Editor’s note: It’s become our annual custom to spotlight our top stories and photos as the year draws to a close. It’s also time for us to discuss how we feel about these reports. 

In the last days of 2023, we’re spotlighting the top reader opinions, our favorite photos of the year, the communicator of the year, and, lastly, our top 10 stories in 2023. For the first time this year, we have also added what we consider to be the most underreported stories in 2023. These articles are being published daily in the remainder of 2023 as we take some desperately needed time off. 

Lastly, in some of these stories, we note our region’s lack of adequate news coverage. If you can, please consider donating to support our reporting efforts, becoming a paying subscriber or choosing a digital advertising package to promote your brand or event. 

Thank you for reading, and happy new year.

– Bob Conrad & Kristen Hackbarth

Social media is a cesspool of stunted thinking,unneccessarily heightened antagonism and a seeming inability to mull verifiable information. As a community news website, we do, however, appreciate thoughtful commentary, and many of our readers in 2023 gave us just that. 

Our opinion columns have some requirements we strive to stick with: They must be based on factual information, not speculation or dodgy sources, and in general, they should focus on the matter at hand and not devolve into the kind of personal attacks so common on social networks. We find civility is accessible to everyone, and many appreciate commentary not based on jingoistic screeds affirming whatever political talking head believes should be the order of the day. 

With that in mind, we welcome thoughtful, local opinion submissions. Head to the form here to submit one. A handful of reader submissions garnered interest in 2023.

A teacher leaves her chosen profession

In a heart-wrenching column, Tiffany Kress told the community why she was leaving public education and her childhood dream of being a teacher. Unruly students were primarily to blame. 

“The disrespectful behaviors we are seeing in our halls and our classrooms are unfathomable,” she wrote. “Imagine teaching a class, and a student chucks an orange juice into your classroom, hitting a student on the head. “Or asking a high school student to stop screaming in the hallways, jumping on vending machines, and blasting their Bluetooth speaker at 7:15 a.m. just to be called a ‘bitch’ and told to ‘go fuck yourself.’ Or being harassed and stalked online by a student who wants to get revenge from behind a computer screen.”

Yikes.

Cycling still risky in Reno

Bike activist Ky Plaskon penned two columns this year, and both were centered on making public roadways, particularly for cyclists. His point is well taken: Riding a bike in the Biggest Little City is like rolling the dice, but with your life being the gamble. Too many cyclists die on local roadways, some by their negligence and others through no fault of their own. 

“As a community, we should be rewarding healthy and clean biking and walking, and protecting our most vulnerable people. Instead, we are punishing them with deadly conditions,” Plakson wrote. His columns focused on how better, more thoughtful infrastructure improves safety, and some of those fixes could be relatively easy to make.

City responsible for homeless shelter’s neglect

The City of Reno’s track record for responsible property management leaves much to be desired. Consider the ever-vacant Lear Theater. By its own admission, the city does not have enough resources to care for its parks adequately. It was, therefore, not a surprise the swiftly abandoned Record Street homeless shelter, funded by a local foundation, became toxic and uninhabitable. 

Also not surprising is the lack of candor from city officials as to why. There have yet to be any attempts to communicate plans for the property. Public records show it was considered as housing for Tesla employees at one point, after 400 or so moved from the shelter to the Nevada Cares Campus in 2021. Ilya Arbatman took the city to task and speculated the facility could become a “brewery district developer’s vulturous plaything.” 

“It seems clear they have been running these buildings into the ground and shirking obvious maintenance and repairs with one primary, although unstated, intent: to sell the CAC and abandon responsibility for any homeless services permanently,” he wrote. 

Aiazzi sounds the alarm on the city’s new stormwater utility tax/fee

The City of Reno’s long-simmering plan for a new tax—as former City Manager Andrew Clinger called it—finally got a hearing in December. Opposition was expressed because the city’s plans failed to consider myriad factors. The University of Nevada, Reno and Washoe County School District opposed the city’s proposed stormwater utility fee in the form presented to the City Council. 

Former City Council member Dave Aiazzi was early to the party, though. He expressed concerns back in February, particularly over the growing amount residents would be charged. He also noted his queries were ignored by council members.

“I do have some questions about the fee amount that staff is recommending to the Reno City Council. I have sent these same comments to the Council and, as yet, have had no replies,” he said.

Hill criticized for moving public comment time at county meetings

Moving public comment to the end of county meetings, though legal and a practice also enacted by the school board, was done to make the meetings more efficient. Numerous public commenters have actively disrupted local government meetings. That meant others had to wait well after a meeting had started before actual agenda items could be considered, sometimes for hours. Washoe County Commissioner Alexis Hill, who as board chair could set the agenda, was called “undemocratic” by local commenter Thomas Daly when she moved the public comment period.

While we disagree that a board chair taking permissible liberties with agendas is “undemocratic” (it’s actually a feature), he nevertheless raised important points about participatory democracy.

“Citizens attending those meetings are not paid and have limited time to speak, thus their desire to provide public comment, on issues both on and off the agenda, at a time certain at the beginning of such meetings, rather than a time uncertain at the end,” he wrote. “For that reason, historically, the vast majority of public comments occur at the beginning of such meetings.