By Brent Lovett Downtown Reno Partnership Board Member
Thursday, February 3, 2022
When I started the Reno City Center project, I was told I would not be able to find the 200-person workforce needed to undertake the largest adaptive re-use redevelopment project in Nevada history. We had 980 hotel rooms to renovate, seven commercial kitchens, a buffet to demolish and two casino floors to convert to retail and services.
The Reno City Center is the proposed conversion of the Harrah’s Reno Hotel & Casino into a mixed-use, multifamily development with 530 market rate apartments, technology office complex, three restaurants, Starbucks and downtown mini storage surrounding a new park plaza on Virginia Street. The property was originally built in 1962.
The 1.4 million square foot Reno City Center located in downtown Reno is near healthcare, retail, employment and educational opportunities. The site has frontage along North Center Street, East 2nd Street and East Commercial Row. A seven-story parking garage is attached to the west building and contains 800 parking spaces plus the project has a long-term lease with Whitney Peak for an additional 300 plus parking spaces.
If we want the project to be transformational, and we do, then we have to start at the beginning.
Each morning, as I sat in the construction trailer on the former Harrah’s plaza, I watched 800 displaced people leave the temporary homeless facility at the Reno Events Center. In this despair,
I saw an opportunity to make a difference for people downtown.
Now, 18 months later, Luxe Industries together with Re-Entry for all Nevada, helped reduce homelessness by hiring over 283 people in 2021. We also currently house almost 100 people in the East Tower of the old Harrah’s hotel.
We created the “LUXE C.A.R.E.S Program.” This is an employee space open to those who need safety, comfort and open communication to help with life’s hardships, such as battling addiction, mental health and family issues. I also teach the “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” to assist team members with creating life goals and learning to listen with the intent to understand, instead of being understood.
We do all of this to help people get back into the workforce and out of poverty. We’ve seen that feeding people twice a day, housing them, giving them training and equipment, and helping them gain certifications all can help people make huge steps out of poverty. We love to see people move out, get their own apartments, purchase vehicles, and start jobs with other companies.
Transforming downtown is not only about changing the built environment, but also affecting change in people’s lives.
Reno City Center will help change the perception of downtown Reno from a gaming and event destination to a true live, work, play environment where locals can enjoy public spaces, shopping and dining outside of event season. This thinking will bring change to the overall feel of downtown, when you know you can go to a local eatery, shop, run errands spend time in a community park.
Reno City Center will show that downtown environments can be transformed with the right amount of time and vision.
Downtown Reno is seeing the transformation from these actions with more students from the University feeling safe and moving to and walking around the downtown area, for example. The completion of the Downtown Reno Partnership Locomotion Plaza and numerous other local projects all have come together to change downtown and provide a path forward.
Over the next 18 months the Reno City Center will have phased openings bringing new and exciting venues to downtown to continue to attract commerce and improve the downtown experience.
Brent Lovett is a new board member for the Downtown Reno Partnership who represents the Entertainment District in downtown. He is also the Director of Design and Construction at Luxe Industries, the group developing the Reno City Center in partnership with CAI Investments.
“What’s Up Downtown” is a monthly Voices column in the NNBW.
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