Unfettered Letters

Public begging

I would imagine there are several lawyers at City Hall. Aren’t any of these professionals capable of writing a city ordinance prohibiting beggars (some who seem to take pride in the appellation) from plying their “trade?”

Today I noticed three at one intersection attempting to stop traffic with their appeals. Last weekend I saw four maintaining their usual places at one heavily trafficked corner on the Country Club Plaza. Periodically they would surrender their posts to allow others to beg. Such activity really does not do much for that area or for the city as a whole.

A few short weeks ago I was escorting visitors from overseas when a panhandler started screaming “racist” at me because I failed to make a contribution. I guess it was a good tactic, as people following behind me made certain to cough up money rather than being screamed at.

T. Allen Lesley
Independence

Panhandling law

Jerry Fridel (8/7, Voices) appears to be upset that Kansas City Police Chief Jim Corwin is refusing to enforce the city’s new panhandling laws.

I applaud the chief for recognizing an inevitable class-action lawsuit against the city. This should only be proof that holding a job on the City Council requires little intelligence about enacting such laws and that maybe we should give the chief a break for exercising his common sense.

Greg Hand
Lee’s Summit

Panhandling ordinance

This is in response to “KC police refuse to enforce law on begging; The department says the panhandling ordinance violates the Constitution and would not pass legal muster” (8/3, A-1).
Panhandling is a mixed bag. We don’t want people soliciting for food or money in places that may cause discomfort for the comfortable. The former City Council acted in haste to deter the solicitations.
Safety was quoted as one reason for stopping panhandlers. However, donations for Muscular Dystrophy, Shrine circus and other charitable causes at street corners have been allowed for years. I hate this type of solicitation. It is annoying to the drivers and dangerous to those collecting.
As for those who are homeless and hungry and panhandling, where is our charity?
Margaret Heckendorn
Kansas City

Poverty and homelessness

Thank you, Bob Savino, for your letter in support of the homeless and poor people (4/9, “Panhandling ordinance”). It appears to me that you are a giving and compassionate person.

I agree that it is unbelievable that the Kansas City Council wants to make it illegal for poor people, and especially the homeless, to stand with a sign asking for money.

I often recall the saying, “There but for the grace of God go I.” Any person can have any number of misfortunes — medical bills, a job loss, an accident, a fire, a disease or disability — that could cause poverty or homelessness.

You are so correct when you say the ordinance is not about public safety but about trying to hide this very real and sad fact of life from the shoppers and other people who may come in contact with those who are much less fortunate.

K. Johnson
Overland Park

Panhandling ordinance

I recently saw a homeless man who was holding up his ragged cardboard sign while standing at a busy midtown intersection. I walked up, handed him a dollar, and chatted for a bit. He wasn’t drunk, disorderly, or aggressive — just broke, discouraged and down on his luck.

Once in my life, he could have been me.

Since the Kansas City Council has passed the proposed panhandling ordinance, it is now illegal for him to stand where he was standing, asking for money.

If this had happened a few days later, he would have been subject to rousting by the police, perhaps even arrest.

If he was panhandling on the Plaza, in Westport or at Zona Rosa, he wouldn’t even have been permitted to speak to me.

Maybe he’s one of the Veterans Affairs-estimated 195,000 homeless veterans on any given night. How easily yesterday’s “heroes” become today’s pariahs.

Can’t we at least dispense with the hypocrisy? This ordinance is not about public safety, as stated. This issue is merchants’ concern for appearances, for sanitized shopping venues where paying customers won’t have to confront the stark realities about our city.

Shame on all of us.

Bob Savino
Kansas City

Banning street performers

So now Kansas City wants to remove street performers from the Plaza and other areas. Great! While they’re at it, here are a few more good ideas:
Require all stores and restaurants to play the same type of music. Limit the variety of radio stations broadcasting in our area. Take down all the colored banners, flags and such around town. Get rid of the graphics on all Metro transit vehicles. Mandate that every single building in the entire city be painted the exact same color by the end of 2008.
Surely if we all put our minds together we can come up with even more ways to make Kansas City even more b-o-r-ing.
Ken Harbeck
Overland Park

Panhandling problem

I worked for Country Club Plaza security for four years in the 1990s and have had several dealings with the beggars in that area, especially Jerry Mazer. He always was and still is down by the Barnes & Noble bookstore, and he makes it very hard for customers to get in the store.
It would never fail that we would get complaints about him or others who would sleep in stairwells or doorways and scare people going to their cars or shopping.
I will avoid certain areas when I am shopping or driving because of the people begging for money. There are several places that they can go (City Union Mission, churches or the Salvation Army) to get help. It seems to me that they do not want help or just need money paying a car payment on a car that is parked down the street.
These people need to ask for help from an agency that can get them a job, instead of asking and expecting a handout from people who do work hard for a living and would like to enjoy life without being bothered when they try to go somewhere.
Angela Heitmann
Kansas City

Panhandling intrusion

People work to get the necessities of life and, hopefully, earn the reward of time away from work and world troubles. There is a proper time for work and for giving to church and a proper time to be left alone.
People on their way to dinner or on vacation or who are taking the kids to watch the game at the Sprint Center have earned the right to their away-from-troubles time.
For panhandlers, it’s not the cause or lack of compassion; it’s the timing. It is the invasion of someone else’s private time and space. It’s the in-person version of the telemarketing call at dinnertime.
Panhandling intrudes on the other people’s private time. That’s what makes it wrong.
George Thomas
Stanley

Panhandlers threatening

The lady who casually shrugged off complaints against panhandlers (2/20, Letters) is unable or unwilling to distinguish between mimes and street musicians and those dirty, aggressive addicts who use their threatening appearance to extort money to support drug and alcohol habits.
Sometimes it is not possible to simply “walk on the other side of the street.”
I have been approached while fueling my car. In one case the aggressor had a knife in his belt.
While not all panhandlers are dangerous, a significant number do become profane and violent if their demands are not met.
People come to Westport and the Plaza to shop and enjoy the entertainment opportunities. Street magicians and fiddle players are a part of the ambience that make visitors want to come back. But aggressive, foul-mouthed vagrants will send tourist dollars elsewhere.
City authorities had better take control of this situation before the Plaza and the new Sprint Center go the way of Indian Springs and Bannister Mall.
Patrick McWilliams
Edwardsville

Well-known panhandler

Regarding Hearne Christopher’s column about Jerry Mazer (2/21, FYI, “Panhandler gives his two cents”): Why would anyone give that man one dime, let alone an entire article in the newspaper. Who cares?

Why not report a story on one of the many local military personnel on duty serving our country? They are the people who matter, not some guy complaining because Sarah McLachlan was rude to him.

Fran White
Overland Park