You’ve all encountered pan-handlers before, whether on the side of the road requesting food & money or worse yet directly in front of your favorite establishment. They are a nuisance.
With all the Day labor agencies in town there is always a way to make cash on a daily basis if they really wanted/needed money. If they are a Vet then the Veterans Admin can help them. Finding shelter isn’t that difficult when you have the Salvation Army around and other non-profit agencies.
I once saw a guy on the side of the road by my job with a sign that said “will work for food” but he had his leg bandaged up and had crutches. Later that same day I saw the same guy walking withOUT the crutches and drinking something from a brown paper bag. (Makes you wonder how many of thes pan-handlers are for real)
Should pan-handling be allowed? If so where do we draw the line? Only downtown?(Is that fair to the establishements they hang out in front of?) Only outside the city limits? Only on the side of highways?
IMHO, I completely support any community that wishes to ban panhandling (and rigorously enforce that ban), provided that the community also provides a minimum level of social services that renders the panhandling unnecessary. Most communities already provide the requisite services, so the heck with panhandling.
Should SUVs be Illegal
You’ve all encountered SUVs before, whether on the road running down your grandmother or worse yet taking up five parking spaces directly in front of your favorite establishment. They are a nuisance.
With all the car dealerships in town there is always a way to get a non-annoying car if they really wanted/needed transport. If they have children then a sedan can be used. Finding transport isn’t that difficult when you have buses and trains around and other government services.
Should SUVs be allowed? If so where do we draw the line? Only in the suburbs? (Is that fair to the people who drive on suburban roads?) Only outside the city limits? Only off road?
What is your opinion?
My opinion is that my idea is more practical and more sensible than yours (and around here, quite possibly more popular). And that’s really saying something.
Short answer: Yes, with an “if”. Long answer: No, with a “but”.
Now gather 'round while Uncle Atty tells a story.
About 6 or 8 years ago, signs went up all over my neighborhood streetcorners that said No Right Turn 9pm-5am. These signs made it nearly impossible to hunt for a parking space without driving 8 blocks away to find a place where you could make a legal right turn. Your only other option was to sit and wait for oncoming traffic to grant you right of way to make three left turns which took almost as long as driving the 8 blocks.
What in the world was the DCPD trying to do? What danger were we being shielded against, aside from uneven wear & tear on our car’s CV joints?
You will probably guess the answer yourself once I tell you that this area was the infamous 14th Street Corridor, once DC’s scummiest red-light district. The signs gave police the legal justification to pull over people who were obviously circling the block looking for $45 blow jobs.
So it came to pass. Blow-job-seekign customers were forced into the left lane so they could continue circling, and protitutes had to walk down the middle of the street to continue to be close to their client base. Police have no intention of ticketing 99.9% of people making right turn even though the signs technically give them permission to do so.
Now, eight years later, the the prostitutes have all moved over to 8th Street and blowjobs are down to $25 a pop. My area is now considered one of the hottest areas in DC, and property values have gone through the roof. I’m also considering turning republican. No, nix that last idea.
So it is with vagrancy laws. Pan handling, loitering, etc. are “outlawed” to give police the option of selective law enforcement. Therein lies the topic for a whole 'nother thread.
I think it should be outlawed in places where other legal alternatives are available. In my town there are numerous agencies set up to help those down on their luck. The problem is that when I’ve offered to help someone get to one of these places the response has always been something along the lines of “Give me money, or Fuck Off”!
You think that it should be illegal to ask someone for money or to hold a sign in a public place?
Personally, if I were homeless I would probably want to drink a lot too. It isn’t as fun as it looks and the options aren’t as attractive as you seem to think they are. In addition, many of the homeless have mental health problems.
When I was in California near Alcatraz there was a guy sitting with a sing that said: “Will work for beer” I took a picture of it cause I thought it was pretty funny
The arguments against panhandling seem to be “they could get a job if they wanted to”. But this doesn’t address the question of whether the state is justified in preventing an individual from begging for money. I can’t think of a justification for this. Panhandlers aren’t completely stupid. If they don’t get any money, they won’t waste their time begging. On the other hand, if someone is willing to give them money, that’s their perogative. Unless they are obstructing traffic or otherwise infringing on the rights of others, I say let them beg.
In our current society, I guess one could argue that they should be licensed (hell, you need a license to cut hair) and regulated as to where they can beg.
I think you’re making some broad assumptions here about the availability of services for the poor and homeless, and using that as an argument for why panhandling should be illegal. While I am not naive enough to believe that all panhandlers are downtrodden lost souls who happen to hit a spot of bad luck, neither do I believe that all panhandlers are lying drunks who are simply too lazy to get aid as expected.
I doubt such a licensing scheme could pass Constitutional muster because it would be a speech restriction that is content-based. In other words, someone panhandling for spare change is required to get a license, but someone soliciting funds for the Republican National Committe would not. Ditto on the place restriction.
There are generally vagrancy or loitering laws that could be enforced to crack down on panhandling, though again, there could be a Constitutional problem if the police are only arresting the panhandlers and not those who are soliciting funds for other goals.
Point is - panhandling is speech, and any attempt to try and single out that form of speech for disparate treatment invokes the First Amendment.
A city ordinance to ban panhandlers was introduced here by one of our assemblymen. It was roundly trounced. However, a compromise ordinance came out of it wherein drivers are forbidden to hand anything out of a car window to panhandlers or anyone else. This effectively removed panhandlers from the streets without infringing on their right to stand there and beg. Surprisingly, nobody has challenged this law yet as being an infringement on some sort of freedom.
Alright, I saw this threat earlier, thought banning panhandling would be a silly idea, and moved on.
Now I return to it and I’m starting to get steamed.
I can understand having laws against aggressive panhandling - following people down the street, harassing them, standing right next to an ATM, etc. That makes sense. Nobody should be subject to intimidation by homeless people seeking money, and many cities already have laws against such kinds of activities.
But banning panhandling, period? Does the simple act of poor people innocently asking for money, for whatever purpose, so offend one’s sensibilities that we should legislate an end to the oh-so-horribly depraved practice of trying to obtain money without an exchange of goods or services?
I really wonder about our country’s morals if stopping begging is a higher priority than stopping poverty.
I tend to think that it should be illegal, for the most part, simply because having to endure aggressive panhandling can cause people to steer away from certain areas, depressing local economies (in my experience, panhandlers almost always set up near stores where people are likely to have change coming out).
The line between ‘aggressive’ panhandling and ‘regular’ is fairly fluid, tough, depending on the panhandler and the mark…so as a matter of law, outlawing all panhandling seems the safest bet.
Also bear in mind, by making it illegal, I’m not condoning imprisonment…but I think that police would have a an obligation to transport the panhandler to the nearest shelter or other agency that offers services for the homeless.
Isabelle, can you please explain for us again why an entire class of people should have their first-amendment rights suspended just so you don’t have to experience the momentary discomfort of looking at them?
No. Pan-handling shouldn’t be illegal. If it upsets/bothers some people, well why don’t you donate to shelters? Rather than thinking up ways to make poor people’s lives harder, why don’t you think up ways to help? I have never been bothered by pan-handlers so I don’t understand why this is such a big deal that it requires legislation.
I’m sorry if other’s people’s debilitating problems bother you, Isabelle. What doesn’t bother you? First it’s gay people getting a day at Disney, then Ozzy Osbourne and now it’s pan-handlers. Geez, if Isabelle was president, we’d all have to be rich, sober, heterosexuals.
Pan-handling shouldn’t be illegal. Ignorance should be.