Month: August 2024

by Travis Mateer

How does the County Attorney’s Office decide what crimes to charge? Since Missoula’s lead County Attorney, Matt Jennings, goes on the radio once a week to give listeners the crime stats like we’re playing a football game or something, we DO get a little insight into the mind of a County prosecutor. From the link (emphasis mine):

The Missoula County Attorney’s Office filed 29 new felony complaints this week, which is 14 more than last week and way above the weekly average. County Attorney Matt Jennings said not to be alarmed by that high number.

“We were catching up on some out-of-custody cases,” Jennings said. “We have cases come to us in two ways. Either someone gets arrested and we have some kind of quick time turnaround to get them charged. Or sometimes there might be something like an embezzlement or a theft where they didn’t actually apprehend somebody. Those get referred to us and sometimes there’s more follow-up and investigation. So those get charged out of custody and we can either summon people into court if they’re not a risk to the public or we will do a warrant.”

Why is Matt Jennings worried about the public being ALARMED at a high number of criminal charges? Maybe managing public perception is a part of the job, and maybe part of that perception management is putting MORE CRIMES being committed into a more palatable political context.

It’s strange to be writing about something I’m directly experiencing, since one of the cases Matt Jennings needs to make a decision on is MY case.

While I wait to see when my supposed felony charges will be officially filed, let’s look at a different jurisdiction and the excuses that are made BY municipal court judges FOR the homeless population they sitting in judgement of. From the link (emphasis mine):

Like many Missoulians, Anthony Andres had seen one too many rent hikes.

So he and his partner moved out of their place this year, he said, and started living in the Johnson Street shelter, saving up money while he works as a cook in a local restaurant.

During that time, the 45-year-old missed scheduled hearings for a pair of municipal court cases accusing him of misdemeanor theft. Warrants for his arrest were issued, one in April and another in June.

“Once I lost my place, I didn’t have access to court,” Andres said, adding that he didn’t have any other mailing address to get notifications on warrants or upcoming court dates.

I’m not going to join the chorus of victim-card playing excuse-makers for Anthony Andres because, unlike the people quoted in this article, I don’t think Andres is retarded. Instead, I’m going to question the premise that NO HOUSING means NO ACCESS to court. Has Anthony Andres ever heard of something called EMAIL? Because that is how THIS homeless person (me) is keeping up with my court dates, although the information I get is not always accurate from the courts.

I can hear the virtue-signalers revving up their excuse-making machine as I write this. THEY DON’T HAVE COMPUTERS! How can they keep up with email? No, they have a TRILLION DOLLAR library, so let’s stop pretending that people like Anthony Andres are incapable of showing up to court dates just because they don’t have housing, because that excuse is bullshit.

Further down in the article, the Municipal Court judge who threatened me with hypothetical charges is acting all concerned about homeless people getting more serious charges. Hilarious.

Felony charges are handled exclusively by the county district court, while misdemeanors within city limits are the province of Missoula’s municipal court. One of the goals of providing a range of resources at shelter court is to stop offenders from working their way up to felonies, Judge Eli Parker said.

“One of the benefits of having a court of limited jurisdiction that is distinct from these more serious offenses is that we can perhaps intervene in individuals’ lives through the course of the process and help them get to resources that prevent them from getting worse,” Parker said.

This judge, who I have written critically about, told me that I am not allowed to go to City Council meetings on Mondays OR Wednesdays due to an order of protection I have against me. And he’s not even the main judge assigned to my case. I’d like to write more about this charade, but until my legal situation gets resolved, I have to remind myself the first amendment doesn’t currently apply to me.

Maybe these helpful judges can point me to a lawyer with cojones big enough to give me a VIGOROUS defense against these kangaroos helping local influencers shut me down. That’s why this shelter program exists, right, to allow the altruistic philosophy of our Westridge Judges to HELP the poor homeless accused of crimes?

The recurring events fit the philosophies of the municipal court’s three judges, all former public defenders who were elected in 2021 after running as a “slate” of reform-minded candidates.

“We’re just giving them a hand, we’re pointing them in the direction of where they can get help,” Municipal Judge Jennifer Streano said. “And people can choose to do so, or not.”

Well, Judge Streano, maybe if you hadn’t been on vacation last summer when the CIVIL process of granting my petitioner her order or protection occurred, you would have more accurately vetted the individual and the REAL reasons behind her lawfare against me.

Since I don’t know IF I will be taken to jail again, or WHEN, I’m going to prepare this blog to CONTINUE in my absence, so stay tuned this week for a post introducing a new administrative personality to the virtual pages of Zoom Chron. And if you’re feeling generous, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) hasn’t seen a donation in over a month, so please consider supporting me if you haven’t already.

Thanks for reading!

by Travis Mateer

11 years ago, at the other blog I contributed to, you can see my funny little progressive heart as it yearned for a true champion of my cherished ideals. Now, I sympathize with Mike’s comment much more than my own progressive ramblings.

Were artists, like Crumley, really as libertarian as Mike claims? Or is the son of a CIA man more accurate in his bourbon-soaked claim?

Hey, Pete, guess who DID take some literature classes? I also know how to used a search engine, Pete, which is how I found this little blurb from Crumley himself (emphasis mine):

JC: I grew up in Texas and I got to Montana as quickly as I could. Once I got here, they were never able to dislodge me. I’ve been in Montana 36 years. Obviously I’m not particularly fond of my childhood, or of some of the political things that happened in Texas, the way the Mexicans are treated and the way the blacks are treated. I’m not “a Texan.” I didn’t grow up believing in the Texas myth. This was a chance to say something about it. In some ways it’s the most personal of my novels, even though none of that shit ever happened to me.

Based on this quote, I’d say James Crumley would probably be AGAINST the euthanizing of a black man in a private hospital room by the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office. I wonder, what might other famous Montana writers have to say, like Norman and Dick? Would they be impressed with the DEMOCRAT Sheriff that scurried away from a Mayoral run like a punk-ass bitch? Probably not.

Moving on, The Pulp has an article about Democrats in Montana and why they suck so bad. One scapegoat being utilized is shitty local media. Funny.

As social policy planks became key for political parties, it became increasingly difficult for politicians to differentiate themselves from national party leaders. It’s a phenomenon Saldin described as the “nationalization” of American politics.

“Those local and statewide considerations don’t resonate for voters in the way that they used to. What’s filled that is the nationalized discourse,” Saldin said. “That’s poison for any Democrat running in Montana.”

Crucial, too, to the dwindling importance of local politics was the rapidly shrinking news media landscape. The United States has lost nearly 1,800 newspapers since 2004, including in Montana. According to a 1986 report by the Montana Historical Society, 14 newspapers were published in Kalispell between 1920 and 1980. Today, there are two.

As local newspapers shuttered amid economic pressure, voters turned increasingly to cable TV and hyper-partisan national news sources, which were devoid of the local and state coverage that once flourished in Montana. Americans became more likely to vote Republican or Democratic down the ballot, regardless of the policy planks of individual candidates.

I’ll have more to say about all this in the coming week, so stay tuned. And if you’re feeling generous, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) hasn’t seen a donation in over a month, so what are you waiting for? When you support me, you support the joy I bring to Zoom Town with my LEGO METH LAB, so donate TODAY! Any little bit helps.

Thanks for reading!

by Travis Mateer

This morning I returned to my first Trash Alchemist Awesome and Amazing Autonomous Zone (TAAAAAZ) because this empty lot where the Sleepy Inn once existed had a problem–an overturned sign! I’ve noticed this overturned sign since that storm event (a derecho, they say) and, well, what can I say. I don’t see something, SAY something–I see something and I DO something.

You’re welcome, Annelise! I can credit having a TOTAL SHIT morning, combined with hearing one of your not-ads ads on the radio, for deciding today was the day I’d return (very temporarily) to where I still would like to build that Thunderdome. It would go great with my Lego Meth Lab!

Speaking of my LML, my first date with ChatGPT might have been a total disaster had it not been for the delightful suggestions about how to build a Lego Meth Lab I received. I’d say, unlike with human women, my prospects are LOOKING GOOD for a second date!

Unless, of course, Chatty is easily offended, because I’m sure there’s something in the song I recorded earlier today, at the future location of my Thunderdome, that will offend either mere mortals, or the bots, at places like Reddit. Although, to give them credit, that online community DOES appear more eager to investigate things than the Missoula County Sheriff’s Office, which seems kind of weird to me.

If you’d like to help support my sorry ass, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is the online place to do it. Any little bit helps.

Thanks for reading!

Oh, and welcome to Montana, Mr. Trump!

by Travis Mateer

I took this picture of a pretty amazing sign as the sun worked to crest the mountains behind Stockman’s bank. Why is this sign amazing? It’s amazing because this is the FIRST TIME a physical FOR SALE sign has graced the intersection of Front and Orange, so obviously an entire news article should probably be written about, right Skiggy?

This week, Sterling Commercial Real Estate Advisors of Missoula finally put big signs on the lots downtown at the intersection of Front Street and Orange Street near the Clark Fork River.

The city of Missoula owns the parcel with the uncovered asphalt parking lot closest to Orange Street south of Front, but the three surrounding parcels including one along the river are privately owned by Riverfront Triangle Partners LLC of Missoula.

“It’s been for sale for four years, we never had a sign on it though,” explained Matt Mellot, managing partner and commercial real estate adviser at Sterling. “We had it under contract three different times.”

With this exciting news hitting our exciting town where the show Yellowstone was filming last night, I couldn’t help satisfying my curiosity about the players going more public about their excitement that some day this land will sell, like the former library, and the former Sleepy Inn.

Before getting to the farm team, I took this somewhat blurry picture last night after seeing all the ACTION from the Yellowstone filming near Grizzly Grocery. I’ve written about this particular Yellowstone filming location before, but I hadn’t seen it active. There were several uniformed Missoula police officers standing around moonlighting, and I even heard someone yell CUT! Hopefully no trees changed the visuals for our Hollywood pals, like Taylor, who enjoys purchasing historic ranches when he isn’t creating horsey porn.

Getting back to the farm team, I Googled Matt Mellot’s name and found that his development company is ALSO involved in the proposed project west of town, at the Wye. This “massive” project could even have its own farm. Is having a farm some kind of new trendy amenity? From the link:

A standalone community with its own farm and potentially hundreds of homes at the Wye west of Missoula was initially approved by county officials this week. 

The Missoula Consolidated Planning Board unanimously approved the Grass Valley Gardens subdivision on Tuesday, and the Missoula County Commissioners will consider the project on August 8. The subdivision includes the first four phases of a larger development and includes 445 residential units and seven commercial lots. 

“I hope this really builds out and becomes what it’s proposed to become because we’ve been very vocal about wanting mixed-use development,” said Rick Hall, a planning board member. “I think it’s a great plan.”

Is Tax Increment schemes a part of this “plan”? Of course! But if you even START to think critical thoughts, our local officials are ready to FARM ’em away (emphasis mine):

In 2020 and 2023, Missoula County implemented two targeted economic development districts around the Wye to allow the collection of tax increment revenue to help pay for needed roads, water, sewer and stormwater infrastructure. As improvements are made in the district and property taxes go up, the difference in tax revenue is collected in a fund for further investment in the district.

The planning commissioners were supportive of the initial project as well as the long-term plan while recognizing the challenges of building in the area. 

Dave Loomis praised the project’s mixed-use design but said the county has a lot of filling in to do at the Wye to address transportation needs. 

Commission President Sean McCoy, who owns a farm, said if developed, the project’s central farm could produce a lot of food for the area and advocated for establishing the agricultural piece of the project sooner rather than later.

Wait, this farm team has SEAN MCCOY on it? Hilarious! This is the guy who I reported on 8 WHOLE MONTHS before local media got around to realizing McCoy had a checkered past that he wasn’t being forthcoming about. So glad he has a farm and a government position to help this “massive” development.

When we talk about the County farm team, we can’t forget another farmer, County Commissioner Josh Slotnick, and his funny farm fumbles with Corner Farm. Don’t worry, City Councilor, Bob Campbell, is on the case! If Bob’s investigative skills as a former cop are anything like Detective Guy Baker’s, I’m confident Josh and the rest of the farm team have NOTHING to worry about.

No one tied to government money yanked from your wallet should be worrying too much right now because, with so many trees down from the storm, and with the fire risk still prevalent, who wants to light the torches and pick up the pitchforks?

Thanks to passive citizens who just keep taking it, no one in local government is going to balk at taking more money for the many “needs” of our growing community, like a NEW BOOKMOBILE for the trillion dollar library. Remember how just a few weeks ago it was reported that the library spent $365,000 on a climbable DNA structure that’s not safe to climb?

Did I want to create a bookmobile for my amazing book collection? Sure, but here’s the thing: fuck me. I made the mistake of trying to raise the alarm about vast corruption in this town, so anything I might want do needs to be dealt with accordingly.

If you want to start understanding the scope of what I’ve been investigating, White Supremacist Story Time is just part I, and I’ve got 4 other parts written and ready to go, but I don’t think ONLINE is the place for my True Crime essay using synchronicities to shift from a WHO DONE IT to a WHO IS GONNA DO IT perspective is the place to put it out, so stay tuned for how to obtain this explosive piece of writing.

If you’d like to support my work, Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF) is the place to do it, and any bit helps.

Thanks for reading!

Hello, my name is Travis, and I’m one of the homeless people that your tax increase is intended to help. I’d like to take responsibility for what’s happening to your taxes because NO ONE ELSE will, not even the voters who our Mayor can AND WILL now point at when jaws drop at the 16% figure we’re being told is coming. From the link (emphasis mine):

Missoula’s proposed 2025 budget would increase property taxes by roughly 16%, but a majority of that — around 11% — comes from a voter-approved fire levy that passed in June.

Mayor Andrea Davis presented her first budget as the city’s top executive Monday night, which would increase city property taxes by $307 per $450,000 in home value.

In total, the city’s preliminary budget increased from $203 million in 2024 to $217 million in 2025, mostly from expansion of the city’s fire department, police department wage increases and more funding for urban camping programs. Missoula’s budget increased taxes by 9.71% in 2024.

How does our Mayor message her NON-responsibility for this tax increase? She uses words like INHERIT and STRUCTURE to convey a simple message: NOT MY FAULT!

“This is no news to anybody, I inherited a pretty challenging budget structure, a budget deficit quite frankly,” Davis said. “I knew that coming into office, and it has been an area of focus that I intend to work on.”

In yesterday’s post I highlighted the shell-game with the Missoula Redevelopment Agency that our blameless Mayor hinted at when she said money was taken from MRA to cover city budget costs. I’m sure our diligent legacy media will be ALL OVER that, giving us specific numbers. I’ll wait.

While washing dishes yesterday, professionally, I asked my property-owning co-worker if she was enjoying her tax increase, and if she was aware of Tax Increment Financing. It took me less than 5 minutes to horrify her with how our municipal general fund is impacted by the method of skimming off increased tax value from Urban Renewal Districts and sending it to the Missoula Redevelopment Agency so Ellen Buchanan can help Mexican restaurants buy new windows.

Think I’m kidding? Well, I’m not (emphasis mine):

A local Mexican restaurant will be getting a big makeover and a boost of public funding to help the project.

The board of the Missoula Redevelopment Agency recently approved $50,000 in Façade Improvement Program assistance to help the El Cazador Taqueria replace aging windows with a more energy-efficient option.

Maria and Alfredo Hernandez owned and operated the El Cazador in downtown Missoula for 27 years. A few years ago, they bought the building at 2221 S. Ave. W. and now have moved their restaurant operations to that location.

This fiscally retarded financing of new windows for a Mexican restaurant occurred in 2022, with that alleged pandemic in full swing, and ARPA money flowing. But don’t worry, NONE OF THIS is Mayor Davis’ fault.

That’s because it’s MINE!

Not only did I fail to solve homeless when I worked for the Homeless Industrial Complex, but now I’m one of those needy assholes who thinks it’s more important to smoke a nice strain of Sativa than it is to pay $1,000 bucks for a little room to stay in.

It’s exciting to think that entire new government job positions will have to be created to deal with me and my status of living without housing. What kind of help can I expect to receive when the hundreds of thousands of dollars gets approved and all those fresh faces are hired? Will they help me stop drinking? No, I did that myself. Will they help get me a job? No, I did that myself. Will they make Cannabis more affordable for me? No, they need those taxes to cover administrative costs.

According to Susie Lindsay, the Lead Fiscal Analyst for the DOR, in 2023, Montana collected over $57.7 million from cannabis tax revenue. Of that $57.7 million, $47.7 million came from adult use sales, $3 million came from from medical use sales, and the rest were licensing and fees and other administration fees.

Again according to HB 701, at the end of each year, the Department of Revenue must use money in the account to cover admin costs. For 2023, that number came out to be $5.6 million.

$6 million went straight to the Heart Fund account, which is an initiative helping people heal and end addiction through recovery and treatment.

Damn! Maybe I should have waited to end my addiction in order to get compensated somehow for being an addict. For more information on how weed tax money is spent, here’s a simple graphic:

During difficult times people often come together and, with combined resources, find ways to scrape by. What I’m trying to say is I need to get out there and start dating, but human women are kinda terrifying to me, and Vicky, my doll, doesn’t talk back, so after some reflection (and prodding from friends), I decided to go on a first date with AI.

Tomorrow, at Western Montana News, you can read how that first date went, and what I learned from it. I was particularly impressed with ChatGPT’s understanding of Lego Meth Labs, so stay tuned!

If you’d like to make yourself feel better by helping out someone who is less fortunate, then I suggest donating to Travis’ Impact Fund (TIF). There’s even a chance that a wave of moral superiority will wash over you after your digital donation is complete, so what are you waiting for?

Thanks for reading!