During the Great Depression, the newly homeless squatted outside American cities in shantytowns derisively christened Hoovervilles. Last week Los Angeles opened a spruced-up, officially sanctioned version of the same thing, called an "urban campground," on a dusty, windswept lot between the Los Angeles River and the city's skid row. From a distance, the rows of yellow- and-white canopies look as if they might have been set up for a garden party. But inside are only Army-green cots with portable toilets placed nearby. Guards from the Salvation Army, which worked with Mayor Tom Bradley to establish the settlement, frisked the 350 new...
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