Not only is Reno the "biggest little city in the world," but it's arguably the most progressive city in Nevada. Pshaw, you say. Blasphemous! Wake and up and smell the newly minted money Wall Street keeps shoveling Stripward. There are casino/casino-condo projects planned from now till the Rapture. Thanks to cable, Vegas has favored-city status on the boob tube. And nary a newspaper across the country hasn't sent a reporter here in last 12 months to rehash the hashed—that Vegas is hotter than a bubbling pot of fish grease.
But hotter doesn't necessarily mean better.
Take Reno, for instance.
Dethroned long ago as Nevada's most important city and increasingly marginalized in the wake of California's burgeoning tribal gaming market, Nevada's fourth-largest locale (behind Henderson and North Las Vegas) has still managed to best its southern sister city in various areas. To wit, Reno has:
• A freestanding art museum; the $16 million Nevada Museum of Art drew 11,000 for its opening night in 2003. Locally, there's a capital campaign underway for a freestanding art museum.
• Nevada's top university. The University of Nevada, Reno, consistently beats University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in academic rankings. Last month's U.S. News and World Report placed UNR in their third tier of American universities; UNLV finished in the fourth tier.
•A functioning, fully-funded mental health court. Operable since 2001, the court has helped hundreds of clients who would've otherwise languished in jails, take up emergency room hospital beds or roamed the streets. Las Vegas' mental health court, opened in 2003, had been consistently underfunded until this year, when lawmakers approved $737,093 in state funds.
Now comes news that Reno is considering a homeless court, a first-of-its-kind state program cribbed from a successful initiative in San Diego. That city's homeless court is run by the San Diego County Public Defender's Office via a grant from the federal Bureau of Justice Assistance. According to SANDAG (San Diego Association of Governments), a quasi-governmental group comprised of 19 municipalities in the San Diego region, the court's goal is to "capitalize on the involvement of homeless clients with shelter programs for the fulfillment of court orders and to try to reduce the incidence of subsequent contacts with the criminal justice system." Thousands of homeless have received legal help since the court started in 1989; in the first four years, 942 homeless veterans had 4,895 cases adjudicated.
San Diego's homeless (numbers vary from 7,000 to 8,000) actually brainstormed the idea of a court of their own. Surveys completed after Stand Down, an annual event created by San Diego civic leaders to provide the homeless with food and social, health and legal services—it has since gone national—showed that 116 of 500 respondents needed help with warrants. Though a local judge agreed to provide services, many homeless were reticent.
"They don't trust the court system. If they come to court, they're either fined or jailed," says Steve Binder, deputy public defender for San Diego's Public Defenders Office and chairman of the American Bar Association's Commission on Homelessness and Poverty. "They can't afford to pay the fine. And when they're released from custody, they're still homeless. We convinced courts that it's a matter of working with providers who have built up trust with the homeless and can offer services. We also convinced the homeless that if you participate, you get credit for this."
Those who voluntarily enter homeless court and abide by its rules avoid arrest and can obtain treatment for substance abuse and other health issues. "We're able to offer a wider range of services to move people forward," Binder says.
Reno's court would be run similarly, catering to homeless people with outstanding warrants for nonviolent offenses. Warrants could be dismissed upon completion of the program.
Should Las Vegas officials decide to replicate Reno's effort, it's anyone's guess when an actual homeless court would be up, running and adjudicating. Currently, the only legal refuge for homeless arrested for nonviolent offenses is the homeless court set up during the annual Stand Down event. Charlie Bawker, chairman of the Southern Nevada Homeless Coalition, which is comprised of community nonprofits, says that of the 2,500 serviced last year, many sought legal remediation from the volunteer attorneys and judges.
"We'd certainly like to see that court expanded throughout the year ... Nevada Legal Services is looking at expanding the homeless court," says Bawker, who also pastors Reformation Lutheran Church. Stand Down is set for November 9 at Cashman Field.
That Reno, and not Vegas, is taking the lead on the homeless court idea comes down to numbers, Bawker says. Las Vegas' larger population equals more homeless—local estimates range from 7,800 to 12,500, triple Reno's number. Clark County also has more municipalities (read: bureaucratic red tape) to contend with—the county and the cities of Las Vegas, North Las Vegas, Henderson and Boulder City set aside funding for homelessness remediation
"We have an awkward government situation. Intergovernmental conversations take longer to take place and that can make it hard to make things happen fast," Bawker says. But that doesn't mean a dedicated homeless court is out of the question. "We're now meeting monthly to implement a plan to put the $4 million from the Legislature for homeless services to work."
And for a final word on why Vegas tends to lag behind Reno, we go to the go-to mouth on all things Las Vegas, UNLV History Professor Hal Rothman: "The population has quadrupled since 1980 and rapid expansion not only stretches the system, but cracks it. You see it in mental health, in the court system, and you saw it in hospitals before privatization came," Rothman says. "Reno has its growth, but proportionally their growth is nowhere near ours. So they have the advantage, the blessing even, of being able to catch their breath and look down the road on social service matters."
Alas, locals can take heart: Vegas hasn't always been a follower. Clark County established the state's first drug court in 1992—two years before Reno's.