While city officials utilize acronyms to refer to anything from policy (JEDI) to homeless camps (ACS), other municipal operators, like city police, sometimes use more colorful terminology to describe the locations they frequent, like THE THUNDERDOME!
For those unfamiliar with the Mad Max movie franchise, here’s a description of the Thunderdome from a fan site:
Now that I’ve firmly established the cultural context of what is meant by the term THUNDERDOME, let’s see how the plan from Mayoral candidate, Shawn Knopp, fits with this idea.
From the link (emphasis mine):
“With the Boise lawsuit from the Ninth District Court, we can’t make houselessness illegal and that makes it very hard to enforce. So, you know, my plan would be to find one place to make it legal to camp,” began Knopp. We get them all in one area and then it’ll be easier to police and then the ones that don’t follow the rules, we have avenues to take legally.”
This is NOT, unfortunately, a viable plan. Even worse, this plan has already been rendered moot after the emergency declared by Mayor Hess late last week, which activates two emergency mills in order to generate enough taxpayer money to re-open the Johnson Street shelter. With more shelter beds available, the limitations imposed by the Ninth District Court decision can be loosened, and “urban campers” can be prevented from creating health and safety situations along the river and in parks.
Shawn Knopp is making the same mistake all the other Mayoral candidates are making, and that mistake is NOT hiring me as a paid consultant to leverage my expertise on this complicated subject. Would it help to communicate that my work availability is wide open, since the book store I applied to turned me down?
If Knopp is dedicated to the Thunderdome model, then my suggestion would be to make it into a reality tv show. I’m pretty sure the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office has developed an important skill set when it comes to acting for the cameras, so turning homeless misery into opportunity shouldn’t be too difficult.
I don’t mean to rag on Knopp for a substandard plan because it’s really not his fault, nor should it be his responsibility alone to address. Especially considering how many people are currently being PAID to find housing solutions for those without conventional places to live.
Later in the article, Knopp does articulate a more accurate understanding regarding WHY our current approach isn’t working.
To have a system that can function with all the complicated sub-populations moving through it like fucked up branches through a storm drain, a daunting amount of infrastructure and policies must be developed. We need more treatment options for addiction, and more nursing homes for difficult people, and mental health facilities, and, yes, probably more jail capacity.
Instead we’re going to get MORE taxes that will be gobbled up by inflation, or diverted to MRA for more bullshit incentivizing of development that will just put MORE economic pressure on those who aren’t getting the raises to keep up with the cost of living.
And while all this is happening, our newspaper industry is dying, leaving Missoula locals less informed than ever before about what’s happening in their own community.
From the link (emphasis mine):
When Western Montana wanted to know about the end of World War 2, find out about “JFK” being assassinated, or learn what had been destroyed in the devastating “Big Blow Up” fires of 1910, they eagerly turned to the pages of the Missoulian.
But now, after surviving the turmoil, and economic challenges since the city’s earliest days in 1870, the storied newspaper has become another victim of changing news tastes and rising costs. The Missoulian announced over the weekend it will cease to be a “daily” printed newspaper, only producing a print edition three times a week.
No matter how you look at this, it’s a sad state of affairs, one that offers two possible responses: accept it, or do something about it.
I’m choosing the latter, and you can help by supporting Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF), or making a donation at my about page.
When you see a man like Griz on the streets it’s very easy to make assumptions, like is it alcohol or drugs? Or maybe a criminal history? Obviously, you’d think to yourself, there’s got to be SOME reason that caused this man to live a life without a roof over his head, something like substance abuse or other poor life choices.
At Griz’s memorial on Saturday many stories were shared, and the fact Griz only PRETENDED to be a drinker is one of the more curious tidbits I heard as people talked about this incredibly kind man with a gift ready to give to almost anyone.
Why would someone pretend to have a drinking problem? I suspect it was just easier to use that cover story because it’s such a common one on the streets, but Griz wasn’t someone who drank to excess. At least not alcohol. He DID drink “chunky” coffee, which sounds absolutely disgusting, but putting bits of bread or donuts into his coffee is something Griz enjoyed doing.
What stood out to me most at the memorial was how many women shared stories of getting ACTUAL help from this man, not the kind of “help” with strings that is usually offered to desperate women in these types of situations. Griz wasn’t like that. He even listened to one woman vent for hours after she left an abusive relationship.
Here’s a picture of this woman’s kid pouring some of Griz’s ashes into the Clark Fork river:
Griz was in a position to help others because he had finally gotten into housing, so one woman’s story was about staying at his place for a few days during winter, which probably saved her life. But one woman couldn’t be saved, and she died while staying with Griz. From what everyone said, he wasn’t the same after that, and it was this tragic event that more than likely contributed to him leaving the apartment and returning to the streets.
And why would someone return to the streets? Why was Griz even on the streets to begin with? Those aren’t easy questions to try and answer, but the memorial gave me lots of insights to consider, and that’s thanks to some people doing God’s work.
That’s right, Eric and Terry are the ones who serve free food by the Missoula County Courthouse. I heard their work recently criticized by Susan Reneau because the overall aggression happening all across our valley led to some older conservative women feeling VERY unsafe when recently picking up Memorial Day wreathes from the Courthouse last month.
Susan Reneau, for those who don’t know, is a well-known Veteran’s advocate. Here’s some bio info from a Twitter account I just found out she has, and am now following:
I went looking at the City website for the video and/or minutes of the City Council meeting but, oddly, it’s not there right now. I sure hope that changes, since it was a pretty important meeting with other important information I was hoping to find.
If Griz was there on the day those women felt threatened, I guarantee he would have intervened. Instead, he was nearing the end of his earthly journey in a hospital up in Kalispell.
On Saturday night, long after the memorial, I took Griz on a final walk around downtown, at least the small portion of his remains I was gifted with.
I can’t say for sure what led Grizzly to be a generous fixture of Missoula’s street culture, but there’s a clue in the 30 knives he had in one of the bags he was packing around, and the 50 knives he had at the pawn shop. The traumas of living show up in different ways, and some people take collecting and/or the acquiring of things into extreme territory, bordering on hoarding, and the root of that behavior, generally speaking, is some kind of trauma.
Whatever it was, Griz is beyond all that now. For the protectors still here, breathing, the fight to expose the REAL predators continues.
If you would like to help me in that noble calling, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is one way to support my work, and making a donation at my about page is another.
This picture was taken outside the Hilton on Friday after I was asked to leave the Republican State convention by the comms woman. Was I making a scene? No, I was merely chatting with some people, but I suspect my Bigfoot hat, Repo Man t-shirt, and coffee-stained pants sent out visual cues that I was NOT someone who paid the $300 dollars to attend this hilarious convention.
When asked, I told the woman I was a journalist, but, alas, the registration had allegedly closed for media. I say “allegedly” because this aggressive comms woman ALSO tried to deny access to the woman I was with, which was both a mistake AND a gift.
I actually wasn’t planning on writing about this Republican convention, but the gift of getting the boot from that location meant I was able to attend the Pachyderm meeting on the other side of town, and THAT turned out to be quite fortuitous. Why? Because I met some REAL patriots and learned about a new political cut-out trying to pre-position itself to exploit non-partisan anger, and this entity is called No Labels.
A knowledgeable political insider claimed this group is connected to Charlie Black and represents the next attempt by Republican “never-Trump’ers” to mobilize against Trump’s political ambitions. A similar effort by political operators like this, known as the Lincoln Group, didn’t end well because of some of the creeps involved. With that in mind, here is some context on who Charlie Black is:
Charlie is best known as one of America’s leading Republican political strategists. He served as senior advisor to both President Ronald Reagan and President George H.W. Bush. In 1990, Charlie served as chief spokesman for the Republican National Committee and served as a principal public spokesman for President Bush in the 1992 presidential campaign. He served on President George W. Bush’s 2000 and 2004 campaigns as a volunteer political advisor and surrogate spokesman. During the 2008 election cycle, Charlie served as the senior political advisor to Senator John McCain’s presidential campaign.
An attorney with more than 40 years of experience in government, public affairs and politics, Charlie has managed the successful elections of several U.S. Senators and Members of Congress. He served as political director of the Republican National Committee under Chairman Bill Brock.
Currently, Charlie serves on the boards of directors of the U.S. Air Force Academy Foundation and the Fund for American Studies; he received the Fund’s Lifetime Service Awards in 2007. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the American Association of Political Consultants in 2010. In 2013, Charlie received the Bryce Harlow Foundation Business-Government Relations Award, the most prestigious honor given to government relations professionals.
A native of North Carolina, Charlie is a member of the North Carolina Bar. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from the University of Florida and a Juris Doctorate from The American University. Charlie resides in Alexandria, Virginia with his wife, Judy.
The fascinating struggle Republican power brokers are trying to navigate is how to harness the energy of Trump supporters while simultaneously marginalizing Trump’s direct influence on the party. This is more difficult in a state like Montana, so maybe that is the reason someone thought it was a good idea (Steve Daines, I am told) to feature Stephen Miller as the keynote speaker for Montana Republicans on Friday.
Those who follow politics are probably aware of Miller’s stamp on the Trump administration. For those who don’t follow the sewer that forms fecal golems like the “man” seen above, here is a little something from Wikipedia (emphasis mine):
In November 2016, Miller was named national policy director of Trump’s transition team.[49] On December 13, 2016, the transition team announced that Miller would serve as Senior Advisor to the President for Policy during the Trump administration.[50] He was initially given responsibility for setting all domestic policy, but quickly assumed responsibility for immigration policy only.[51][52] Since becoming one of three Senior Advisors to the President, Miller has been regarded as the adviser who shaped the Trump administration’s immigration policies.[53]
In the early days of Trump’s presidency, Miller worked with Senator Jeff Sessions, Trump’s nominee for Attorney General, and Steve Bannon, Trump’s chief strategist, to enact policies through executive orders to restrict immigration and crack down on sanctuary cities.[54] Miller and Bannon preferred executive orders to legislation.[51] Miller’s and Sessions’s views on immigration were influenced by anti-immigration groups like the Federation for American Immigration Reform, NumbersUSA, and the Center for Immigration Studies.[55] Miller and Bannon were involved in the formation of Executive Order 13769, which sought to restrict U.S. travel and immigration by citizens of seven Muslim countries, and suspend the United States Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) for 120 days, while indefinitely suspending entry of Syrians to the United States.[7][8][9] Miller has been credited as the person behind the Trump administration’s decision to reduce the number of refugees accepted into the United States.[10][56]
I’ll get to immigration later in the post, but first, the REAL reason Miller spoke on Friday, I am told, is because of the woman he married. To understand the Montana connection, here’s an excerpt from a Vanity Fair article about how Stephen Miller met, and married, Katie Waldman. Longtime Zoom Chron readers should note a quote from the self-disappeared Democrat partisan, Don Pogreba. From the first link (emphasis mine):
Waldman, meanwhile, had become press secretary for Montana senator Steve Daines. Though Daines praised her “very strong personality” and “incredible work ethic,” Montana Post editor Don Pogreba recalls an approach that was immature and pedantic. When he tweeted that a congressional bill to get rid of Obamacare could kill 25,000 people, she scolded him for his “dangerous rhetoric” and tweeted back, “Where in the bill does it say that? Point me to that bill text.” She moved on to bigger things. In late 2017 she landed a job in communications at the Department of Homeland Security, just before Kirstjen Nielsen took over as secretary. Among its roles, the department oversaw the security of the Southern border—Stephen Miller’s life obsession.
By 2018 migrants from Central America were approaching the border by the tens of thousands. From his perspective, the only way to deter people from coming to the border would be for them to see families suffer as vividly as possible. Miller just needed to wrest control away from DHS. For several months, working with the heads of ICE and border security, he tried to get Nielsen to sign off on a zero-tolerance memo—which would effectively lead to family separation. “Stephen was particularly trying to insert himself into the communications shop,” says a former DHS official. “He had this thing about calling everyone and trying to get the answer he wanted.” He found that person in Katie Waldman.
This connection–one I was not previously aware of–is putting the Montana Republican obsession with the Southern border in a new light for me. And to think, if it WASN’T for the comms enforcer, I may have missed this intriguing development with inept Republican leadership in Big Sky Country.
Speaking of inept leadership, the woman who is most responsible for ensuring Missoula remains a ONE PARTY town is currently defending her leadership position. Will Vondene Kopetski survive the political reckoning coming for her? Early reports are no, she did not.
One of the things Kopetski was supposed to do was prove she was the legitimate chairperson with documentation. I don’t believe that happened, so in a late-morning meeting on Saturday Vondene was apparently ousted. Let’s see if local media reports on this at all.
If all this isn’t interesting enough, I’m going to end this post with a podcast episode I suggest giving a listen to. You can easily dismiss it, since the podcast is called Tin Foil Hat, but I found the guest, Mel K, has an interesting take on immigration worth listening to (video at the link).
If you appreciate MY take on local issues, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is one way to support my work, and making a donation at my about page is another.
The most critical issue facing Missoula’s elected leaders and non-profit influencers this summer is homelessness and the “urban camping” that has exploded this year across parks and along the river.
While there’s a huge need for creative thinking and accurate information, the decline of local media, and the exertion of narrative control by those who fear transparency, is limiting the robustness of the conversation we, as a community, need to have about this difficult issue.
The image above shows that addressing health and safety hazards is something Parks and Rec ALREADY had the ability to do before the emergency ordinance that’s upsetting the virtue-signalers and non-profit failures, like Susan Hay Patrick (SHP) of United Way.
I’m glad SHP is audaciously bashing this ordinance, especially considering it was SHP who totally botched oversight of the 10 Year Plan to End Homelessness during the time the plan was “housed” at United Way. From the first link:
The ordinance came after complaints of increased houseless people in city parks following the closure of the Johnson Street Winter Shelter on April 10, 2023. Other shelters in Missoula have little availability, forcing those staying at Johnson Street to flock to the parks.
“This closure of the winter shelter really has demonstrated that there is a need, post COVID, for year-round emergency shelter,” says United Way of Missoula County CEO Susan Hay Patrick.
…
Hay Patrick recognizes that camping in city parks can pose an issue, citing the damage to the environment and possible health issues for those staying in tents. Still, this ordinance is not the solution in her mind.
“Moving people is not the answer to the problem, just like ignoring homelessness does not solve homelessness,” she says. “So I think it’s a big dilemma for our community right now. And that’s why we need year-round shelter. And I think the majority of council members understand that, and I want our community to understand it.”
United Way, along with eight other organizations, including the Missoula YWCA and Hope Rescue Mission, have sponsored a public letter urging the city council to allocate funding for a year-round emergency shelter. Hay Patrick says this will likely be in the same building as the Johnson Street Shelter.
I’m not sure SHP got the memo, but the Mayor is getting down and dirty by declaring an EMERGENCY, thus allowing the esoteric mill-mechanism to target your pocketbook.
From the link (emphasis mine):
The City of Missoula on Friday declared an emergency surrounding homelessness and its lack of shelter space, enabling it to levy two emergency mills to help fund year-round shelter at the Johnson Street shelter.
Officials estimated the extra mills would generate around $500,000 and cost the average homeowner about $10 in all. But when coupled with the city’s remaining ARPA funds, the county and local partners, it should be enough to operate the Johnson Street shelter for the remainder of the year.
When this week in review posts, it will be summer for Missoula’s school kids and the camps for many will start on Monday. I wonder how quickly the doors will open at Johnson Street? And I wonder how this will be received by those in the parks and along the river who seemed to think that the 9th circuit court decision meant anything goes?
When I say anything goes, I’m mostly referring to the rampant drug abuse and criminal activity that comes along with it. Did our placeholder Mayor reference drugs in his declaration? Not that the Missoula Current reported.
“There’s an increasing number of folks living without shelter, and that’s increasing in our public spaces,” Hess said. “This is a statewide problem, it’s a national problem, and it’s a problem without an immediate and easy solution.”
While a number of factors have contributed to the sharp increase in Montana’s homeless population and urban encampments, Hess attributed much of it to the cost of housing across the West. He also blamed the Legislature for cutting mental health case management in 2017, setting the stage for thousands of people to slip into homelessness.
Problems, problems, problems. And thanks to our atrocious media landscape, not even well-defined problems!
I’m doing what I can to change some of that, and you can help by supporting Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF), or making a donation at my about page.
Thanks for reading/listening, and stay tuned for Monday’s post about Republicans fighting with themselves as Rome burns!
I found out yesterday that another old timer–known to his street friends as “Grizzly”–passed away from cancer. He was a gentle teddy bear with a gruff exterior and voice that boomed, often seen around town rolling cigarettes and reading paperbacks. Griz was always giving people gifts, and would pass along stuff he came across that he thought my kids would like. I’m going to miss him.
The walking bridge by campus, where I took this picture, is also where I met an eccentric street person when I first moved to Missoula 23 years ago. Not many people remember Tommy, probably because a more famous Tommy (the Leprechaun) is usually who comes to mind, but this Tommy used a micron pen to draw very intricate drawings, like this one:
Another homeless person who is dead–a mentally ill woman by the name of Holly–died under circumstances I’m currently investigating. I’ve gotten unofficial confirmation of her death from one official source, and several unofficial sources, so I’m pretty sure she’s dead, but it’s the MANNER of death I’m wondering about.
All I’ll say at this point is that her death was violent, and her assailant ended up dead by his own hand quickly afterward, so it doesn’t appear awareness of her death went much farther than a small circle. If anyone has any insight, my email is willskink at yahoo dot com.
I’d email the Missoulian about this 3pm memorial, but those pretenders are too busy quoting a CURRENT staff member of the Poverello Center because he’s a much better token than I could ever dream to be.
“I strongly feel that when we look at our community we need to be making decisions that consider everybody,” said Poverello Center employee Riley Jacobsen, “not just folks who are living in homes, because ultimately we all live in Missoula, even those who are living in tents.”
I wonder how the article would read if a former coordinator of the Poverello’s Homeless Outreach Program was a SUPPORTER of the ordinance? I guess we’ll never know.
If you would like to help fund the knowing MY reporting produces, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is one way to support my work, while hitting up the donation button at my about page is another.
