If you haven't noticed any good news lately, you've come to the right place.

I've often written that if you reflect on your life and wonder how in hell you ended up ensconced in the confines of the High Desert Outback of the American Dream, it's because this place, its people and other resident critters need all the help they can get.

Here's a Barbwire 2-for-1 sweet upper sundae with a cherry on top. Read on.

GOOD NEWS 1. In an overweight nation much more concerned with butt control than gun control, maybe we can split the difference (and perhaps the seams) by unzipping the old taboo of rent control.

Welcome back to back to the future. It's 1978 again. This boomtown is exploding and people are living in tents down by the river. During the casino expansion four decades ago, speculators prowled with suitcases full of cash buying any property, no matter the price. They knew they could flip title in less than a year for a fat return.

The math was addictive. Buy an apartment house, jack up rents to pay for the financing, then sell when the next guy with a suitcase knocks on your door. Renters in Nevada have never had any rights to speak of. Those that exist are as weak as Kleenex in a hurricane.

I thought it couldn't get worse than '78. Dead wrong. Landlords are now charging people hundreds of dollars just to APPLY for a rental. The going rate is $50 per person. That's $200 upfront for a family of four with no guarantee.

You can get three of your credit reports online for a buck apiece. Landlords buy subscriptions and pay far less than consumers for detailed records. The bandidos are charging half-a-hundred-a-head just because they can.

UPDATE: I am informed that some property managers and rental agencies even charge a fee to process tenant rent payments. Reminds me of an old Robin Hood comic I read as a kid where evil Prince John imposes a tax for breathing English air.

I am calling upon public officials to see what can be done now and what legislation needs to be passed in the 2019 session. This is criminal extortion but legal in this exploitive backwater state in serious need of a consumer advocate like Barbara Bennett.

She came to public notice when she started a campaign for a rent justification ordinance, promptly trashed by the Reno City Council. When established landlords saw rents rising due to speculators, they raised theirs even without increased costs. ("Whatever the market will bear," as Ebenezer Scrooge might say.) The streets and riverbanks took the overflow.

So in honor of the late, great Reno Mayor Bennett, let's start a renters' rights advocacy organization in her name. Volunteers, please call me. Since I'm helping launch a new advocacy organization this week anyway, why not double down?

¡Sí se puede!

GOOD NEWS 2. Tonight, April 25, the Nevada Museum of Art hosts the premiere of Love, Chantal, a docudrama based on the diary of a Reno teen who lost her life to an eating disorder. I tried to get a non-profit started in 2014 when dancer Callie Hutson died of anorexia at 24. I know her family and they tried everything but could not save her.

The same thing happened to local top gun attorney Robert Hager who lost his Chantal at just 19.

Another top gun, Peter Chase Neumann, invited me to a bar association dinner a couple of years ago. As fate would have it, I was seated next to Bob Hager who told me he was producing a film about eating disorders. He called me when the film was done and the rest is history, starting tonight. Admission is free.

Food and refreshments start at 6:00 p.m., film at 7:00, conversation and organizing at 8:00. Just in promoting this event, I've been amazed at finding affected people every time I turn around.

We have formed the Chantal Coalition to educate the public about the warning signs. Eating disorders are the number one killer of American women aged 15-25. Early action brings hope. Volunteer at ChantalCoalition.org/

¡Sí se puede!

GET OUT THE MARASCHINO. And the vino. Legendary NAACP matriarch and community leader Dolores Feemster is out of the hospital and recovering at Manorcare in Spanish Springs.

She had not been there a day when she ran across a family in crisis and took steps to help. As they still say at Hug High, when somebody's in trouble, call Dolores.

I told her that God apparently has a lot more work for her to do.

¡Sí se puede!

CONSUMER PROTECTION, PART DEUX: How to get a boileroom phone hustler to go away.

These guys have no sense of humor.

Probably Republicans.

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)

Web Extras —> IMPORTANT DATES: Washoe County sheriff candidates forum sponsored by the Reno-Sparks NAACP, ACTIONN and other community organizations. Watch this space.

UPDATE: Looks like there will be two, one on April 30 and another on May 15. Stay tuned.

ANTE INTO THE GAME: Support the new season of Barbwire.TV by putting your money where my mouth is.

Metastasizical Statisticals Trump FCC chair investigated for Sinclair ties TheVerge.com / 2-15-2018 Ready for Trump TV? Inside Sinclair Broadcasting’s Plot to Take Over Your Local News Its mix of terrorism alerts, right-wing commentary and “classic propaganda” could soon reach 3/4 of the US. By Andy Kroll/Mother Jones Oct.-Nov. 2017 How Sinclair Broadcasting puts a partisan tilt on trusted local news By William Brangham/ PBS NewsHour 10-10-2017 Top-down Democrats haven't learned By Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 8-10-2017 More Faux than Fox? Corporate octopus Sinclair moves to dominate Nevada and U.S. television By Dennis Myers / Reno News & Review 8-3-2017

  A thousand thanks to those who keep sending show suggestions.

  Stay tuned.

  I encourage you to donate to the cause at Barbwire.TV/ The medium that shapes public opinion needs at least one refuge where it is not filtered through the distorted green eye shades of prissy corporate accountants for whom profit is the only priority; where self-censorship is the journalist's normal work environment and where all sins of omission are tacitly encouraged and forgiven with the wave of a balance sheet.

  This is important. We've got a lot of work to do.

 

END OF TIMES SURVIVAL KIT. Defend yourself with humorous or humorless but always-peerless pontification by subscribing to the Barbwire Confidential News Service. Scandalous bonuses for new subscribers.

Hush Hush!

 

"Media is the plural of mediocre." — Jimmy Breslin (1928-2017)

Last year's dark foreshadowings unfortunately became reality. I thus suggest inoculation by signing onto the HushHush! list at BallotBoxing.US/ It's cheap as well as enlightening entertainment. I suggest coming aboard now. Subscription prices go up soon. Thank you kindly for your support.

Be well. Raise hell. / Esté bien. Haga infierno. (Pardon my Spanglish.)

Andrew Barbano is a 49-year Nevadan, executive producer of Nevada's annual César Chávez Day celebration, first vice-president and political action chair of the Reno-Sparks NAACP, labor/consumer/civil rights advocate, member of Communications Workers of America Local 9413/AFL-CIO and editor of NevadaLabor.com and BallotBoxing.US and SenJoeNeal.org and DoctorLawyerWatch.com/ As always, his opinions are strictly his own. Check local listings for other Nevada cable systems. E-mail barbano@frontpage.reno.nv.us. Barbwire by Barbano has originated in the Sparks Tribune since 1988 and received its 8th Nevada Press Association award and 5th first-place at the 30 Sept. 2017 NPA annual convention in Carson City. (That trophy and about six bucks will get you a Latte Mocha Cotsafracas Chingade at just about any Starbux worldwide, guaranteed.)

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