Destin City Council bans "aggressive" panhandling (w/council roundup)

A new Destin ordinance would ban panhandling around the city’s beaches, the town center and the Destin harbor district, as well as banning “aggressive” panhandling throughout the town.

Destin City Council unanimously approved the ordinance Monday night, but it will require a second vote before it becomes law.
Under the ordinance, panhandlers in those three areas of Destin who keep begging after a police warning could be fined up to $500, imprisoned for up to 60 days or both.

The ordinance also outlaws aggressive panhandling, which it defines as making express or implied threats; continuing to beg or "verbally demand" payment after being told no; blocking the movement of pedestrians, bicycles, cars or wheelchairs; soliciting at bus stops, restaurants, on a bus, in a parked car or within 20 feet of an ATM machine.

City Manager Greg Kisela told The Log Monday that the city can't outlaw panhandling completely, but it can keep panhandlers out of the listed parts of the city by basing the restriction on the negative impact panhandling could have on tourism.

“The courts have said you can’t disallow panhandling, but you can limit it,” Kisela told the council Monday.

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For more on this story and others from Monday night's council meeting, click on http://frasersmind.freedomblogging.com/ .

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Meanwhile, Log staffer Jenni Rich provides this report.

No one wants a plague of panhandlers, but a Destin church that feeds many homeless and struggling workers is worried about the new law.

The Log asked the crowd at St. Andrews By-The-Sea Episcopal Church’s Monday lunch program if they thought an ordinance would curtail unwanted soliciting.

The struggling, but working clientele, seemed to have little hope for the ordinance or respect for those it targeted.

“I can’t believe that people actually give them (beggars) money,” Rudy Martin, a regular visitor at the church and resident of Destin Campground, told The Log.

With the homeless facing another hurdle to acquiring money to buy their next meal, the church is worried that its resources for helping the needy will begin to dry up faster.

Not being able to decipher who is starving and who is not, they would rather err on the side of helping their fellow man.

“I don’t know if that’s going to have an effect or not,” Father David Powell, pastor of St. Andrew’s, said of the ordinance.

Powell has seen people who “know the language of the law” and can get around such ordinances legally by holding up signs that say “God Bless You” and other phrases, not specifically asking for a donation.

Sightings of intoxicated homeless individuals passed out on well-manicured public lawns around Destin and the sometimes relentless demand for money has sparked complaints to the City Council.

“Nobody likes that in this town,” Rudy said.

Destin’s problem has not been as visible as neighboring Fort Walton Beach, where transients often stand on street corners with signs. To stave off that image in Destin, the city passed an ordinance Monday that prohibits soliciting, begging or panhandling in the Town Center, harbor area or the beaches of Destin.

Though the ordinance is now in place, many are skeptical about how effective any efforts to stop encounters with the homeless will be.
The new ordinance defines “aggressive soliciting” as a second degree misdemeanor and sites that a violation could result in up to a $500 fine and/or 60 days in jail.

“Sixty days in jail won’t stop them,” added Will Martin, Rudy’s brother. “They’d probably do it again so that they could go back to jail for free food.”

Also at Monday’s meeting:
•The council voted unanimously to hire the Choctawhatchee Basin Alliance to help meet federal stormwater-management requirements, including holding presentations for local organizations, developing a volunteer water-monitoring program and training city staff and residents on stormwater-runoff control measures.
The city will pay the CBA $25,000 for its work. Councilor Sam Seevers said it would cost the city at least three times that to do the same job in-house.
•The council made a formal declaration that the temporary construction easements Crystal Beach Drive owners had given the city in order to complete roadwork there were terminated.
•The council approved the city’s schedule of fees for the new fiscal years. The fees for city services remain the same, except for the rates charged for boats docking at city-owned boat slips on the Destin harbor.
•Kisela said that once work on Airport Road wraps up in a few weeks, the speed limits will return from 25 mph to 35 mph.
•The council voted unanimously to contract with Regions Bank for a city purchase card.