Kathleen Taylor Bites Back
Councilmember Kathleen Taylor … “She Who Must Be Obeyed”
So who watched the Reno City Council Meeting - we did.
And our take away …
Councilmember Kathleen Taylor finally snapped about downtown Reno — and honestly, it was the most enthusiasm we’ve seen on the council dais since someone mentioned their free catered lunch arrived.
While Mayor Hillary Schieve continues her 12-year Easter egg hunt for the mysterious “bad actors” ruining downtown, Taylor has decided to take a different approach:
Blame the unhoused, bark at critics, and threaten to eject anyone who doesn’t share her enthusiasm for Downtown. Well she is running for Reno Mayor.
Her now-infamous comment says it all:
“If you don’t want to be part of the team, if you don’t want to take pride in your downtown, see you later.”
Well, thank you, Coach Taylor.
Question though — is “the team” the council? Because if that’s the team, the only thing they’ve won in the last decade is the gold medal for “Approving Pointless Studies No One Reads.”
Let’s break this down:
Taylor wants MORE citations downtown. Charming.
Except the City of Reno is already chronically short on code enforcement officers, so unless Taylor plans to personally patrol downtown with a ticket book and a whistle, this is just another round of “tough talk, zero infrastructure.”
Meanwhile, actual residents with real code enforcement needs?
They can go pound sand, apparently — or more accurately, wait six for an inspection that may never come.
Almost twelve years later, the Mayr still hasn’t found those “bad actors.”
Maybe she should check:
The dais to her left
The dais to her right
And possibly the mirror
Because the only people making downtown worse than it already is… are the ones who keep approving millions for reports, consultants, and “vision plans” that turn into nothing but PowerPoints and ribbon-cuttings.
Taylor’s real problem? The homeless.
Let’s be honest:
If downtown had the exact same issues but the people causing them wore Patagonia vests and ordered $8 cortados, Taylor would call it “vibrancy.”
But when the unhoused show up — human beings who have nowhere else to go because the only option is the Nevada Cares Campus and we’d rather stay on the streets — she treats them like they’re an invasive species eating the landscaping.
Downtown Reno doesn’t need another pep talk.
It doesn’t need another councilmember threatening residents on the mic like she’s sending them to detention.
It needs leadership willing to do something beyond issuing press releases and Instagram reels.
Until then?
The only thing ruining downtown… is the leadership downtown.
And in the meantime, Taylor can keep shouting into the void.
The unhoused will still be unhoused, residents will still be ignored, and downtown will still look exactly the same.
But hey — at least we know who can’t tolerate what downtown has become.
It just happens to be the people elected to fix it, and let’s remember two of them Councilmember Kathleen Taylor and Councilmember Devon Reese are both running for Mayor. If elected one of them might find some of Hillary’s bad actors.