Reno Must Learn From San Francisco's Blight Tax
It's time to clean up downtown and make it livable again.
Once, Virginia Street was the heart of Reno. It wasn’t just where tourists came to gamble—it was where locals shopped, ate, and gathered. Casinos opened onto the street, drawing foot traffic that supported a healthy ecosystem of small businesses. Today, that street-level energy is gone. Virginia Street is lined with vacant storefronts, many of which have been shuttered for years.
Local reports, interviews, and visual surveys indicate that approximately 60–70% of storefronts have remained vacant for extended periods.
Community and business leaders have described the downtown corridor as hollowed out, particularly in the section between El Dorado, Circus Circus, and across from the now mostly fenced-off “Neon Line” properties owned by Jacobs Entertainment.
If 70% of these retail properties are vacant, Virginia Street is functionally paralyzed as a commercial corridor. This disrupts foot traffic, hurts neighboring businesses, and discourages tourism and investment.
The result? Lost tourism dollars, local frustration. The downtown core is hollow, and no one is being held accountable.
Despite years of discussion, Reno has yet to implement one of the simplest, most effective tools available: a commercial vacancy tax, also known as a blight tax.
Meanwhile, just across state lines, San Francisco took action.
💡 What San Francisco Did Differently
In 2020, San Francisco voters approved a Vacant Storefront Tax aimed at landlords who left commercial spaces empty in key neighborhood corridors. The tax applied to any storefront vacant for more than 182 days and imposed a $250 per foot of street frontage penalty in the first year, doubling each year thereafter.
However, the goal wasn't to punish—it was to encourage landlords to be realistic about their rent expectations. As SF Supervisor Aaron Peskin bluntly said:
“You don’t have to get taxed—just rent your storefront.”
It worked.
Neighborhoods like North Beach and Haight-Ashbury saw vacancy rates cut in half. In Bayview, the city waived permit fees and issued $44,000 in small business grants, helping local entrepreneurs like Vanessa Lee open restaurants in previously vacant spaces.
The results? Healthier vacancy rates, revitalized corridors, and millions in collected tax revenue now flowing back into local business support.
😞 Meanwhile, in Reno...
On Virginia Street, the situation stagnates. Properties owned by family trusts and out-of-town LLCs sit idle because the owners are either:
Speculating on future sales, they hold on for the big payout
Unwilling to invest in repairs, they defer maintenance or put it on the renter
Unrealistic about rent prices – they don’t read the market well
Holding out for the dream tenant – maybe a corporate renter will come along
They hold out despite not being able to write off unrealized rent and receiving the same write-offs regardless of whether the property is rented or not.
Even when approached by developers (as in the failed West 2nd project), they refused to sell at competitive prices. When Jacobs Entertainment entered the scene, it overpaid for properties but has failed to revitalize the area, instead letting buildings sit fenced off and deteriorating as they can’t attract developers at high prices.
What Reno Has Done
In response to the vacancy issue, the City of Reno initiated a $1 million grant program using American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds to assist tenants in improving vacant spaces. There has been some success in this area where tenants fixed up their spaces, but the problem persists. The Downtown Reno Partnership launched the Vacant Storefront Beautification Initiative, commissioning murals on empty storefronts to enhance the area's appeal and attract potential tenants. While well-intentioned, this isn’t nearly enough. Slapping on paint doesn’t make a property rentable. Instead, it highlights the bad situation.
San Francisco utilized the blight tax to provide significantly more assistance to tenants, with positive results.
🧾 What a Reno Blight Tax Could Look Like
San Francisco’s approach offers a blueprint:
Apply a per-foot penalty for vacant storefronts after 6 months.
Double the penalty each year the property remains unused.
Reinvest the revenue into small business grants, permit waivers, and local entrepreneur support.
Focus first on core corridors, such as Virginia Street, and then expand citywide.
🚦Time for Reno to Act
If San Francisco can turn around neighborhoods with double-digit vacancy rates, what’s stopping Reno? Our empty storefronts aren’t just eyesores—they’re lost jobs, lost opportunity, and lost tax revenue. It’s time to stop begging absentee landlords to cooperate and start making it costly to do nothing.
A blight tax works. San Francisco proved it.
Reno needs to stop studying and start doing.