Solution needed to panhandling: business leader

Those who oppose more restrictions on panhandling need to start proposing solutions to the problem, the executive director of a downtown business association says.

Brent Penner, executive director of Downtown Saskatoon business improvement district, offered his reaction Tuesday to the demise of a more restrictive panhandling bylaw on a tied vote at city council on Monday.

Penner, who serves as chair of the city’s street activity steering committee, asked for greater restrictions on panhandling in March 2015, including a crackdown on panhandling near parking pay stations and near theatres.

Council endorsed a more restrictive bylaw that addressed those concerns in January by a 6-5 vote. That bylaw was defeated on a 5-5 vote on Monday, when Coun. Troy Davies, who backed the bylaw, was absent.

“The timing is unfortunate,” Penner said in an interview on Tuesday. “Had the entire council been there, the result could have been different. That’s the process. That’s democracy.”

The bylaw revisions that died on the tied vote would have banned panhandling from people using parking pay stations, waiting to use parking pay stations and accompanying someone using a parking pay station. The revised bylaw would also have prohibited panhandling within eight metres of the entrance to a theatre or a liquor store.

The suggestions came from the city’s community support officers, who noted rising concerns about panhandling after the new parking pay stations were introduced in 2015, Penner said.