The normal approach to “car camping” is to lay low and, like water, find a place of least resistance to get some sleep.  Because Walmart has national notoriety for the RV culture it feeds, the Walmart parking lot is a fairly safe bet when using a vehicle to live out of.

Why is the proximity to ACTUAL water such a tricky factor in the current challenge of Missoula’s “urban crisis camping” phenomenon?  Let me use the hilarious caricature of “Van Life” provided by the late Chris Farley to illustrate why the ideal geography to park one’s van is DOWN BY THE RIVER!

The trickiness of waterfront geography begins with determining jurisdiction and, in Montana, there’s nothing more challenging than jurisdictions that factor in water.  If you want an example that includes a famous person with the money to make legal claims, just Google Huey Lewis and the Mitchell Slough and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

Though I’m going to be intentionally vague about one of my favorite locations in Missoula to park, it won’t be difficult to figure out.  The reason I’m risking a good spot by writing so specifically about it is because REAL information from REAL experiences is much more valuable than the noise coming from loud virtue-signalers, like Missoula’s State Representative, Zooey Zephyr.

The interactions I’ve had recently at this location highlight the two things the title of this post suggests I might be.  The first one, Broken Windows, is going to take a little explaining, so I’ll start with the opportunity that I presented two police officers on pedal-bikes when they rolled up to me inquiring about a person causing a disturbance.

I knew exactly who these officers were referring to because the guy causing a disturbance by yelling had been staring me down before leaving the area in an unstable rage.  I recognized this man from my time working at the shelter, and I knew he wasn’t someone to mess with in this kind of agitated mental state, so I was more than happy to tell the officers the man’s description and the direction of his movement from the former Missoulian building to the stairs that connect the riverfront trail to 3rd street.  

My knowledge of this person and my willingness to assist law enforcement in making contact with him is the kind of opportunity my presence in this area presents, but it doesn’t end there.  I also told a few businesses that someone in the area was acting angry and aggressive, and that law enforcement had already been notified.

The flip-side of my presence is where the theory of Broken Windows comes into play, and according to Wikipedida, this theory asserts that “…visible signs of crime, antisocial behavior and civil disorder create an urban environment that encourages further crime and disorder, including serious crimes. The theory suggests that policing methods that target minor crimes, such as vandalism, loitering, public drinking and fare evasion, help to create an atmosphere of order and lawfulness.”

When you don’t have a conventional place to sleep, living becomes loitering, and if other factors exist, like trash piling up from obnoxious partying, then the predictable result, at least historically, has been to enforce minor crimes so that the disorder of antisocial behavior doesn’t spread.

While the virtue-signaling by definition doesn’t include any acknowledgment of what vice produces in one’s life when allowed to go unchecked, the reality in Missoula regarding urban camping is that responses have been primarily complaint-driven, and the complaints that come in are MORE than warranted. And I’m saying this after having transitioned myself from a former service provider to someone meeting the technical definition of homelessness.

Since I’ve been a consistent visible presence at my favorite location for more than a few weeks, I’ve had plenty of visitors—some housed, some not—and inevitably more vehicles will start appearing, leading eventually to the type of behavior that almost always ruins a jurisdictionally opportunistic location for car camping.  

Since my former employer, the Poverello Center, has decided to politicize the program I spent five years developing, the H.O.T. program, I’m going to write a special article for next week ahead of the Poverello’s 50 year anniversary.  I’ve already scoped out the display on the 4th floor of our trillion dollar library and you won’t want to miss what I’m going to say about it, so stay tuned!

And, like I always say at the end of every Zoom Chron post, thanks for reading!