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Montana Town Faces a Homelessness Problem Similar to San Francisco and L.A


andhra_jp

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Missoula’s parks are full of people in tents. Moving them is hampered by a court ruling that has frustrated many leaders in the American West.

Some 600 people without homes live in the Northern Rockies college town, triple the number of a decade ago, many of them in tents in city parks.
Their presence has sown growing anger among residents who say the parks have become dirty and unsafe.

Missoula has a law against camping in a park but can’t enforce it because of a 2018 ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which prevents officials from removing anyone camping in a public space in its Western U.S. jurisdiction unless there is a shelter for them to move to. Missoula has less than half the beds that would be necessary to comply with the order, most of which are already being used.

The average monthly cost of a one-bedroom apartment in Missoula is $1,195, up 50% from 2019, according to rental listings platform Zumper. Nationwide, the increase was 21%.

Unlike the large encampments that have proliferated in some West Coast cities, Missoula’s homeless people largely live in small groups of tents tucked beneath trees.

 

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