Be careful of what you wish for. … You might get it.
From a speech to the Nevada County Board of Supervisors that can only be described as pathetic in January 2019, I’ve accidentally evolved into the leader of the No Place To Go Project, a grassroots movement to allow people to live in RVs and trailers.
I’m not bragging. I never wanted to be a leader. I’m not particularly good at it. I know a dozen people who could do it better. Nevertheless, here I am.
Becoming a leader has been an unintended consequence of this op-ed column that I’ve been writing for the last five years. I wanted to write about homelessness and mental illness because I have lived experience with both – and I have a lot to say about that.
I’ve lived through multiple episodes of homelessness, survived childhood and spousal abuse, and benefited from years of cognitive behavioral therapy for my bipolar and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorders (ADHD).
I’m also educated, stubborn and driven by a desire to share what I’ve learned the hard way about overcoming adversity, about turning my weaknesses into strengths.
When I started this column, I didn’t think people would take me seriously. But they did – and that’s how you become an accidental leader.
Being a leader – especially when you never intended to be one – is an awful responsibility and obligation. I have to walk my talk.
Bad credit
There’s a fine line between taking credit and accepting responsibility.
Back in 2019, I wished for an RV ordinance that would allow people to live in RVs and trailers because that’s what saved me – and hundreds, maybe thousands of other people – from being homeless.
Seven years later, I got what I wished for. Nevada County has produced a proposed and revised RV ordinance.
It sucks.
Instead of making it possible for people to live in legally RVs & trailers, the ordinance is clearly designed to make it damn near impossible.
So, now, instead of taking credit for helping people find housing, I have to accept responsibility for making it even harder.
Well, not quite yet. The supervisors are scheduled to vote on it in a public hearing at the Rood Center in Nevada City at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, July 28.
An unintended consequence
The supervisors were originally scheduled to vote on the Alternative Housing/RV Dwelling Draft Ordinance March 10. Three of the supervisors –Lisa Swarthout, Sue Hoek and Hardy Bullock – caved to threats of lawsuits and opposition pressure. Supervisor Robb Tucker was never going to vote for it anyway.
Only Supervisor Heidi Hall defiantly stood her ground. She passionately reminded her colleagues that the ordinance was about providing badly-needed housing for the county’s most vulnerable people. She said the county has developed “zero” housing for its lowest income residents. “We are in a housing crisis. This is our community. This is about us working together.”
Instead of letting it go to a vote, Chair Lisa Swarthout offered a “compromise.” After some dithering about unintended consequences and such, the supervisors outvoted Hall 4-1 to send the ordinance back to staff for a rewrite.
The rewrite was published June 2. It’s even more restrictive and demonstrative of government overreach.
On July 2, the supervisors got a perhaps unanticipated unintended consequence. In an eight-page response to the revised ordinance (www.noplacetogoproject.org/dealbreakers), the No Place To Go Project Board of Directors informed the supervisors and senior staff that the revised ordinance is just “paper housing.”
We will neither support nor oppose the ordinance. We’re taking a better alternative housing ordinance that serves the people to a vote of the people.
US, the people
For more than seven years, by a clear majority, citizens have made good-faith, relentlessly reasonable attempts to petition the county to write an ordinance making it possible for people to live legally in RVs & trailers. Regardless, the county has proposed a revised ordinance that makes it even more impossible than the original ordinance.
Fool us once, shame on you. Fool us twice, shame on us. We’re not going to waste any more of our time and hope trying to convince the supervisors to do the right thing.
We could just give up and become housing outlaws, helping at-risk people in RVs to survive evade, resist and escape Code Compliance enforcement. But no. We’re not about breaking the law. We’re here to change the law.
Two weeks ago I wrote The Case Against Paper Housing. In it, I declared The No Place To Go Project’s intention to put a people-friendly initiative on the ballot. The next day, we received the largest donation in the Project’s history. And we’ve formed an alliance with the patron saint of illegal trailers, Brad Peceimer.
The Project is working to make what Brad does legal. Over the last 10 years, he has given away almost 400 trailers to deserving people. As a civil engineer, he ensures those placements he makes on private property meet health & safety standards for potable water and septic management.
Like me, Brad is an accidental leader. We’re natural allies. People follow us because of what we do for our fellow citizens in need.
“Be like Brad” is the mantra of the Gold Country Guardians (https://goldcountryguardians.org/), a brand-new nonprofit formed to support Brad’s selfless philanthropy – trailers, cars, firewood and so much more.
Putting an initiative on the ballot is a major enterprise. It’s going to take more than two years. We’re going to need money, lawyers and a small army of committed, organized volunteers.
If you want to be part of the solution, please write me at tom@noplacetogoproject.org or donate to the No Place To Go Project (www.noplacetogoproject.org/donate-now-1).
Government and free enterprise have failed us. So, it’s up to us, the people. If we want good government, we have to do it ourselves. Power to the people.
Tom Durkin is the executive director of the No Place To Go Project, a nonprofit organization using the creative arts to advocate social justice for at-risk and unhoused/homeless people. Donations are tax-deductible and gratefully appreciated. Durkin may be contacted at tom@noplacetogoproject.org.