It’s looking to be an oppressive summer for St. Petersburg’s homeless, and I’m not just talking about the heat.
Mayor Rick Baker and the St. Petersburg City Council will unveil their projected cuts to the city budget at a Friday workshop and the chances that social services will survive look increasingly slim. Sarah Snyder of the Homeless Leadership Network tells me there will be no money for additional emergency shelter space this year. Mental health services and other programs are facing cuts as well.
But the City Council isn’t stopping with budget cuts; they are also meeting to discuss ways to limit the money homeless people make themselves.
Tomorrow, council members will take on the issue of panhandling at a 1:30 p.m. workshop at City Hall. For years, residents and council members have complained about those ubiquitous shaggy men and women holding signs on our medians asking for a bit of change, but in recent weeks, police officers have harassed the panhandlers in an attempt to drive them off the roadways (in one case, slapping a homeless man with a $73 fine). Now, the City Council wants to pursue an ordinance limiting begging throughout the city.
But city officials may want to tread carefully. State courts have ruled that passive panhandling is protected under the First Amendment. Plus, by instituting a blanket ban on people standing in road medians, the city could anger fundraising fire fighters and, of course, those Sunday Times hawkers. Not to mention the city already lost a court battle over the aforementioned ticket.
On the surface, this looks like another attempt by city officials to criminalize a problem attributed to homelessness before trying to come up with a solution.
This article appears in Jun 20-26, 2007.