The end of a calendar year is a natural time to reflect on the past 12 months.
And for us at The Nevada Independent, 2024 has been quite a whirlwind.
As we did at the end of 2023 and 2022, Indy reporters are pleased to share some of their favorite stories from the past calendar year.
Below, you’ll find a rich variety — profiles of Nevada’s governor and U.S. senator, investigations into poor working conditions at a state agency and a nearly shuttered shelter for Native American youth and dives into the new industry of legal cannabis consumption lounges and a program that unifies families separated by the border.
Thank you, as always, for reading our stories.
Senior Reporter Howard Stutz
Cannabis lounges provide a new lure for Las Vegas visitors
Las Vegas saw the opening of its first two cannabis consumption lounges in 2024, where visitors can legally take a few bong hits, smoke a pre-rolled joint or sample cannabis-infused mocktails. Backers said the lounge concept is a natural fit for the hospitality-driven economy of Nevada. In some ways, the locations resembled a sports bar or cocktail lounge.
Aviators’ four decades in Las Vegas provided a road map for the Golden Knights
With all the discussion and focus on professional sports in Las Vegas — especially the pending move by MLB’s Athletics to a $1.75 billion stadium on the Strip — I wanted to remind our readers that Southern Nevada has a rich history in minor league sports, led by the Triple-A baseball franchise now known as the Las Vegas Aviators and its longtime president, Don Logan.
After bitter primary, Culinary Union, legislative Democrats not singing kumbaya — yet
Culinary Workers Union Local 226 targeted Sen. Rochelle Nguyen (D-Las Vegas) in the June primary because she helped present a bill in the 2023 legislative session that unwound pandemic-era hotel cleaning requirements. Nguyen won, but reporter Tabitha Mueller and I took a deep dive into the ramifications of the union’s unprecedented effort.
Reporter Amy Alonzo
A huge NV Energy project has doubled in cost. Ratepayers are being asked to help fund it
The idea for this story germinated more than a year before it was published. In interviews and conversations, I noticed that very few people outside the conservation and energy circles were aware of the project. The final story was the result of seemingly endless hours sifting through energy dockets (where “ctrl-F” doesn’t work) and agonizing over seemingly minute details.
Is Clark County’s $80M settlement with Red Rock developer the new model for land use disputes?
I’m proud of this piece. While the land use dispute had been going on for years and was full of complicated nuances, I came into the matter at the eleventh hour with little of its background and a fairly tight turnaround time but still produced a well-sourced, digestible story that explained what was happening, and what led up to it.
Reporter Tabitha Mueller
‘You have to grow into it:’ Joe Lombardo’s rise from beat cop to governor
I loved getting the chance to interview political figures and family members from across the state about Gov. Joe Lombardo and explore his background, motivations and political career. Working on this story gave me valuable insight into Lombardo’s leadership style and how it shaped his interactions with the Legislature.
‘We’re looking for a lifeline;’ Nevada’s only Native youth shelter at risk of closing
It’s not often that journalists can see the immediate effects of a story. But this piece made one of my top picks this year because it allowed me to highlight a problem affecting an often-overlooked community. It was also gratifying to see the response to the story and how politicians and organizations recognized the youth shelter’s vital role and rallied to support it.
Reporter Gabby Birenbaum
The Inflation Reduction Act may transform Nevada. Will voters care?
This story provided me with my first opportunity to travel to Reno, to see the transformations that the clean energy industry is bringing to the Nevada economy up close — and understand why voters may not be feeling the benefits yet.
I think the election results ended up proving one of the theses of the article — policy implementation happens on an entirely different schedule than elections.
In partisan Senate, does Jacky Rosen’s ‘kill ‘em with kindness’ approach work?
Typically, my reporting on Capitol Hill is limited to the six members of the Nevada delegation. But for this profile of Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV), I got to speak to her colleagues on both sides of the aisle to gauge her reputation among her peers and see if she’s as friendly and well-liked as she portrays herself.
Having covered her for two years, this profile presented an exciting challenge in trying to distill everything I had learned about her. Fairly unique among senators for her lack of political experience and low-key demeanor, it was fun to dive so deeply.
Reporter Rocio Hernandez
From a split hiring vote onward, Jara struggled to unite district during 6-year tenure
The resignation of Clark County School District Superintendent Jesus Jara was one of the biggest news stories in K-12 education this year. In this story, I had the chance to examine Jara’s bumpy six-year tenure.
Indy Explains: What’s happening with universal free meals for Nevada students?
This school year marks the first year that school meals will not be free for all Nevada K-12 students after Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo vetoed a bill by Democrats that would have extended that funding in 2023. I explained why students at some school districts will continue to receive free meals without an application. We also fact checked Lombardo’s claim that “as much as 73 percent of food provided through school lunch programs ends up in the trash,” which our investigation showed was false.
Reporter Eric Neugeboren
Workers in NV child mental health program say manager bullied them ‘with nobody to help’
I enjoyed writing this story — which took months of reporting — because it helped give a voice to state employees who felt that those in positions of power did not care about their well-being. It also provided a rare look into how state agencies respond to allegations of workplace misconduct, revealing flaws in the processes to report misconduct.
Analysis: How redistricting helped Nevada Democrats — but not enough to gain supermajority
I noticed that few of the rationales for Nevada Democrats’ downballot success in this election mentioned the state’s redistricting in 2021, which led to much more favorable legislative and congressional maps for Democrats.
The resulting data analysis provided more concrete data into just how much Democrats benefitted from redistricting — particularly in Congressional District 3 and swingy Assembly districts — but also revealed the delicate nature of the process that made it harder for Democrats to secure a legislative supermajority.
Big pharma, big bucks: Analyzing how (and why) the industry donates to Nevada politicians
I enjoyed writing this story that explored the history of the pharmaceutical industry’s campaign donations and involvement in Nevada politics. Typically, political discourse surrounding the industry accuses certain politicians or parties of being bought out by “Big Pharma,” but this story showed it’s far more complicated than that, with donations often going to powerful lawmakers regardless of party and correlating more with the party of the governor.
Reporter Isabella Aldrete
What’s behind Nevada Latinos’ shift toward Trump in the 2024 election?
This story felt like a synthesis of all the stories about the Latino vote that I’d been working on leading up to the election. It gave me the chance to connect all these different threads — fears about the economy, immigration and just general political disconnect — into one large piece. I also found the conversations I had with sources to be really eye-opening!
Program reunites Mexican parents separated from their children by border, bureaucracy
Reporting on this piece was incredibly heartwarming. This story covers a relatively small, not very well-known family reunification program organized by a local Mexican organization. So many immigrants struggle to see their families again for financial and political reasons, and feel that the U.S government has failed them. Seeing the local community come together to help reunite families that hadn’t seen each other for decades was quite moving.
