Cincinnati City Council will vote today on an ordinance intended to curb aggressive panhandling.

        By a 6-0 vote, City Council's Law and Public Safety Committee approved a proposal Tuesday that Chairman Pat DeWine said would “put some teeth” into the city's anti-begging ordinance.

        The ordinance would place restrictions on the times that panhandling is allowed (between dawn and dusk), and the places where it is prohibited (on private property, a bus stop or within 20 feet of a bank or automated teller machine, or in a line outside any business).

        New are restrictions on what someone can say while panhandling.

        Lying about one's disability, veteran status or residence in order to solicit money would be forbidden. Even someone who misrepresents why he needs the money could find himself in jail.

        Mr. DeWine said the new law could apply to someone who asks for $5 for gas — but doesn't have a car.

        “That's not panhandling. That's a scam. It ought to be illegal, and this ordinance makes it illegal,” he said.

        Since taking up the issue late last year, City Council has had no shortage of stories from merchants. Tuesday's story came from Doug Kennedy, owner of Appointments on the skywalk level of the Carew Tower.

        He said a man who roams the “no man's land” in the skywalk between the Carew Tower and Lazarus will often follow alongside single women, nonchalantly asking them for money.

        “He is a constant intimidator to people who don't know who he is and don't know he's nonviolent,” Mr. Kennedy said. “... And when I talk to my clients, the reaction is always the same: "Why do I come down here to be abused?'”

        The ordinance says “passive” forms of panhandling — for example, standing or sitting on the sidewalk with a sign asking for money — are legal.

        Early opposition to the proposal seems to have abated. Alicia Beck, director of the Greater Cincinnati Coalition for the Homeless, told council members Tuesday that downtown businesses have “valid concerns.”

        E-mail gkorte@enquirer.com
       

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