portofino 5. La Cucina 6. Pietro’s Famiglia 1/8 PIENOBLEV -Thank you for voting for us!-

24 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com 1/4DOUGH BOY 22 CELEBRATING 85 YEARS! 775-323-3979HomemadeHalfwayCasale’sClubravioli-Meatballs-Spaghetti-Lasagna“Nothinghalfwayaboutit!”Samelocationover85yearsBetweenRenoandSparks2501East 4th St. Think Free!

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 25 BEST JAPANESE RESTAURANT Kauboi Izakaya 2. Ijji 3. Ichiban Japanese Steak House 4. Tokyo Sushi 5. Haru BEST JUICE/JUICE BAR Jüs 2. Keva Juice 3. Great Basin Community Food Co-op 4. Jamba Juice 5. Nektar BEST LATE-NIGHT DINING Gold N Silver 2. Roberto’s Taco Shop 3. Noble Pie Parlor 4. Homegrown Gastropub 5. Shenanigan’s Old English Pub BEST MARGARITA El Adobe 2. Los Compadres 3. Miguel’s 4. Mari Chuy’s 5. Casa Grande BEST MARTINI Roxy at the Eldorado 2. Death and Taxes 3. Wild River Grille 4. Bistro Napa 5. Sparks Water Bar BEST MEXICAN RESTAURANT Los Compadres 2. Miguel’s 3. El Adobe 4. Anna’s Mexican Grill 5. Murrieta’s 6. Casa Grande BEST MIDDLE EASTERN/ AFRICAN RESTAURANT Zagol Ethiopian Cuisine 2. Aladdin’s Market and Kitchen 3. Suri’s BEST RESTAURANTMINDEN/GARDNERVILLE JT Basque Bar and Dining Room 2. The Overland 3. Minden Meat BEST OUTDOOR DINING Stone House Cafe 2. Wild River Grille 3. The Shore 4. Noble Pie Parlor 5. Mari Chuy’s Midtown 6. David’s Grill at Red Hawk Golf and Resort BEST PIZZA Blind Onion Pizza and Pub 2. Smiling With Hope 3. Noble Pie Parlor 4. Sizzle Pie 5. R-Town Pizza BEST RENO RESTAURANT Washoe Public House 2. Two Chicks 3. Noble Pie Parlor 4. The Shore 5. R Town Pizza BEST RESTAURANT WORTH THE LONG WAIT Casale’s Halfway Club 2. Two Chicks 3. Tokyo Sushi 4. BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company 5. Noble Pie Parlor BEST ROMANTIC RESTAURANT Beaujolais Bistro 2. Wild River Grille 3. La Strada 4. Bistro Napa 5. The Shore BEST SALAD Great Full Gardens 2. Süp 3. Saladworks 4. Noble Pie Parlor 5. Two Chicks BEST SALAD BAR Whole Foods 2. Toucan Charlie’s Buffet and Grille 3. Saladworks 4. Churrasco Brazilian Steakhouse 5. Pizza Factory BEST SANDWICH SHOP Full Belly Deli 2. Deli Towne USA 3. Michael’s Deli 4. Capriotti’s 5. Port of Subs 6. GourMelt Grilled Cheese Shop I’m extremely picky when it comes to salads. A perfect salad has high-quality ingredients, a mixture of textures, and the perfect amount of salad dressing, preferably house-made—not too much, and not too little, with every bite having a nice coating. Mamma Celeste’s salads meet all of these criteria—and more. You can’t go wrong with any salad you order, but my favorite (so far) is Little Nick’s Grecian, with both baby spinach and romaine lettuce; black and kalamata olives; pepperoncini; cherry tomatoes; bacon; feta cheese; and Mediterranean dressing. I personally hold the kalamata olives, but that’s up to you!

BEST CAFÉ TO GET SOME WORK DONE Walden’s Coffeehouse 3940 Mayberry Drive, Reno Celeste’s Gastropub and Pizzeria 360 Los Altos Pkwy., Sparks

BEST SALADSGASTROPUB Mamma

Those of us who work remotely know the critical importance of a good local coffeehouse. Not just any coffeehouse will do. First, you must have food—and not just a few paltry pastries. I mean legit, hunkerdown-for-several-hours-and-eat-two-full-meals food. Second, the coffeehouse needs electrical outlets—many, and easily accessible. There should, of course, be good, free wi-fi, not to mention plenty of places to sit. If you have these things, I’ll be your fan for life and will undoubtedly spend a lot of money with you. For these reasons and more, I’m a fan for life of Walden’s Coffeehouse—the O.G. location in West Reno. The food is outstanding, from great bagels and cream cheese, to full-on egg and pancake breakfasts, to French dip sandwiches, to turkey chili—a heavenly concoction topped with cheese, red onions and crisp bacon; it’s probably my favorite chili in town. The wi-fi is free and not timed, and most every table is at or near a window—plus there’s a roomy patio. And I can always find an electrical outlet. With all this, Walden’s is hard to beat.

—Jessica Santina

—Cheree Boteler

26 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 27 BEST STEAK Western Village Steakhouse 2. Atlantis Steakhouse 3. Texas Roadhouse 4. Bimini at the Peppermill BEST SUSHI Tokyo Sushi 2. Tha Joint 3. Ijji 4. Hinoki Sushi 5. Ohana Sushi BEST TAHOE RESTAURANT Gar Woods Grill and Pier 2. T’s Rotisserie 3. Jake’s on the Lake 4. Lone Eagle Grill BEST THAI RESTAURANT Bangkok Cuisine 2. Thai Lotus 3. Moo Dang 4. Thai Chili BEST SOUPS Süp 2. Great Full Gardens 3. Saladworks BEST TRUCKEE RESTAURANT Squeeze In 2. Jax at the Tracks 3. Drunken Monkey 4. Moody’s Bistro Bar and Beats 5. Trokay BEST VEGAN FOOD Great Full Gardens 2. Nom Eats 3. Laughing Planet 4. House of Mexica 5. Noble Pie Parlor BEST VEGETARIAN FOOD Great Full Gardens 2. Laughing Planet 3. Nom Eats 4. Two Chicks 5. Noble Pie Parlor BEST SCOTCHWHISKEY/BOURBON/SELECTION Chapel Tavern 2. Whiskey Lounge 3. Ceol Irish Pub 4. Z Bar BEST WINE BAR Whispering Vine 2. Craft Wine and Beer 3. Engine 8 Urban Winery 4. Midtown Spirts, Wine, and Bites 5. Vino 100 6. Archive Wine + Beer BEST WINE LIST Whispering Vine 2. Bistro Napa 3. Midtown Spirits, Wine & Bites 4. Atlantis Steakhouse 5. Archive Wine + Beer BEST SEAFOOD RESTAURANT Oceano at the Peppermill 2. Sky Terrace Oyster Bar at the Atlantis 3. Smee’s Alaskan Fish Bar 4. Nugget Oyster Bar 5. Mr. Crab BEST SMOOTHIE Keva Juice 2. Jüs 3. Jamba Juice 4. The Human Bean 5. Nekter BEST VIETNAMESE RESTAURANT Golden Flower 2. Pho 777 3. Pho 999 4. Pho La Mint 5. SF Kitchen BEST SPARKS RESTAURANT Western Village Steakhouse 2. BJ’s Nevada Barbecue Company 3. Sparks Water Bar 4. GourMelt Grilled Cheese Shop 5. M&M’s Southern Cafe BEST PATIO Engine 8 Urban Winery 1260 C St., Suite 150, Sparks Sure, Reno has plenty of great patios—but I think Sparks often gets short shrift in the Best Of business. Fortunately, those of us in the know have discovered Engine 8 Urban Winery. The owners, Mike and Wendi Rawson, and their staff are friendly and welcoming; the wine and food are great. But Engine 8’s best feature is its patio—my favorite spot to while away a summer evening (or a spring evening, or a fall evening). The winery enjoys a location that makes its patio ideal for long, relaxing evenings, and it’s open year-round. Situated in front of the Galaxy Theatres in the ever-growing Victorian Square, Engine 8’s roomy patio is surrounded on three sides by apartments and businesses, providing both plenty of shade on hot evenings and an upbeat, urban vibe. The patio has offers plenty of seating, including a six-top featuring a firepit at its center, perfect for cold nights. Engine 8’s live-music lineup, its menu featuring charcuterie and outstanding specialty pizzas, and its wine flights all invite you to linger, sip and relax all evening long. —Jessica Santina Engine 8 owners Wendi and Mike Rawson. Photo/David Robert NIKOS-==-==-=-=� GREEK KITCHEN Servingtraditional Greekfoods for lunch & dinner THANK YOU FOR VOTING US OPENWEDNESDAY-SUNDAYAT11AM •171DISCDR.STE.105,SPARKS WWW.NIKOSGREEKKITCHE .NET •775-499-5777

—Cheree Boteler

Designs.

28 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com BEST ADULT THEMED STORE Chocolate Walrus 2. Suzie’s 3. Adam & Eve BEST ANTIQUE STORE Junkee Clothing Exchange 2. The Nest 3. Reno Antiques 4. Carson City Antiques and Collectibles5.Antiques & Treasures ROCK! BEST BANK Great Basin Federal Credit Union 2. Wells Fargo 3. United Federal Credit Union 4. US Bank BEST BARBER SHOP Derby Supply Company 2. Beautiful Bearded Man 3. Maxwell’s Barbershop 4. Commonwealth Barber Company 5. Town Barbers 6. Tabu’s of Reno Barber Lounge BEST BEAUTY SALON Jensen & Co. Salon 2. Eye Candy Salon 3. Au Salon 4. Siren Salon 5. Shearz BEST BICYCLE SHOP The Reno Bike Project 2. High Sierra Cycling 3. Blackrock Bike Shop 4. College Cyclery 5. The Drop Out Bike Shop 6. Sierra Cyclesmith BEST BOOKSTORE TIE Grassroots Books Sundance Books and Music 3. Barnes and Noble 4. The Radical Cat 5. Golden Owl BEST BOUTIQUE CLOTHING STORE Junkee Clothing Exchange 2. Bad Apple Vintage 3. Biggest Little Fashion Truck 4. Nomad Boutique 5. Labels Consignment Boutique BEST BRIDAL SALON Swoon 2. Blue Garter 3. La Di Da 4. Moonlight Lace 5. Studio Inspire Bridal BEST CAR WASH Sierra Car Wash 2. Surf Thru Express Car Wash 3. Hutch’s Car Wash 4. Buggy Bath Car Wash 5. Jimmy’s Express Car Wash BEST CARPET CLEANING COMPANY Evergreen Carpet Care 2. Full Steam 3. New Sunrise 4. Coit 5. Details BEST CHILDREN’S CLOTHING BOUTIQUE Once Upon a Child 2. Biggest Little Baby 3. The Children’s Place 4. Chez Vous BEST JEWELER CREATIVITY D Street Designs 45 St Lawrence Ave., Reno Doug E. Moore’s philosophy is to create love via the jewelry he makes. While he does offer ready-to-purchase pieces, working with Doug on a custom piece of jewelry is a delightful experience. I’ve had the pleasure of both doing this myself and being with friends who have created pieces. This customized experience is one that I would highly recommend to anyone looking to purchase something, be it for themselves or a friend/loved one. Doug’s creative process includes spending time getting to know you and discovering the emotions behind the piece (or pieces) of jewelry you’re looking to create with him. It’s personal to him—because it’s personal to you.D Street Designs uses only the highest-quality metals and stones, and prices range from affordable to sky-is-the-limit.

Doug E. Moore of D Street

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 29 We say it often to our members. We couldn’t be the best Credit withoutUnionyou. Equal Housing Lender. Insured by NCUA. All loans are subject to credit/collateral approval. Personal and business banking Home loans • Investments • Insurance and more IT’S GO TIME Visit GNCU.org/RealTalk Thanks!

30 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com Open 9 Hours a Day • 6 Days a Week Monday-Saturday 10am – 7 pm • Closed Sundays Shop online at RCWilley.com. Furniture | Electronics | Appliances | Flooring | Mattresses Thank you Reno for voting us #1

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 31 BEST CLOTHING STORE Bad Apple Vintage 2. Junkee Clothing Exchange 3. Macy’s 4. Dillard’s 5. Freestyle Clothing Exchange BEST COMPUTER STORE Apple Store 2. Best Buy 3. Reno Computer Fix 4. New 2 U Computers 5. Mac-O-Rama BEST CREDIT UNION Greater Nevada Credit Union 2. Great Basin Federal Credit Union 3. United Federal Credit Union 4. Sierra Pacific Federal Credit Union BEST DOGGY DAYCARE Pet Play House 2. Animal Oasis 3. On Command 4. Adventure Pet 5. Charlie’s Place BEST DRY CLEANERS Bobby Page’s 2. Mia’s Professional Cleaners 3. Reno Cleaners 4. Peerless 5. Canyon Cleaners BEST EVENT PROMOTER Amplified Entertainment 2. Chris Payne 3. Late-Nite Productions 4. Steve Emmerich 5. Design on Edge BEST FRAME SHOP Nevada Fine Arts 2. Michael’s 3. Midtown Frameworks 4. The Frame Shop 5. Eagle Framing BEST GROCERY STORE Trader Joe’s 2. WinCo 3. Raley’s 4. Great Basin Co-op 5. Sprouts BEST GYM St. Mary’s Fitness Center 2. South Reno Athletic Club 3. Planet Fitness 4. Orangetheory Fitness 5. Anytime Fitness 6. Parkway Athletic Club BEST HARDWARE STORE Carter Bros. Ace Hardware (Midtown) 2. Home Depot 3. Lowe’s 4. Shelly’s True Value Hardware BEST HEAD SHOP The Melting Pot World Emporium and Smoke Shop 2. Art Dogs and Grace 3. Smok’n Ray’s 4. Sol Cannabis 5. Pyramid Vapory and Art Studio BEST HOME FURNISHINGS STORE RC Willey 2. The Nest 3. Consign Furniture 4. Forever Yours Fine Furniture 5. Mor BEST HOUSE CLEANING SERVICE Molly Maid 2. Munoz Cleaning Service 3. White Lotus BEST JEWELRY STORE Michael & Son’s Jewelry Co. 2. BVW Jewelers 3. Midtown Diamonds 4. Honey and Goldies 5. D Street Designs BEST LIQUOR STORE Total Wine and More 2. Lee’s Discount Liquor 3. Ben’s Fine Wine and Spirits 4. Craft Wine and Beer 5. Pyramid Liquor BEST MARIJUANA DISPENSARY The Dispensary 2. Mynt 3. Silver State Relief 4. Rise 5. Sol Cannabis BEST MORTGAGE COMPANY Bay Equity Home Loans 2. Greater Nevada Credit Union 3. Guild Mortgage 4. Caliber Home Loans BEST MOTORCYCLE DEALER Reno Harley-Davidson 2. Big Valley Honda 3. Carson City Motorsports 4. Sierra BMW BEST NEW CAR DEALERSHIP Dolan Toyota 2. Bill Pearce Honda 3. Dolan Lexus 4. Corwin Ford BEST OPTICAL SHOP Costco 2. Pritchett Eye Care 3. DeMers Family Vision Group 4. Downtown Vision 5. Arlington Eye Center BEST TIRE SHOP Barajas Tires 2255 Glendale Ave., No. 7, Sparks I needed a couple of tires replaced earlier this summer, but when I called my usual Fourth Street tire stores, none of them had my size in stock. Supplychain issues were the culprit; my tire size is normally as easy to find as a coffee shop in Midtown. The internet was perused; more rubber barons were called; no luck. That is, until I called Barajas Tires. A jolly fellow named Pablo answered the phone and assured me that he had the tires in stock. Great! Even better: The price was about 20 percent less that I had paid for these tires before. Off to Sparks I went. Pablo greeted me outside his neat and clean shop and told me to take a seat. In about the time it took me to go over my emails on my phone, the tires were mounted— and I was ready to safely hit the streets again. —David Robert The Dispensary. Photo/David Robert

32 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com BEST OUTDOOR GEAR SELECTION 4. Sierra Trading Post BEST PET BOARDING 5. Fantasia Pet Resort BEST PET SUPPLY STORE 5. Hammer’s Healthy Hounds BEST PILATES STUDIO Juice Box Yoga 2. Studio Sculpt 3. Club Pilates 4. Sunday Pilates BEST PLACE FOR MUSIC LESSONS It’s All About Music 2. Mountain Music Parlor 3. Lucas Paul - Kid Rocker 4. Play Your Own Music BEST PLACE TO BUY A FIREARM Scheels 2. Bizarre Guitar and Guns 3. Cabela’s 4. Mark Fore and Strike 5. Sportsman’s Warehouse BEST PLACE TO BUY A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT Bizarre Guitar and Guns 2. Guitar Center 3. Mountain Music Parlor 4. Blue Note B’s BEST PLACE TO BUY CDS OR VINYL Recycled Records 2. Sundance 3. Discology BEST PLACE TO BUY PLAYA GARB Junkee Clothing Exchange 2. The Melting Pot 3. St Vincent’s Thrift BEST PLACE TO BUY VINTAGE CLOTHES Junkee Clothing Exchange 2. Bad Apple Vintage 3. The Nest 4. Savers 5. Empty Hands Vintage BEST PLACE TO GET A CAR REPAIRED Greg’s Garage 2. CoAuto 3. A Master Mechanic 4. Independent Auto 5. Devine Automotive BEST PLACE TO GET AN AUTO SMOGGED Instant Smog 2. SmogCheck 3. Hutch’s Quik Smog 4. GK Auto Smog 5. Smog Monkey BEST PLACE TO GET PIERCED Black Hole Body Piercing 2. Evolution Tattoo 3. Under Your Skin 4. Claire’s BEST PRINT SHOP Pitch Black Printing Co. 2. Reno Type 3. Laika Press 4. Allegra BEST SELECTION OF LOCAL ART The Holland Project 2. Sierra Arts Gallery 3. Artists Co-op Gallery Reno 4. Pyramid Vapory and Art Studio 22 MIKE RICHARDSON Branch Manager | NMLS ID# 1195440 300 East 2nd Street, Suite 1205, Reno, NV 89501 mrichardson@bayeq.com | 775.685.4678 | bayeq.com/reno THANK YOU FOR VOTING BAY EQUITY AS NORTHERN NEVADA’S Bay Equity LLC. Equal Housing Opportunity. This is not a commitment to lend or extend credit. Restrictions may apply. Rates may not be available at time of application. Information and/or data are subject to change without notice. All loans are subject to credit approval. Not all loans or products are available in all states. Bay Equity LLC, 770 Tamalpais Drive, Suite 207, Corte Madera, CA 94925; NMLS ID#76988. Nevada Mortgage Company License #3918. NMLS consumer access: www.nmlsconsumeraccess.org BECH-220817-5.0 BEST MORTGAGE COMPANY 2 Years in a Row!

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 33 BEST SHOE SELECTION Reno Running Company 2. DSW 3. Scheels 4. Off Broadway Shoes 5. Dillards BEST SKATE SHOP Classic Skate Shop 2. Sierra Nevada Skateboards 3. Vans 4. WheelHouse CC BEST SPA Peppermill Spa Toscana 2. Spa Atlantis 3. Dolce Vita Wellness Spa 4. The Refuge Spa 5. Bella Grey Medical Spa BEST SPECIALTY FOOD STORE Trader Joe’s 2. Great Basin Food Co-op 3. Sprouts 4. Butcher Boy 5. Whole Foods BEST TATTOO PARLOR Evolution Tattoo 2. Aces Tattoo 3. Lasting Dose 4. Marked Studios 5. Twofold BEST THRIFT STORE Junkee Clothing Exchange and Antique Store 2. SPCA of Northern Nevada Thrift Store 3. Savers 4. St. Vincent’s Thrift 5. Assistance League Thrift Store BEST USED CAR DEALERSHIP Carmax 2. Reno Tahoe Auto Group 3. Bill Pearce Motors 4. Mountain West Auto BEST USED CLOTHING STORE Junkee Clothing Exchange 2. Plato’s Closet 3. Savers 4. Bad Apple Vintage BEST VAPE SHOP Happy Dayze 2. Cloud 9 3. Pyramid Vapory & Art Studio 4. Knuckle Dusters BEST VETERINARIAN CLINIC Klaich Animal Hospital 2. Mountain View Animal Hospital & Holistic Pet Care 3. VCA Baring Boulevard Animal Hospital 4. Desert Hills Animal Hospital 5. Southwest Veterinary Hospital 6. Mountain View BEST VIDEO GAME STORE Cap’n Games 2. GameStop 3. Best Buy BEST WEDDING RECEPTION SITE The Elm Estate 2. Tannenbaum Events Center 3. River School Farm 4. Whitney Peak Hotel 5. National Automobile Museum BEST WINE SHOP Whispering Vine 2. Total Wine & More 3. Craft Wine and Beer 4. Lee’s Discount Liquor 5. Napa Sonoma Grocery Company 6. Archive Wine + Beer BEST WORKOUT WEAR SELECTION Scheels 2. Lululemon 3. Dick’s Sporting Goods 4. Big 5 BEST YOGA STUDIO Juice Box Yoga 2. The Studio 3. Temple Yoga 4. Yoga Pod 5. Yoga Six 6. Biggest Little Baby

34 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com BEST FLOWER SHOP Sparks Florist 2. Moana Nursery 3. Amy’s Flowers 4. Helianthus Floral 5. The Garden BEST GARDEN NURSERY Moana Nursery 2. Old Stone House Gift and Garden 3. Rail City 4. Sierra Water Gardens 5. Natural Selection BEST CANNABIS GROWER (LOCAL) Sol Cannabis 2. SRENE 3. The Real McCoy 4. MMG Agriculture BEST CANNABIS PRODUCT (LOCAL) Sol Cannabis 2. Sierra Well 3. MMG Agriculture BEST HARVEST FESTIVAL Andelin Family Farm 2. Garlic Festival 3. Nevada Youth Empowerment Project Fall Harvest Festival at Bartley Ranch BEST LANDSCAPING COMPANY Cory’s Lawn Service 2. Moana Nursery 3. DRC Landscaping 4. Carson Valley Lawn and Landscape BEST LOCAL FARM/PRODUCE GROWER Andelin Family Farm 2. Reno Food Systems 3. Girl Farm 4. Prema Farms BEST PLACE FOR AN AFTERNOON STROLL Wilbur D. May Arboretum and Botanical Garden at Rancho San Rafael Park 1595 N. Sierra St., Reno The Wilbur D. May Arboretum and Botanical Garden at Rancho San Rafael Park is a hidden gem of natural splendor in the midst of the concrete and asphalt of Reno. The gardens are beautiful in spring and summer; the tree groves flame with reds, oranges and brilliant yellows in the autumn. Well-groomed paths flow through a variety of plants and trees in themed gardens and groves. Sheltered benches provide spaces to relax and enjoy the sights of the changing seasons, enhanced by birdsong and sightings of rabbits, squirrels and other wildlife. Evans Creek flows through the area, providing them a sheltered habitat. The arboretum and gardens are open daily year-round for quiet walks and gatherings in all seasons. Several of the gardens host weddings by appointment. —Frank X. Mullen Sparks Florist's Tracy McDonald. Photo/David Robert

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 35

36 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com Thank you to all of our customers!We cannot express how much we appreciate you! Show this advertisement for 10 percent off (through Sept. 30)! Firecreek Crossing 4809 Kietzke Lane, Suite C, Reno info@toysnmoreofreno.com775-384-1044 22

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 37 BEST ARCADE GAMES Coconut Bowl at Wild Island 2. Press Start 3. Grand Sierra Resort 4. Circus Circus 5. Atlantis Fun Center BEST FAMILY OUTING Lake Tahoe 2. Andelin Family Farm 3. Reno Aces 4. Coconut Bowl at Wild Island 5. Press Start BEST INDOOR ACTIVITY FOR KIDS The Discovery: Terry Lee Wells Nevada Discovery Museum 2. Coconut Bowl at Wild Island 3. Fly High Trampoline Park 4. DEFY Sparks Trampoline Park 5. Press Start BEST KID-FRIENDLY RESTAURANT Red Robin Gourmet Burgers and Brews 2. Two Chicks 3. Laughing Planet 4. Great Full Gardens 5. Press Start BEST LIBRARY Downtown Reno Library 2. Northwest Reno Library 3. Spanish Springs Library 4. South Valleys Library 5. Sparks Library BEST PARK Rancho San Rafael 2. Idlewild 3. Pah-Rah 4. Lazy 5 5. Cyan Park BEST TOY STORE Toys N More 2. Learning Express 3. Biggest Little Baby 4. Kelekia Toys and Gifts BEST WEEKNIGHT ACTIVITY Magic Carpet Golf 2. Riverside Farmer’s Market 3. El Rancho Drive-in 4. Press Start Great Full Gardens Cafe & Eateries Welcome Back RN&R & Burners! Headed to the Playa this year? Grab some frozen soups and frozen organic cold-pressed juice to fuel your burn. Pre-orders now being taken at info@greatfullgardens.com! Three full-service locations to serve you Midtown • South Meadows • Sparks at Legends The Kitchen at www.greatfullgardens.comLongley/McCarran

38 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com BEST ALL-AGES SPOT The Eddy 2. The Holland Project 3. Press Start 4. Pure Country Canteen BEST BAR Chapel Tavern 2. The Glass Die 3. Pure Country Canteen 4. The Stick 5. Cypress BEST BEER SELECTION Piñon Bottle Company 2. Beer NV 3. Craft Wine and Beer 4. The Glass Die 5. Pure County Canteen BEST BOWLING ALLEY Grand Sierra Resort 2. Coconut Bowl at Wild Island 3. High Sierra Lanes 4. Carson Lanes BEST COCKTAIL MENU Death and Taxes 2. Rum Sugar Lime 3. Roxy 4. Blind Dog Tavern 5. Pure Country Canteen BEST COMEDY CLUB Laugh Factory 2. Reno Tahoe Comedy 3. Reno Improv BEST CONCERT VENUE Grand Sierra Resort 2. The Holland Project 3. BartleyTIE Ranch Nugget Event Center 5. The Alpine 6. Cargo Concert Hall BEST CRAFT COCKTAILS Death and Taxes 2. Rum Sugar Lime 3. 1864 Tavern 4. Chapel Tavern 5. Pignic Pub & Patio BEST DANCE CLUB Pure Country Canteen 2. Lex Nightclub 3. Faces 4. Cypress Reno BEST DISTILLERY 10 Torr 2. The Depot Brewery and Distillery 3. Ferino Distillery 4. Seven Troughs 5. High Mark Distillery BEST DIVE BAR 40 Mile Saloon 2. Shea’s Tavern 3. Pure Country Canteen 4. The Elbow Room 5. Woodrow’s Tap Room BEST GAY HANGOUT Five Star Saloon 2. The Emerson 3. The Glass Die 4. Faces 5. Carl’s BEST LOCAL WHISKEY Frey Ranch 1045 Dodge Lane, Fallon I had the pleasure of first touring Frey Ranch when their first batch of whiskey had been in barrels a little less than a year. As a whiskey lover, I remember thinking, oh, man, I hope this turns out good. Several years later, the time had come to taste. That first sip of Frey Ranch’s whiskey not only met my expectations, but exceeded them, by far. Every time I sip on this local whiskey, made with love by Ashley, Colby and the Frey Ranch team, I am delighted. While I really enjoy their bourbon, it’s the straight rye whiskey I prefer to sip (neat, please), to enjoy in my favorite cocktail (the Boulevardier), or to savor in a Whiskey Bloody while brunching. Never had a Whiskey Bloody? Well, after trying one with Frey Ranch’s rye, I am quite sure you’ll never go back to the original Bloody Mary. —Cheree Boteler

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 39 BEST KARAOKE West Second Street Bar 2. The Point 3. Pure County Canteen 4. The Stick BEST LOCAL BREWERY Great Basin Brewing Company 2. Revision 3. Lead Dog 4. IMBĪB Custom Brews 5. The Brewers Cabinet 6. Brasserie St. James BEST PLACE FOR A FIRST DATE The Eddy 2. The Glass Die 3. Kauboi Izakaya 4. Pure Country Canteen 5. The Hideout BEST PLACE TO BUY SEXY UNDERWEAR Chocolate Walrus 2. Victoria’s Secret 3. Adam & Eve BEST ROMANTIC BAR Fireside Lounge 2. Death and Taxes 3. Whispering Vine 4. Archive Wine + Beer BEST SPORTS BAR Flowing Tide Pub 2. Bully’s 3. The Stick 4. Old Bridge Pub 5. Coach’s Grill & Sports Bar BEST STRIP CLUB Men’s Club 2. Peppermint Hippo 3. Fantasy Girls 4. Spice House BEST TRIVIA NIGHT Bighorn Tavern 2. Little Waldorf 3. Beer NV 4. 10 Torr 5. Woodrow’s Tap Room Chapel Tavern. Photo/David Robert

40 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com

Carson Valley Swim 1600 State Route 88, Minden

The Carson Valley Swim Center offers not one, but SIX pools— two outside (adult and child), and four indoors. The large lap pool outside also features an expansive climbing wall, from which daring climbers can jump right into the deep end. Indoors, take a spin on one of CVSC’s two impressive water slides; sit in a shallow pool under a splash pad; or choose between a high and low diving board at the large, deep center pool—all under the watchful eyes of lifeguards.

Plus, CVSC offers a fully equipped fitness room, a party room, shaded picnic tables and a clean, spacious locker room that even has a swimsuit spin dryer. Swimming and diving lessons are available for both children and adults; you’ll also find water aerobics, lifeguard classes and CPR classes. And access is available for low, low prices: I’m talking $3 a day for kids, seniors and people with disabilities; $5 for adults 18-60; and $15 for a family. Oh, and it’s open year-round! —Jessica Santina Lake Tahoe.

Photo/David Robert

My family and I stumbled upon this state-of-the-art aquatic center in Minden on a road trip, and it was like a gift from heaven.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 41 BEST BICYCLE RIDE PATH/ DESTINATION Truckee River Bike Trail 2. Tahoe East Shore Trail 3. Damonte Ranch Wetlands Loop 4. Ash Canyon Trail BEST GOLF COURSE Red Hawk Golf and Resort 2. Lakeridge 3. Washoe 4. Somersett Golf & Country Club 5. Sierra Sage BEST HIKING TRAIL Tahoe Rim Trail 2. Hunter Creek Trail 3. Galena Creek Trail 4. Mount Rose Trail BEST LOCAL HOT SPRINGS Walley’s Hot Springs 2. Carson Hot Springs 3. Steamboat 4. Carson Hot Springs BEST PICNIC SPOT Rancho San Rafael 2. Bower’s Mansion 3. Idlewild 4. Tahoe Meadows 5. Crissie Caughlin Park BEST PLACE TO SWIM Lake Tahoe 2. Sand Harbor 3. Truckee River 4. Pyramid Lake BEST SKI RESORT Mt. Rose 2. Northstar 3. Palisades Tahoe (formerly Squaw Valley) 4. Sky Tavern BEST SNOWBOARDING Mt. Rose 2. Heavenly 3. Boreal 4. Alpine Meadows 5. Diamond Peak BEST POOLS

Center

42 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com We would like to thank the Reno community for voting Dr. Tiffany McCormack “Best Plastic Surgeon” in the “Best of Northern Nevada” poll by Reno News & Review! At our practice, Dr. McCormack continues to achieve refined, high-quality plastic surgery results that complement patients’ natural features. She excels in the entire spectrum of cosmetic surgery, including: FACIALSURGERYPLASTICBODYPROCEDURESCONTOURINGSURGERYBREAST MAKEOVERSMOMMY We perform all procedures in our on-site, AAAASF-accredited surgical facility to help you achieve your desired results with the privacy, safety, and one-on-one attention you deserve. As one of few medical spas in Reno and Lake Tahoe led by a board-certified plastic surgeon, M Spa is equipped to help you look and feel your best with convenient, in-office treatments! We offer cutting-edge non-surgical services, such as: NOT SURE WHICH TREATMENTS WILL MAKE YOUR GOALS A REALITY? No problem! Visit our website and simply select on the specific concerns you want to improve. Our team will contact you with treatment suggestions and answer all of your questions. Contact M Spa online at mspareno.com or by calling (775) 284-2020. • CoolSculpting® and KYBELLA® • BOTOX® Cosmetic • Facial fillers including JUVÉDERM®, RHA®, and Sculptra®, among other products • Cellfina™ • Laser Hair Removal • FemTouch • Genius™ Radiofrequency Microneedling • Laser Skin Resurfacing 5530 Kietzke Ln | Reno, NV 89511 | (775) 284-2020 Contact Dr. McCormack online at plasticsurgeryrenotahoe.com or by calling (775) 284-2020.

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Reno historian Alicia Barber didn’t set out to be a journalist—yet she became a watchdog regarding historic preservation and the progress of new development in Reno. While media outlets cut budgets and decrease coverage, Barber digs deep into documents, monitors Planning Commission/City Council agendas, and contextualizes debates and decisions that will chart the area’s growth for generations. Her Barber Brief (aliciambarber.com) and newsletter inform residents about what’s going on behind the scenes. With the thoroughness of a historian and the curiosity of a reporter, she delivers wellresearched and insightful reports about official actions and trends that otherwise would fly beneath the public’s radar. As developers squeeze maximum profits out of their projects, Barber reports without pay, because she cares about the future of the Truckee Meadows and the public’s right to know.She also is co-founder of Reno Historical (renohistorical.org), a smart-phone app and website dedicated to Reno’s history, and she is the author of Reno’s Big Gamble: Image and Reputation in the Biggest Little City. She knows the city—and she gets the scoops. —Frank X. Mullen Alicia Barber.

Alicia Barber

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This enthusiasm led to the inaugural RTIA show, an event Dolan said she hopes will lead to more recognition for Reno’s art scene.

Dolan and O’Keefe began selling some of their art online shortly after moving here, but quickly broadened that idea.

“We turned it into the Reno Fine Arts Collective (www.renofineartscollective.com); that was initially just an online gallery and collective of local artists presenting their work and selling it online,” Dolan said. “We popped up a gallery downtown at the bottom of the Chase building on Virginia for five months last summer, and it was really just to kind of test the market. Two things we were hearing so prominently was that there was really nowhere to hang art for local artists, and people felt that consumers who could buy art of any level of quality would not come to the locals to buy it; they would go to a major city like San Francisco or L.A. with the assumption that the quality is higher in these larger places. We were pleasantly surprised with the reaction to the gallery we had, considering the smoke last summer and lingering COVID issues. We had a lot of art that sold; we had a lot of people come in, and a lot of enthusiasm around the addition to the art scene.”

Dolan pointed out that the show has a tongue-in-cheek slogan: “Reno, NV ... who knew?”“Every piece of the show celebrates this

“The last piece of this creative movement was always going to be a large show, because that’s where my dad’s background comes in,” Dolan said. “… There’s an energy here in Reno; we feel the timing is really great to try something really loud and to make a statement about Reno being an arts and culture destina tion, and a center that could really be recog nized nationally. Maybe someday … people don’t talk about Austin or Miami; they talk about Reno and Tahoe.”

After moving here a few years ago, Kevin O’Keefe and his daughter, Briana Dolan, fell in love with the abundance of art.

“Miami was a very dangerous place, and no one would ever visit there willingly—and it was totally changed with Art Basel, which at first wasn’t a big deal—but within four or five years, they ended up being the art center for both North and South America,” O’Keefe said. “… With all these changes, with COVID— with California and New York changing so much—we really felt that this was a time to take all of these artists, put them all together, and feature them … going out to all of the galleries in the country to say, ‘You need to come here.’

“Duet” by Alexandra Averbach, courtesy of the George Billis Gallery.

46 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com ARTS & CULTURE | BY MATT KING

The organizers of the Reno Tahoe International Art Show want to make Northern Nevada into a national art center

Reno ... who knew?

The two of them decided to sell some of their art—and that effort quickly morphed into a citywide collective. Now they’re prepar ing for their biggest project, the Reno Tahoe International Art Show (RTIA), taking place Thursday, Sept. 8, and through Sunday, Sept. 11, at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center. From visual art in numerous mediums to live music, screenings, Q&As and more, the RTIA is truly celebrating everything that is art. “I was working for a hospitality designer in New York City, and my dad had previous ly been in the trade-show world, and he was running a big exhibition in New York City called ICFF (the International Contemporary Furniture Fair),” Dolan said. “Our two careers were sort of intertwined that way, but both came crashing to a halt because of everything happening with the pandemic. Ever since we’ve arrived here … this whole city and region continue to surprise us in so many ways, all positive, and we’re very happy to be forwarding this mission that we’re calling the Reno Creative Movement.”

O’Keefe focused in on Miami as an example of what he and Dolan want to accomplish.

“We have 100,000 people who have moved here from someplace else who are wealthy and affluent art buyers, and we have a lot of people here who are art enthusiasts.”

“We were totally shocked to find that there are so many artists, makers, designers and builders of all kinds here in Reno alone, and then, of course, in Tahoe and the expanded region,” Dolan said during a recent phone interview with her and O’Keefe.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 47 best of Native American artists in the West,” O’Keefe said. “It’s 3,000 feet, and over 300 pieces of art, ranging from sculptures that are $100,000 all the way down to beautiful pottery.

It’s something we’d like to anchor here in Reno and turn into a major place where every one in the whole country and Europe can come and look at what’s best in Native American art in IfReno.”youlike art mysteries … how about some paintings that may or may not have been paint ed by Jackson Pollock?

Added O’Keefe: “Pollock was very wealthy, and with that, he was kind of a wild man, so he wasn’t happy with just the wife; he had other girlfriends, and he gave them some things. When Jackson Pollock died in a car crash, his wife said, ‘OK, this is all of the inventory that my husband ever did; there is no more,’ and there were several girlfriends who said, ‘Yes, there is.’ The Wyoming Working Group has been saving these pieces, and now they have the DNA science behind it. Pollock-Krasner never says that they’re not Pollocks; they just don’t say they are.”

The Reno Tahoe International Art Show will take place from Thursday, Sept. 8, through Sunday, Sept. 11, at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center, 4590 S. Virginia St., in Reno. Tickets are $25 to $100 in advance. For more information, visit rtiashow.com. sort of discovery of how cool this region is. ... We’re very happy to be able to incorporate the film aspect and celebrate some local filmmak ers,” Dolan said. “For the talks, we’re putting together a schedule that’s exciting and interest ing, and really highlights a lot of pieces of the show. We also have musicians throughout the weekend. Many of the performances will be taking place at the Convention Center, but we do have an opening-night concert taking place at Cargo Concert Hall at the Whitney Peak … highlighting an all-star group of selected musi cians who will be performing together for one time only. We also have a (Reno Tahoe Artist Award) program that is going to culminate with a gala event at the Nevada Museum of Art on Saturday over the show weekend; that’s a separate 501(c)(3) program. We’re giving out eight awards in various categories, plus a grand prize we are calling the Reno Creative Movement award. Some of the art from Burning Man will also be making an appearance in the RTIA show’s sculpture garden. “We’ve also got the sculpture walk, which is actually a huge piece of the puzzle that we did not anticipate,” Dolan said. “We wanted to have some sculptures coming from Burning Man because of the timing (just before the RTIA show), so we’ll have almost 20 largescale sculptures coming directly from the desert to the show. Those will be paired with almost 40 other sculptures throughout the entire show, and those are coming from artists from all over the world, many of which are associated with the Buffalo Creek Art Center in Gardnerville.”Aspecialexhibit will be dedicated to Native American art, called First Nations, Indigenous Peoples “It’s probably the biggest collection of the ONLINE kgaypalmsprings.com A work by Russ Connell.

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“We had a call from someone who said, ‘We have about 25 original Jackson Pollocks here,’” Dolan said. “They’re very contentious with the Pollock-Krasner Foundation (which was established by Pollock’s widow), but they have the science behind them to spend $20 million vetting these pieces; there’ll be a lot of controversy associated with it.”

The world-renowned Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis makes its Northern Nevada debut on Monday, Sept. 12.

Gogh

History is in the air

September brings arts, history and book events to Northern Nevada Fall is in the air—and arts and culture events are dropping like autumn leaves this month.TheNevada Humanities Literary Crawl returns to Reno on Saturday, Sept. 10. Participants are invited to join in an explor atory day of fiction, nonfiction and poetry readings, as well as panel discussions, family activities and workshops, all taking place at venues around California Avenue, including the Downtown Reno Library. Access to all events is free and open to the public. The crawl will kick off with keynote speaker Aimee Nezhukumatathil at the Ne vada Museum of Art at 11 a.m. Nezhuku matathil is the author of World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments, named Barnes and Noble’s Book of the Year in 2020.

BY FRANK X. MULLEN

From TheaterVictoriantoVan

The Nevada Historical Society, 1650 N. Virginia St., presents Writers’ Wednesday on Sept. 7 with a book signing, recep tion and lecture from 5 to 6:30 p.m. with Carolyn Grattan Eichin, author of From San Francisco Eastward: Victorian Theater in the American West. The Historical Society on Sept. 9 is offering a new docent orientation session from 10 a.m. to noon. The society is looking for volunteers to help lead gallery tours for fourth-graders, organizations and adults. Volunteers also are invited to learn how to scan images and create records for the society’s database. Those interested may fill out the volunteer application form at www.nvhistoricalsociety.org or email society director Catherine Magee at cmagee@ nevadaculture.org.OnThursday,Sept. 15, the society’s monthly “High Noon: Shootout With Neal Cobb” lecture will feature Guy Clifton, author of Dempsey in Nevada. Clifton, an award-winning Reno journalist, will talk about Dempsey’s life story from hobo kid to heavy weight boxing champion to beloved American icon. Dempsey, Clifton says, left his footprints across the Silver State. At noon, Sunday, Sept. 11, Historic Reno Preservation Society will host a program by Debbie Hinman entitled “Exploring the El Beyond Van Gogh continues at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center’s Exhibit Hall 3 through Monday, Oct. 3

Artown, art shows and Van Gogh Artown’s September to December Encore Series kicks off at 7:30 p.m., Monday, Sept. 12, at the Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts when the world-renowned Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis makes its Northern Nevada debut. Composed of 15 of the finest jazz soloists and ensemble players today, Jazz at Lincoln Center Orches tra produces thousands of performances and educational/broadcast events each season, both in New York City and around the world.

Reno Apartment Homes” at the Downtown Reno Library, 301 S. Center St. The El Reno Apartment Homes are examples of the work of architect Paul Revere Williams. In 1936, Williams built a demonstration house made of steel for the Architects Building Materials exhibition in Los Angeles. A year later, builder Roland Giroux had 15 of the homes shipped to Reno and assembled at 1307 S. Virginia St. Ten years later, the units were sold off indi vidually and moved to other spaces; 12 of the units still exist. Hinman, a HRPS tour guide and a researcher and writer for society’s publi cation, FootPrints, will present an overview of the homes and their occupants. Details at www. historicreno.org.

Beyond Van Gogh continues at the Re no-Sparks Convention Center’s Exhibit Hall 3 through Monday, Oct. 3, with continuous performances Sunday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m., and Friday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. The show boasts more than 300 of the greatest works of post-Impres sionist artist Vincent Van Gogh projected as a three-dimensional immersive experience. Tick ets start at $39.99, and details can be found at vangoghreno.com.

48 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com |

On Sunday, Oct. 30, the Dance Theatre of Harlem will perform at the Pioneer Center at 7:30 p.m. Dance Theatre of Harlem is a leading dance institution of global acclaim, encompassing a professional touring company, a leading studio school, and a national and international education/community outreach program. Then on Sunday, Nov. 6, the Soweto Gospel Choir is scheduled to perform at the Pioneer. The choir is a three-time Grammy Award-winning group which commemorates South Africa’s Freedom Movement and the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. The evening will include a program of South African freedom songs and works by Billie Holiday, James Brown, Otis Redding, Curtis Mayfield and Aretha Franklin. Details: artown. org/encore.

Capital City Arts Initiative’s Contrasts exhibition, by Mariah Vargas and Sogand Ta batabaei, is open at Western Nevada College’s Bristlecone Gallery, 2201 W. College Park way in Carson City, through Thursday, Sept. 15. Other Carson City Arts Initiative events include James McCarthy’s Alignment pho tography exhibit at the Community Center’s Crowell Board Room, through Thursday, Oct. 20. Moiré, by Claire Pasquier, continues in the Courthouse Gallery through Thursday, Sept. 29. Details at www.ccainv.org.

ARTS & CULTURE

Free!Think

BY JESSICA SANTINA

TankQuotesFREEOptions&Tankless

SSPA’s production is a charming rendition, with a few standout performances. Beckwith’s Cinderella is a standout, as are real-life couple Sweet and Taylor as the baker and his wife. Their acting chops and excellent vocal talents get a full workout here. Also noteworthy is Powers as Jack, whose recent return from weeks of military service makes his performance even more impressive. But that second act, though … it just feels long and slow. Also frustrating were some gratingly high-pitched voices and technical glitches. But in fairness, what I caught was essentially a dress rehearsal; I expect those will smooth out as the show proceeds with its run. It would have been impossible for me not to enjoy myself, as I enjoyed a night of great laughs, stunning costumes and beautiful songs.

The first act’s brisk pace, clever comedy and happily-ever-after finish make the time fly, and I love every minute of it. However, I’ve never been a fan of the show’s second act. It’s a huge bummer—the hangover the morning after. Sure, it’s the whole point—the moral of Sondheim’s story—when these characters’ dreams come crashing down around them, but it’s also a giant speed bump slowing the action to a crawl.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 49 |

The last one showering shouldn’t be left in the cold! GO TANKLESS.

The Sierra School of Performing Arts’ production of Into the Woods will be performed at 7:30 p.m., Thursday through Saturday, Sept. 8-10; and at 2 p.m., Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 10 and 11, at Reno Little Theater, 147 E. Pueblo St., in Reno. It will take place at 7 p.m., Friday and Saturday, Sept. 16 and 17; and 2 p.m., Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 17 and 18, at Brewery Arts Center, 449 W. King St., in Carson City. Ticket prices vary. For tickets or more information, visit www. sierraschoolofperformingarts.org.

Be whatcarefulyouwish

corn; and a slipper as pure as gold. Off they go into the woods—but as they and all the others soon discover, they should be careful what they wish for. Little Red’s journey into the woods puts her squarely in the path of a big, bad wolf (Scott Hernandez). Jack’s decision to trade his cow for the baker’s magic beans leads him to a deadly encounter with a giant (Marti Creveling). And even Cinderella’s Prince Charming (also played by Hernandez) isn’t all he’s cracked up to be.

ARTS & CULTURE

The Sierra School of Performing Arts’ production of ‘Into the Woods’ is quite charming, despite a long, slow second act When I was in graduate school, I took a class in children’s literature. I expected the class to be a lovely balm for my soul, but when we read the Grimm Brothers’ fairy tales, I realized how very dark and miserable those stories are. Gone were the Disney-fied happy endings. This was torturous stuff—parents abandoning their children, witches kidnapping people, mermaids wishing for legs as they suffer the pain of knives with every step. The Sierra School of Performing Arts’ latest production, Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods, masterfully illustrates—with a few laughs along the way—just how rough these cautionary tales are, and how fairy tales really do showcase the worst, mostselfish instincts in all of us. As the show opens, we meet a host of characters, many familiar, who all wish for something. As our narrator (Kirk Gardner) explains, the baker (Chad Sweet) and his wife (Melissa Taylor) wish for a baby, but they can’t have one, because a witch (played by two actresses, Cindy Sabatini and Hanna Blayney) has cursed the baker’s family. Then there’s Cinderella (another shared role, played by Darby Beckwith and Elise Van Dyne), whose wicked stepmother (Barbara Brand) forbids her from going to the king’s ball. Little Red Riding Hood (Tara Rispin) wishes to visit her granny’s house deep in the woods. And little Jack (played by Quentin Powers and Sam Crabtree) loves his cow, Milky White (Reno Biondi), like a pet, but his mother (Lynette Gardner) insists he sell it. To have the child they wish for, the baker and his wife must go into the woods to seek out four items for the witch: a cow as white as milk; a cape as red as blood; hair as yellow as Chad Sweet and Melissa Taylor in the Sierra School of Performing Arts production of Into the Woods.

for

Janna Ireland, “El Reno Apartments,” Reno, Nevada, 1937, 2021 (cropped), chromogenic print. Photograph courtesy of the artist.

I thought that came out really loud and clear in the exhibition. In photography, there’s often this mystique of old, falling apart, abandoned buildings. And that’s not what you were doing. You were addressing the building itself, not its state dilapidation. Thank you. How did the commission with the Nevada Museum of Art come about? A few years ago, I heard from Carmen Beals (the museum’s Las Vegas-based associate curator and outreach director), whom I didn’t know at the time, but she was interning for the Nevada State Museum. … And she had an idea to do a project for the Clark County School District about Williams. She wanted some photographs for this project, and the project ended up falling through. But later on, she brought me to the attention of the Nevada Museum of Art, which led to the fellowship. What does the fellowship consist of? It’s this project, and it’s over the course of two years. So there was a long period of research and actually photographing, and now we’re … reaching the end of the fellowship. As you were looking at Williams’ Nevada buildings, what kind of decisions were you making? The process … was actually very different from working on this project in Southern California. I visited Las Vegas for the first time in 2018 and made some photographs for the magazine Art Papers of Williams’ buildings. And that’s actually how Carmen ended up finding me, because she was looking into Williams’ connection to Nevada. … But then when I began to work with the museum, I had Carmen doing research. (Historians) Claytee White and Alicia Barber and Brooke Hodge were all doing research support, and that meant that it wasn’t me by myself sending emails and trying to figure out (if I could get into the buildings). There were people to do that legwork for me, which was amazing. There is a microsite, alegacyrevered.org. It has all of the photographs on it, as well as the essays and information about Williams. In Reno, we largely know Paul Revere Williams in connection with the Lear Theater. There are probably so many stories about him that we haven’t heard, so I’m glad to hear that a lot of this is becoming available. Yes. And I’m hoping that it means that we get answers to more questions and hear more stories. Like, where did he stay when he came to Reno, for example? Did he have friends here? Have there been any surprises for you as you’ve been traveling in Nevada? Something that I really loved learning about was the El Reno Apartments. … One thing about Paul Revere Williams that I find fascinating is that he was interested in innovative materials, and the El Reno Apartments were constructed out of steel, which meant that when the land underneath them was sold to be repurposed, the buildings themselves could just be picked up and moved because of the way they were constructed. … It meant that so many of them have survived, and are now dotting the city. What are you working on now? I was just hired in a tenure-track teaching position at Occidental. … I’m also doing some work about my family here in Los Angeles, and in the beginning stages of planning some work about my family back East, where I grew up. Is this a similar project, where there will be historical research involved, and you’ll be traveling and looking at places? I’m more interested in looking at people for this project.

A legacy revered

Janna Ireland is a Los Angeles photographer who has spent the last few years researching and photographing buildings designed by Paul Revere Williams. Her exhibition, Janna Ireland on the Architectural Legacy of Paul Revere Williams in Nevada, is this summer’s featured show at the Nevada Museum of Art, on display through Oct. 2 Renoites might recognize Williams’ name from his iconic Lear Theater on Riverside Drive. He worked from the 1920s through the 1970s and was the first well-known Black architect in the Western U.S.—a fact that the exhibition explores with quotations on the walls. (One example: In 1937, the so-called “architect to the stars” talked about designing “roomy estates, entrancing vistas, and stately mansions,” yet being excluded from the neighborhoods in which they were built.) Williams’ left a long list of notable buildings in the Silver State, including the El Reno Apartments on Mt. Rose Street and La Concha Motel in Las Vegas (now part of The Neon Museum). Janna (rhymes with “Donna,” not “Hannah,” says her website) Ireland talked by phone from Los Angeles about the book and the exhibition. Before this exhibition got under way, you were working on a book, Regarding Paul R. Williams—A Photographer’s View. How did that project come about? In the summer of 2016, an architect based here in L.A. named Barbara Bestor—who is also the executive director of the Julius Shulman Institute at Woodbury University—approached me and asked if I would be interested in doing a new body of work about the architect Paul Revere Williams, and then having a show at Woodbury’s gallery. In the summer of 2019, I met the publishers of Angel City Press, and they invited me to meet with them and pitch a book to them. So I did. And that ended up becoming Regarding Paul R. Williams—A Photographer’s View. It was important to come up with a title that would let people know what kind of book it was. That’s where the “photographer’s view” part comes in—so that it’s clear that it’s not a biography of Paul Williams or a collection of historic photographs of his work, that it’s new

work by a photographer who’s interpreting the work as an artist. When you are doing architectural photography, do you think a lot about what we can learn from people and communities by photographing structures? I do. But in the Paul Williams’ work, what I wanted to do was really center him and make sure that I was looking at him as a person, which meant a lot of times kind of putting the people who were actually living there in the background and trying to avoid showing too much of the life going on in this space— alluding to it, but not focusing on it, so I could be focusing on the architecture. … if I’m approaching a building that’s abandoned, for example, trying to photograph it with the same respect I would a structure that’s been really well taken care of.

A photographer’s tribute to Paul Revere Williams’ 20th-century Nevada buildings is on display at the Nevada Museum of Art

50 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com | BY KRIS VAGNER

ART OF THE STATE

Janna Ireland on the Architectural Legacy of Paul Revere Williams in Nevada is on view at the Nevada Museum of Art through Oct. 2 and will be on view at the Nevada State Museum in Las Vegas starting Dec. 3. Learn more about Ireland, Williams, and related research by Alicia Barber, Brooke Hodge and Claytee White at alegacyrevered.org.

Brawny barrister

‘She-Hulk: Attorney at Law’ is hindered by bad CGI; ‘Bodies Bodies Bodies’ Is horror that tries—unsuccessfully—to be satire

Murphy is a regular riot! As for the show’s grabs at humor, it’s hit and miss. As Marvel shows go, Loki was funnier. So, I am not enthralled after four episodes. I’ve gotten messages from friends saying quite the contrary after watching the first episode, so maybe I’m a pill, and my Shrek-phobia is stupid. There are five episodes left for me (the first season is nine episodes), so we shall see. For now, I’m not impressed. She-Hulk: Attorney at Law is now streaming on Disney+, with new episodes being released every Thursday through Oct. 13.

I’ve watched the first four episodes of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law—the latest from the Disney/Marvel streaming juggernaut—as of this writing, and I have mixed feelings. Better Call Saul’s ending certainly leaves a void for attorney shows, but this hardly fills it. The show is episodic—sort of a spoof of comic books, lawyer shows and Marvel in general. The story doesn’t really follow through from one episode to the next, and this takes away some of the urgency of watching, because the episodes are relatively self-contained.

Tatiana Maslany stars as Jennifer Walters, lawyer and cousin of Bruce Banner (a game Mark Ruffalo making guest appearances). After a bloody car accident, she gets infected with Bruce’s Hulk mojo and becomes the title character.Icouldn’t really get past how bad the SheHulk CGI is. When Jennifer Walters is in Hulk mode, it looks like they put Maslany in some prosthetics, increased the scale of her image in the frame, and gave her skin a strange, glowing green hue. It’s distracting, especially when Ruffalo’s “Smart Hulk” is standing next to her—and looks 100 times better. She-Hulk looks like she belongs in a Shrek sequel. The show does have some virtues. Maslany is fun in the role, and I suppose there is room in this world for lawyer-show satire … but I just couldn’t get past the she-totally-lookslike-Shrek thing. If Donkey had ran into the frame, it would not have discombobulated me. Actually, I kind of miss Donkey; that Eddie Tatiana Maslany in She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. Amandla Stenberg and Maria Bakalova in Bodies Bodies Bodies

12345 2 1

FILM

The normally reliable A24 film studio delivers a useless horror film with Bodies Bodies Bodies, a run-of-the-mill slasher comedy that tries to masquerade as a satirical statement on today’s rich kids. First off: We don’t really need a horror movie that points out the shallowness and narcissistic leanings of today’s social-mediadependent, rich 20-sometings. It’s just not relatable humor. OK, if you are a narcissistic, rich 20-something, it’s relatable, but all of us other philistines don’t give two shits.

The one redeeming quality is Bakalova, who shows range beyond being Borat’s stooge. Otherwise … Bodies Bodies Bodies is boring boring boring.

The cast includes Pete Davidson as Pete Davidson, or some douche who is just like Pete Davidson, which is the role Pete Davidson always plays. There’s also Amandla Stenberg, Rachel Sennott, Chase Sui Wonders and Maria Bakalova (from the Borat sequel) rounding out the cast, all of whom are required to yell and scream a lot. The film offers nothing original regarding how the young adults are being dispatched. They get shot; they get stabbed; they fall down; they fall down again. The body count stacks up, and the paranoia builds, but the film lacks any structure or true sense of mystery that would make us care. When the big reveal comes near the end, it falls flat.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 51 | BY BOB GRIMM

Second: The premise of the film involves these rich 20-somethings experiencing real murders while playing a game called Bodies Bodies Bodies? There’s no such game (at least that I know of), so when they blurt out the rules early in the film, it just sounds like a bunch of nonsense—a third-rate Clue rip-off. Also, rich 20-somethings generally don’t play games like Bodies Bodies Bodies at sleepovers. That’s the stuff of 12-year-olds’ sleepovers … maybe.

Speaking of golf, Golf NV is the golf shop at South 40. The shop by itself is 9,000 square feet, and plans for the space include practice simulator bays, private-\ lesson rooms and a putting green, along with all the latest golf equipment, name-brand clothing and merchandise.

Casino’s Cactus Creek Prime Steakhouse. This fantastic lineup of pros was put to the test during South 40’s recent soft opening, as they debuted an abbreviated menu—a delicious teaser of what’s to come when the full menu launches in early September. Guests should come prepared to enjoy an array of dishes ranging from sesame-crusted ahi, to lobster mac and cheese, to varied pizzas. On the beverage side, the menu includes custom cocktails and an array of wine and whiskey. South 40 opened serving lunch and dinner, while management plans to soon phase in Saturday/Sunday breakfast and brunch. Gaming is slated to be added to the restaurant’s bar in the new year. To get started on the South 40 journey, guests enter through the “entertainment” area’s bulk candy store and retail center. Get nostalgic and grab some jelly beans from the 25-flavor Jelly Belly bulk dispenser, or go with treats from local candy-maker Kimmie Candy. Dots Ice Cream, Napa Sonoma gift baskets and a wide selection of greeting cards round out the offerings. The arcade includes games for players young and old; the vast space features games such as Halo Fireteam Bravo, Guitar Hero, Big Bucks, Mario Cart, Lane Master, Down the Clown, Willy Wonka Coin Pusher, Connect 4 Hoops, and even a ring toss; people can also enjoy virtual reality rides such as Kong: Skull Island and Virtual Rabbids. “So many families living in south Reno don’t want to drive all the way to downtown, midtown or Sparks to do fun activities,” Jepsen said. “We want this to be the place for everybody— adults, kids, families—so that’s just what we’ve created.”TheBackyard at South 40 is a fully customizable space. Patrons are invited to “create their own living room” with modular, moveable couches and food service from either South 40’s Backyard Snack Bar or the restaurant. Activities abound, including cornhole, six miniature bowling lanes, darts, axe-throwing and ping-pong tables. The athletic set can enjoy challenges thrown by the hyper pitch machine, Super Kixx Pro soccer kicker and Golden Tee golf. DJs and bands will perform outdoor concerts on the weekends. For those more concerned with food and drink, the aforementioned Backyard Snack Bar offers a specialty beer wall flanked by TVs galore and a 20-foot projector screen, offering all the sports viewing fans can handle.

FOOD

“Our hope is to become the go-to location for a good time.”

South 40 co-owner Dennis Banks:

South 40 brings food, drink, games, live music and a whole lot of space to South Meadows Parkway South Reno is one of the more familyfriendly areas of Northern Nevada—and that makes South 40 a perfect fit. South 40—its name is a reference to what was once one of the largest ranches in the region—spans one full acre, the perfect size to allow kids and adults to enjoy a variety of activities, dining experiences, music, gaming (the adult kind and the kid kind) and more. Formerly known as The Zeppelin—also a nod to the immense size of the space at 1445 South Meadows Parkway—the property was purchased about eight months ago by local dining dream team Dennis Banks, Art Hinckley, Chuck Jeaness and Kevin Jepsen. Known for hotspots like Norte Cantina, Napa Sonoma South and Mexcal, the group tapped its collective expertise to create the South 40 concept and quickly recruited Al Karsok to oversee the project. Karsok brings decades of experience to the table, having managed the parent company that owns the aforementioned restaurants. The restaurateurs also brought on Blaire Smulyan as the restaurant general manager, and Russell Upton as director of catering. With plans to make South 40 a premier events venue—there are two banquet spaces that fit 70-150 guests each, both with private entrances—catering is a top priority. Bringing the food to life is executive chef Alfred Johnson, well-known as the multi-awardwinning former executive chef at the Bonanza

An acre of fun

Photo/ David Robert For more information, visit south-40-reno.com.

52 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com | BY CHEREE BOTELER

“We hope community members will choose us when they’re in need of a venue for any type of celebration,” Banks said. “Our hope is to become the go-to location for a good time.”

Owners Mike and Wendi Rawson started the winery in 2018; leveraging Mike’s foodservice experience, they have created a unique place for people to eat, drink and gather. Engine 8 has an extensive food menu as well as regular live music, creating a unique winery experience that might seem more like a wine bar—even though you’re actually in a tasting room. So welcome to Reno … the biggest little wine region in the world!

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 53 | BY STEVE NOEL are available for purchase by the glass or bottle in the tasting room; bottle prices range from $20 to $35. Both red and white wine flights are available—three wines for $8. You can also sign up for the wine club, which brings along discounts and special events. You don’t even have to leave your seat to visit another winery. Great Basin Winery (greatbasinwinery.com), owned by Wendy and Adam Hand, opened in 2018. Adam is the winemaker and has been making wine for many years. He began as a home winemaker, but his skills and determination drove him to open a commercial winery. Adam has longterm relationships with vineyard owners in Amador, Sonoma and Mendocino counties in Northern California, allowing him to source high-quality fruit and make high-quality wines right here in Reno. Adam has used natural fermentation since 2017. “I really like to let the fruit make the best wine it can,” he said. “I do nothing to adjust the PH or the sugar content and really try to take a minimalist approach to winemaking.” That hands-off approach really shows in the quality of his wines. Great Basin offers a tasting of five wines for $8, as well as wines by the glass or bottle; prices range from $18 to $25 per bottle. Great WINE

Biggest little wine region

“I love Rombauer chardonnay, and this Great Basin 2021 Chardonnay is every bit as enjoyable,” he said. If you are looking for a different type of urban winery experience, you may want to head to Engine 8 Urban Winery (www. engine8urbanwinery.com), located at 1260 Avenue of the Oaks, Suite 150, in Sparks.

“It is fun and casual, not packed like Midtown,” Jeff said. “Non-wine drinkers can get a beer at Lucky Dog and sit with their friends.”Haden, a UNR grad student, decided to take Joel, his wine-loving college friend who was visiting Reno for a few days, to the Fourth Street wineries. Joel said he was to surprised to find the wines on par with—or even better than—the wines from Northern California wineries.

Welcome to the crush! September is harvest time in the vineyard—and if you are a wine lover as I am, you probably wish you were in wine country right now. Well, what if I told you that you are in wine country right now, and you can visit wineries right here in Reno? In 2015, Nevada passed a law allowing commercial wineries in counties with a population of more than 100,000. Previously, wineries could only exist in the smaller counties, but that law paved the way for the creation of several wineries here in urban Washoe County—some even producing wine from vineyards located here in Nevada. To clarify: Wineries are different from vineyards. Wineries produce wine from grapes that grow in vineyards, just as breweries produce beer from grains grown on farms. Wineries are production facilities, and vineyards are farms. While many of us picture wineries nestled in amongst the vines, that’s not the only place they can be. In 2016, three wineries decided to work together in a shared location to keep costs lower: Basin and Range Cellars, Nevada Sunset Winery, and Great Basin Winery. They were able to secure a lease of half of Lead Dog Brewing’s building at 415 E. Fourth St. Sadly, one of the three, Basin and Range, has suspended operations; calls to learn the status and future plans of the winery have gone unanswered. We hope they reopen soon. Nevada Sunset Winery (nevadasunsetwinery. com), owned by Mike Steedman and Alynn Delisle, opened in the summer of 2017, and is credited with being the first urban winery in Nevada. When you visit Nevada Sunset Winery, you will be hosted by one of the owners, who will not only pour your wines, but also take you back into the production area to show you how they make the wines. Where else will a winemaker host you in the tasting room, and then give you a tour? Take that, Napa!Nevada Sunset Winery offers a wide selection of red, white and rosé wines, made with grapes from both California and Nevada vineyards. The current tasting menu offers 19 different wines with something for everyone, including favorites like chardonnay and cabernet sauvignon, as well as some lesserknown grapes like Frontenac. All of the wines Engine 8 Urban Winery opened in 2018. Photo/David Robert Basin also has a wine club providing discounts and member benefits. I asked Jeff and Katherine, two Great Basin Winery regulars and wine-club members (and childhood friends of Adam’s), why they enjoyed visiting the Fourth Street wineries.

Alynn Delisle and Mike Steedman opened Nevada Sunset Winery—credited with being the first urban winery in Nevada— in 2017. Photo/David Robert

A trip to three local wineries—two in the same Fourth Street building, and one in downtown Sparks

54 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com SARAH SHOOK & THE DISARMERS OCTOBER 8 CHURCHILL ARTS COUN CIL Members $17 • Non-Members $20 • Youth & Students $10 Box O ce, Art Bar & Galleries Open at 6 PM  • Performances at 7 PM Oats Park Art Center • 151 East Park Street, Fallon, Nev. For tickets & info call 775-423-1440 or visit churchillarts.org FANTASMAGRUPO SEPTEMBER 3 BATALLAPERLA NOVEMBER 5 MAHANTHAPPARUDRESH FEBRUARY 11 (775) 885-7000 • casinofandango.com Live GermanCraftLiveGuestEntertainmentVendorsOompahBandFairFood–Brats, Spaetzle & More Bavarian Beer Garden* Located Out Front in the 395 Parking Lot. PARTY AT OUR HAUS!SATURDAY & SUNDAY,OCTOBER 1ST & 2ND11AM – 7PM BE BAVARIAN FOR THE WEEKEND! *Ages 21+ OKTOBERFEST IS BACK! Enjoy the best brats, brews, and all things Bavarian at our 7TH Oktoberfest, with: ADMISSIONFREE

“I know Vern said that the goal is not to specifically foster professional musicians here, but that is a part of it,” Bennum said. “Continuing to foster those opportunities without changing what is already great about their organization would be my specific goal, and I think the goal of our board of directors. We just want to pool our resources to make sure that this is something that can continue to grow forever.”

The RYJO started out of necessity, Vernon Scarbrough said. “In 2006, Karen and I recognized that there were quite a few youth groups in the community already, but none of them were focused on jazz,” Vernon said. “Consequently, as a band director, we decided we’d start a nonprofit, and tried to create an organization that would give kids an opportunity to play jazz outside of the school district, and supplement and complement what they were learning in the school district. We started a big band in 2006, and we had I think 23 students start with us. We approached the Reno Jazz Orchestra at the time and made our pitch to them, hoping to merge or become a part of the RJO, but they were not ready for that, and we were not ready for that. …

Smiles among members of the Reno Youth Jazz Orchestra.

The RJO is for the professional big-band players in town, and the RYJO is for the developing ensemble. We just have been running in parallel for years to the point where the RJO matured into an organization that would be capable, and have the resources available, to continue the RYJO.”

“One way that John was personally affected by RYJO is through (who is now) his fiancée,” she said. “She’s a trombone player and was a great kid. She didn’t have the transportation, so we were able to help her with that; she would come to rehearsal on the bus with her big trombone, and then we were able to get her home. Then we were able to procure a trombone donation for her—and she went on to be a spectacular player.”

For more information, renojazzorchestra.com.visit

“As this was their baby, Karen and Vern will be continuing to oversee our operations and the music direction of that youth program for at least the first year, and then probably in a supervisory role or some kind of consulting role, because it really was their vision that we want to continue,” Bennum said. “After that, of course, we want to continue that legacy and just grow it by hopefully serving more youth musicians … and giving them more opportunities to perform alongside their mentors, and become peers with their mentors as professional musicians.”

However, the founders will remain involved.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 55 | BY MATT KING Orchestra organization represents a huge milestone for us in terms of developing and growing our education programs. I’ll let Vern and Karen speak more to this directly, but they grew RYJO from a tiny seed on their own back in 2006 into what it is today, and their students have gone on to do incredible things. … I’m just really thrilled to be affiliated with them and to be a part of continuing their mission and ours as we go forward.”

“So many of those kids (have been part of the RYJO),” he said. “Some of them have been my own students, and many of them have become my colleagues, so it’s really special to me. … It’s really special to me to see that my students get those opportunities.”

Karen talked about how the RYJO helped out someone close to Bennum.

“I’m new to my position with the Reno Jazz Orchestra, but Vern and I have a long history; he was my first music teacher in the sixthgrade. He was my band director, and he has recently become our (board) vice president of the Reno Jazz Orchestra,” Bennum said. “He has been a great mentor to me, then and now. The inclusion of RYJO in the Reno Jazz

“For the RYJO, our purpose is not to create professional musicians,” Vernon said. “We’re trying to teach jazz education by giving our students performance opportunities that they would not get in their school. Unlike the school district that rehearses every day, our program only meets one day a week, and we only practice for two hours. Creating that opportunity for students to play is really what it’s all about. … I’m a firm believer that the younger kids need to have the chance to see what right sounds like, and what right looks like, for these really high-caliber musicians. They can sit next to a player who’s much better than them, and it raises up their own level of playing.”Bennum pledged that the merger will benefit both orchestras.

MUSICBEAT

After 16 years, both Karen and Vernon said they are ready for the transition. “We’ve been doing it for such a long time, and we grew it into two big bands and a combo,” Karen said. “Over the years, we’ve had hundreds of kids graduate; we have a 100% graduation rate from high school; we have many kids who went on full scholarships for music. We have kids who’ve turned pro; we have one who’s touring with a band. We were ready to hand over all the administrative duties—like the fundraising and setting up the gigs and that kind of stuff—to the RJO. They’ve been wanting to merge with us for a long time, so it just is a natural transition, really.”

The Scarbroughs said they firmly believe that the best form of education for musicians comes through playing with other musicians, and they’re excited that the merger will provide more opportunities for the orchestras to commingle.

Bennum didn’t get the chance to play in the RYJO, because it started two years after he graduated from high school.

United by jazz

The Reno Jazz Orchestra merges with Reno Youth Jazz Orchestra in an effort to enrich music education for all The Reno Jazz Orchestra (RJO) and Reno Youth Jazz Orchestra (RYJO) separately catered to different age groups for many years, only occasionally sharing a stage. At long last, that’s changing: The groups announced a merger in July, and the nonprofit orchestras are now working together to enrich music education across the area. During a recent phone interview, Reno Jazz Orchestra executive director John Bennum joined Reno Youth Jazz Orchestra founders Vernon and Karen Scarbrough to discuss the merger.

What artist, genre or musical trend does every one love, but you don’t get? There are so many. I won’t call anything out, because everybody should enjoy what they like. What musical act, current or defunct, would you most like to see perform live? I never got to see the Ramones, The Clash or the Shangri-Las. I’d love to see The Cramps just one more time. What’s your favorite musical guilty pleasure? You shouldn’t feel guilty about what you dig, but I will say that when “Steal My Sunshine” by Len comes on the radio, the windows go up, and so does the volume! Same goes for “Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl)” by Looking Glass. What’s your favorite music venue? Discoteca Penelope in Benidorm, Spain. Every year over Halloween weekend, they throw a giant rock ’n’ roll party. The place is like an M.C. Escher painting come to life or something. There are multiple levels with multiple rooms and a swimming pool. It’s wild! What’s the one song lyric you can’t get out of your head? “You should be labeled with a skull and crossbones; you’re a jinx to my soul,” “Skull and Crossbones,” Sparkle Moore. What band or artist changed your life? How? The Cramps and Devo. The Cramps opened up my world to all sorts of trash culture and music. Devo showed me that punk was more than abrasive guitars; it could be abrasive synthesizers, too!

Guitarist and vocalist of Thee Saturday Knights here.]

[Your byline

THE LUCKY 13 Noland Magnuson

What was the first concert you attended? Garth Brooks at the Lawlor Events Center in 1992. My mom and some of her friends camped out in front of JJ’s Ear Candy in Carson City for two days to get those tickets. What was the first album you owned? The first album I bought with my own money was No Doubt’s Tragic Kingdom in ’95 or ’96. I bought it on cassette, then on CD a few years later, and just a few years ago, I bought it on vinyl. It’s still worth a listen, even though it doesn’t grab me the way it did when I was 12 or 13. What bands are you listening to right now? Currently, I really like C.O.F.F.I.N., Blood shot Bill, Chubby and the Gang, The Trash Bags, Wyldlife, Jackie Mendez, a lot of the Mango Hill and Penrose Records stuff, Jacques Le Coque, and The Barreracudas.

You have one question to ask one musician. What’s the question, and who are you asking? I’d ask Los Shains, a Peruvian band, how they heard “The Crusher” by The Novas, a regional Minnesota band, in 1964, and how on earth they thought to play it together with “Out of Limits” by the Marketts and create “El Monstruo.” What song would you like played at your funeral? “Caveman Hop” by Jerry Coulston, or “Mah Mah Chicken Pot Pie” by the Leopards. Figurative gun to your head, what is your favorite album of all time? Out of This World by Gino Washington. What song should everyone listen to right now? “It Don’t Move Me” by Danny Dodge.

If you have the knowledge, the desire, and the ability to write and report, email a resume, clips/writing samples and anything else you would like to share to jimmyb@renonr.com!

The Reno News & Review is looking to expand its paid freelance writing team!

56 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com | BY MATT KING

Thee Saturday Knights is, simply put, a badass rock band. The Reno band’s two releases, Life of Crime and Already Dead, sound like ’70s rock with some punk influence thrown in. Any song by the band is perfect for driving really fast, running or headbanging. For more, visit theMagnusonurdayknightsreno.bandcamp.com.theesatNolandistheguitaristandvocalistforband.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 57 | BY MATT JONESJONESIN' CROSSWORD “Trade Offs”—well, it’s close enough. By Matt Jones Across 1. Pack down firmly 5. Garbage bag size 9. ___ above (slightly 13.better)Hammer on the 14.screenHeeda hypnotist 15. Downton Abbey 16.countessScratches left on the chalkboard by a temporary teacher? 19. Director Guillermo ___ Toro 20. ___-Hulk: Attorney at Law Disney+(newseries) 21. Theme 22.attractionsparkRidingtransitwithouthaving to buy a ticket? 27. Yell at 28.sportingsomeeventsAssistancefor a treasure hunter 29. Japanese eel and rice dish 31. Forensic scientist Barry (aka The 34.Flash)Tommy Pickles’ younger brother on Rugrats 35. Quick bite 38. Java that works even better in all 42.caps?Actress Collette of The Staircase 43. South Africaborn Strictly Come Dancing celeb 45.44.Mabuse“Swell!”Spanishnewspaper whose name means “The 47.Country”___Lingus (carrier based in Dublin) 48. Option for a non69.68.67.66.65.64.59.58.57.55.50.gradDifferencebetweenNasdaqandEuronext?“Bluescreenofdeath”causeMerchandisetrackingIDBeobligated“Don’thaggletoomuchatthefleamarket”andothers?D.C.management?Naturalgasadd-in(forsafetyreasons)ReasonablenessLead-into“margarine”Rome’sfifthemperorWindowframe Down 1. “___ words have never been spoken” 2. Easy pace 3. Appropriationstarter 4. Some high-end brain imaging 5. PacificNorthwestern pole 6. ___ Dhabi (capital of the UAE) 7. “___ me tell you ...” 8. Soapmaker’s need 9. Berry that’s some how still trendy 10. Separate with rope 11. Steve of Family Matters 12. Cafe cup 13. ___movie (2008 web keys)theseriesanimationnamedforleft-handhome 17. Denny’s rival 18. ’60s TV equine 23. Chef Lagasse 24. Brackish swimmer also called a grindle or a swamp trout 25. The U of SVU 26. 1 on the Mohs 31.30.scaleBlazingToward the rear of a ship 32. Language spoken in Vientiane 33. Hard-hit baseball 36. Card game with 49.48.47.46.41.40.39.37.squiggles,diamonds,andovals“Holditrightthere!”ScamorshamEndingformeteororphosphorAllowanceofasarcasticquestioner(oragreatWordlescore)FringebenefitCrossingothcultureDayone,informally My LovePsychedelicStorydirector 51.Morris The Jetsons pet 52. Hospital garb 53. Up to one’s neck 54.(in)Prawn of later Muppets features 56. Bi- cubed 60. Prodigal one, so it’s said 61. Lyric poem 62. “What can I do ya 63.___?”Black or Red, for instance © 2022 Matt Jones Find the answers in the “about” section of RenoNR.com! Free!Think

The specs guy Michael Grover

58 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com | BY DAVID ROBERT15 MINUTES

What about environmental sustainability— keeping eyeglasses out of landfills? I could easily fill up this building, if it had three stories, with all the eyeglasses I fixed or made over the last 38 years. One guy can make a dent (in the amount of waste); it only takes a small percentage of people to make a difference. To have a disposable society where everything is just tossed is fucking ludicrous. It’s like that movie WALL-E—it’s happening right now! We’re so goddamn close to Idiocracy, it’s frightening Have the presence of online discount optical companies and the rise in laser surgery affected your business? With all those options out there, it hasn’t made a dent. It’s one-on-one when you walk in my door. I know what I’m doing. I know someone’s prescription by a half a diopter just by looking at them. Sometimes, it’s just dead nuts on—I know what the cylinder axis is. And by just looking at a prescription, I will interpret the face shape and have four or five pairs already picked out and waiting for the customer to choose from. Nowadays, you can’t even get someone to answer a phone call with things like telemedicine. You can actually walk through my door without an appointment, and talk to a guy with four decades of experience.

Michael Grover was fascinated by Latrodectus mactans—black widows—as a kid; not-so-consequently, he wanted to become an entomologist when he grew up. Then he wanted to be a truck driver. And then he wanted to be a rock star. “That certainly didn’t work out,” he says. Instead, he became an optician— specifically, someone who focuses on eyeglass frames and repairs. If you have a pair of spectacles that needs help, or you need a new pair, head to 141 Vassar St.; visit www.eyeglassrepairnv.com to learn more. How did you get into the optical trade? In high school, my brother and I worked sorting mail. He was offered a job in an optical lab; he took one look at that and said, “Hell no, but Mike might like it!” I jumped right in. They had a pile of frames and an acetylene torch, and I asked if I could play around with it. I took to it like a fish to water and never looked back—and pretty soon, I got so busy doing repairs that I couldn’t work for anyone else, and now I’m so damn busy that I can’t even work for myself. … (If only) I could clone myself—but without a mouth. How long have you been at the Vassar Street location? This is my 14th year here as of June 1.This building has morphed. It’s been a recording studio. It’s been a conduit for a lot of cool things. For 14 years, it’s been just me, one guy, autonomy. There’s nobody else here, just me to answer the phones, fix the toilets, pave the parking lot, pull the weeds and fix the roof. I wear a lot of hats. I’m not slinging drinks all day—not that that’s a bad thing; I do love my drink-slingers. But I do make people see. I’m an optician, which is the fun part. I’m a light-bender, and I like doing that. What’s your clientele like? Ages 2 to 102. Everybody has eyes, and a lot of people need glasses, and everyone who has glasses either breaks them or loses them or whatever else. I don’t just fix them; I also make them. I have my own frame line … and have 300 to 500 frames in stock at any one time. Just a quick, friendly warning: You know how they keep the spray paint locked up at Walmart in a glass case? They should keep fucking superglue locked up, too. Don’t try using superglue to fix your glasses; everybody tries it, and it doesn’t work! People don’t realize how viscous that stuff is. It hits the lens, and then it dries and sticks to the fingers. It’s a mess. Superglue is my nemesis.

RenoNR.com | September 2022 | RN&R | 59

Red 88: It’s always the Year of Yum inside this classic 1955 Ford Vanette. From the spicy to the sublime, from miso to shoyu, and plenty of toppings—you’ll get ramen your way. Pair it with poke to amp up the authenticity. At Loco Bueno, we’re making mouth-watering Mexican favorites in an iconic 1969 Chevy P30 Step Van. This truck turns out more than tacos. perfect al pastor or fresh ceviche

60 | RN&R | September 2022 | RenoNR.com LEGENDSBAYCASINO.COM LOCATED IN SPARKS AT THE OUTLETS AT LEGENDS AT LEGENDS BAY CASINO Get your grub on at our unique Food Truck Hall. This 5,000-square-foot culinary and entertainment destination is your new place to gather with friends. WE’RE DRIVING DINING IN A NEW DIRECTION FOODVINTAGETRUCKSMEETVISIONARYCUISINE ANOTHER BONUS? CATCH LIVE ENTERTAINMENT from artists at The Bandwagon on a classic chassis – a 1953 White Motor Company 3000. In Crust We Trust! Pizza Genius makes its home in a 1940s-era farm truck. Our geniuses create your favorite pizzas and subs. Fall in amore with our antipasto and seal the deal with our scrumptious cannolis.

— It’s All Crazy Good! CRAFT 55 CRAFT55 CRAFT55 C R A 5 5 55TFARC 55TFARC55FARC 55TFARC C A 5 5 CRAFT55Craft 55 pours the best local and regional craft brews and cocktail creations. Why the 55? Because we always have 55 rotating beer varieties. VIEW OUR WEEKLY ENTERTAINMENTLIVESCHEDULE!

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