The wreck sits just past Geiger Lookout, northbound on State Route 341, heading to Reno.
It’s 8:51 in the morning. What a bad time for it.
Traffic crawls, brake lights stretching down the grade. Law enforcement is on the scene.
Men in uniforms move slowly but surely. Drivers sit in their cars, waiting.
Some drum their fingers on the wheel. Others stare.
No way around it. If you’re going that way, you’ll be late.
The shots came early, before dawn. Then a call for help.
Police at the VA hospital needed backup. Reno officers answered, securing the scene, but the case was no longer theirs.
The FBI took over.
It happened at 2:30 the morning of February 12, near the ER entrance, where Locust and Burns meet.
No one says what led to it. No one says who fired first. No one says if anyone fell.
The FBI keeps its mouth shut, calling it an active investigation. States there’s no danger to the public.
The emergency room stays open, but the way in is blocked. Patients find another door.
People ask questions. The hospital says nothing. The FBI says nothing.
Maybe in time, the truth will come out. Maybe not.
If you know something, say something. Secret Witness takes anonymous tips at 775-322-4900.
The law says one thing. The calendar says another.
If you look it up, Indigenous Peoples’ Day is October 13. That also happens to be Columbus Day.
But in Nevada, the law marks Indigenous Peoples’ Day as August 9. Democratic Assemblywoman Shea Backus wants to change that with Assembly Bill 144.
Backus, who represents northwest Las Vegas, learned last year that even her bank didn’t recognize the August date. The signs on the door were clear.
They were observing the holiday alongside Columbus Day. That, it turns out, is where the real fight is.
“I don’t oppose an Indigenous Peoples’ Day,” Janine Hansen said. She leads Nevada Families for Freedom and has run for office more than once. “But when you put it on Columbus Day, you erase Columbus Day.”
That, some would argue, is bad for history. Columbus never set foot in what is now the United States.
He sailed to the Caribbean. He never saw the Great Plains, crossed the Mississippi, or laid eyes on the lands that later became Nevada. Whether that history is seen as a triumph or tragedy, erasing it does not change the past.
During the Assembly Committee on Government Affairs hearing in Carson City, all parties spoke in a politically correct manner. But no one wanted to say what was obvious.
“Indigenous Peoples’ Day isn’t just about recognition,” Backus said. “It’s about placing Indigenous voices at the forefront of decisions that shape the future of the state.” She is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation.
Tuesday was Nevada Tribes Legislative Day, and the room filled with supporters of AB144.
Speakers from at least four tribes stood up for it.
“Our history exists whether or not it’s in your textbooks,” said Mathilda Guerrero Miller of the Native Voters Alliance of Nevada. “Our contributions shaped this state long before Nevada was even a name on a map.”
Nevada has 20 federally recognized tribes, 28 bands and colonies, and over 60,000 urban Indians. Supporters included Make the Road Nevada, UNLV, and members of the Walker River Paiute Tribe.
Now, the bill sits in the Assembly’s hands. If it moves forward, the Senate will decide.
The date on the calendar may change. The fight over history will not.
Washoe County has a new Registrar of Voters. His name is Andrew McDonald.
He is the fourth or maybe the fifth. No one is sure anymore.
His job does not include cleaning up the voter rolls. That is the voter’s problem.
McDonald replaces Cari-Ann Burgess, who left last September. He has worked in elections before, in Clark County and San Diego, Calif.
Now, he will make $175,240 a year to screw things up even more–here.
The county commissioners approved him. One of them, Clara Andriola, gave a speech.
She thanked McDonald. She thanked the process.
She said he was professional. Then, she seconded the motion.
Now, the county has a new registrar until they need another one.
Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo wants more land for housing, but he won’t fight for it himself. Instead, he wrote a letter. He sent it to Nevada Democrats, asking them to push for a resolution urging the federal government to release land for development.
Like a limp biscuit, he couldn’t do it on his own.
He blamed inflation. He blamed interest rates. He blamed the cost of living. But most of all, he blamed the federal government. Nearly 87 percent of Nevada is federal land. Lombardo says that strangles developers and stifles construction, leaving rural communities unable to grow.
Projections show Washoe County could run out of developable land by 2027. Clark County might hold out until 2032. Lombardo says he has talked to Nevada’s federal delegation about the problem.
He also wrote to President Biden last July, asking for the same thing. That letter didn’t get him far. So now, he writes again.
Sierra Nevada Realtors released its January 2025 report on existing home sales in Carson City, along with Douglas, Lyon, Churchill, and Washoe counties, excluding Incline Village. The report details the median sales price and number of home sales across the region, sourced from the Northern Nevada Regional Multiple Listing Service.
The median sales price for single-family homes, condominiums, and townhomes across all five counties is $504,000. Since December 2024, prices have risen by 0.9 percent, but total sales have dropped sharply by 19.9 percent.
Carson City recorded 49 sales in January, a significant 33.8 percent drop from the previous month but a 25.6 percent increase from the prior year. The median sales price was $550,000, a slight 0.7 percent decrease from last month but a solid 10 percent increase from a year ago. Inventory stood at 127, down 2.3 percent from last month and 17 percent lower than last year.
Churchill County saw 14 sales, up 7.7 percent from the previous month but down 30 percent from a year ago. The median sales price fell six percent from last month to $376,000, though it remained 1.4 percent higher than last year.
Douglas County reported 29 sales, marking a 27.5 percent drop from December and a steep 39.6 percent decline from last year. The median price for an existing single-family home climbed 9.2 percent to $715,000 but was still down 10.7 percent from last year’s figure.
Lyon County had 73 sales, down 21.5 percent from last month and 2.7 percent from a year ago. The median sales price for single-family homes, townhomes, condominiums, and manufactured properties was $375,000, down 2.6 percent from December but unchanged from last year.
Washoe County, excluding Incline Village, saw 516 new listings and 364 closed sales. The median sales price was $525,000, a 3.7 percent drop from December but a 2.9 percent increase year-over-year. Inventory stood at 991, down 9.6 percent from last month but 24.2 percent higher than last year.
The numbers tell the story. Prices hold steady or rise in some areas while sales drop nearly across the board.
Fewer buyers, more inventory in some places, and less in others. The market shifts, but where it goes next, no one knows.
He swung himself into the saddle with the ease of a man born to the range, the leather creaking beneath him as if greeting an old friend. The sun hung low over the mesa, painting the sky in streaks of orange and red, but he paid it no mind. His gaze fixed on the horizon, where the land stretched wide and wild, promising freedom and danger.
He reined the horse lightly, and with a nudge of his heels, it moved forward, hooves striking a steady rhythm against the hard-packed earth. The wind caught at the brim of his hat, tugging it back, but he leaned into it, his shoulders squared against the coming night.
There was a job to do, a trail to follow, and he had miles to go before the stars would see him rest. Without a backward glance, he rode away, leaving nothing but a cloud of dust and the weight of things left unsaid.
CARSON CITY, Nev. – In a move as wild-eyed and desperate as a coked-up blackjack player doubling down on a busted hand, Governor Joe Lombardo has thrown his chips onto the table, demanding that Uncle Sam fork over chunks of Nevada’s vast federal wasteland to stave off a looming housing catastrophe.
With nearly 87 percent of the state locked away in the bureaucratic grip of Washington, Lombardo is howling at the moon for a resolution that would pry loose enough dirt to keep developers happy and the housing market from plunging into full-blown hysteria. “Growth is strangled,” he warns, like some old prospector clutching his throat in a desert fever dream.
The numbers are grim: Washoe County is staring down the barrel of a land shortage by 2027, with Clark County trailing close behind, set to hit the same wall by 2032. The Governor insists he’s been hammering on the doors of D.C., pleading with the feds and the President himself to release Nevada’s land from its bureaucratic purgatory.
The question now: Will the Beltway overlords crack open the vault, or will Nevada’s housing market be left gasping in the dust? Either way, the dice have been rolled—now we wait for the house to play its hand.
SILVER SPRINGS, Nev.—(UPDATE) The deputies knocked. They called her name. They told her to come out, bring the child, make this easy, please. There was no answer.
The man outside the door had told them what was happening. He said her name was Haylie Baggett, thirty-eight, locked in the bedroom with her three-year-old son.
Domestic violence call. It was never good when a call like that turned into a door that wouldn’t open.
Minutes passed. No answer. The Lyon County Sheriff’s Office made the call to force entry.
Gunfire. The child is down.
The mother is down, dead, suicide-murder.
Deputies dropped to the floor, trying to save the child. Central Lyon County Firefighters arrived, working fast, but the wound was too much. Careflight took the little one to Reno. No use. The child died at the hospital.
The house on Spring Circle in Silver Springs went quiet after that. The deputies stood in the wreckage.
Investigators arrived. The man who made the report was still there.
Story written in the spent shell casings and the blood on the floor.
They said the case is still under investigation.
But no one is talking about the husband, Christopher. No one is saying where he was when his wife barricaded herself in that room.
Everyone is asking why.
A mother, her child, the closed door, a gun. The rest is silence.
RENO, Nev.–The wind cut through Reno City Plaza like a dull knife, making the candle flames shiver. They stood there anyway—priests, imams, rabbis, monks—murmuring prayers over names that most of the city never knew. Seventy-seven dead. Not in some far-off war, not a catastrophe—just in the slow, grinding death of being poor in a town that doesn’t see them.
Father Chuck Durante, voice steady but eyes tired, said, “This is the first year we are going in the right direction.”
A win, if you wanted to call it that. Last year, it was 135. This year, only 77. Progress, like a half-smoked cigarette in a puddle.
They read the names. They read the ages. Sixty-three men and fourteen women. Most went down hard—fentanyl, meth, the kind of things that happen when no one gives a damn.
Fourteen made it to natural causes, six got murdered, and four took themselves out. Two are mysteries, while nine are still waiting on an answer they’ll never hear.
The plaza isn’t for the dead, but for one night, it held them. Their names, at least.
Then, the candles burned out, and the city moved on.
The Old Blog in the Desert 