Appeals Court Upholds Boulder's Camping Without Consent Ordinance

Here’s the Daily Camera's report:

“Boulder judge rejects homeless man’s appeal, upholds city’s anti-camping law”

(Update: the Colorado Supreme Court has refused to hear the case)

If you don’t own property, or rent (or otherwise have permission to use) property from someone else, you can at least still sleep on public property in Boulder. However, you can not use a blanket while sleeping on public property in Boulder. Because the use of a blanket is a serious threat to public health and the environment.

I wish I were exaggerating, but three times (once regarding the first issue on appeal, twice regarding the second) the court depends on the fact that the ordinance “allows people to sleep on public property at any time” to uphold the trial court’s ruling. The crime is not in the sleeping, it is in the use of “shelter” defined as “cover or protection from the elements other than clothing.”

The district court’s ruling also notes that the ordinance allows anyone “to use shelter for daytime napping.” I guess sleeping bags are only an environmental hazard at night.

The law doth punish man or woman
That steals the goose from off the common,
But lets the greater felon loose
That steals the common from the goose.