My sense is Reno would need the equivalent of "a second UNR" to step up the quality of its job market. Perhaps a regional focus on alternative, post-K12 profess

My sense is Reno would need the equivalent of "a second UNR" to step up the quality of its job market. Perhaps a regional focus on alternative, post-K12 professional education would make sense? (It could become a center for in-person workshops, testing, etc to complement remote-learning MOOCs – it has the space and transport links.) Proximity to the Bay Area is a double-edged sword: cultural affinity and talent interchange but also brain-drain. As long as the skyline is dominated by casinos – while eye-catching in its own way – Reno's external image will suffer from that association. Reno can't compete with Vegas in scale, nor with the spread of state-by-state gambling in convenience, and yet is still hit by the stigma of gambling-as-an-economic-pillar. Some of the downtown conversions of defunct casino-towers to other uses (like condos) are encouraging. If I were a local civic planner, I'd be tempted to offer a subsidy for any skyline-altering night signage that's not gambling-related. (Tesla! UNR! Aviation! Anything! There's still some risk people would see bright lights and think, "tacky gambling", no matter the actual messages.)