No rush to commence begging trial

A proposal to use Safecity hosts to discourage people from giving money to beggars has been put off amid pleas to consider other options.

Palmerston North mayor Grant Smith said the proposal was too important to rush through, and the debate has been delayed until August.

The city council’s community development committee had earlier supported a two-month, $18,000 trial to extend the night time Safecity host programme into daylight hours.

But Mash Trust community support services manager Christina Hemmingsen told a city council meeting on Monday the council should look for a long-term solution to the visible problem of people begging in the streets.

She said lasting results would involve working one-on-one with people to understand what had driven them to beg, and working out solutions to meet their needs.

‘‘We do not believe there is one standard answer to why people beg. We need to develop understanding of the person and their unique needs.’’

Mash operations general manager Sharon Saxton said, ‘‘we don’t think anything is to be gained, to pop something in, and then take it away again’’.

Hemmingsen said Mash, which runs the Luck venue where people in need could visit to have meals, shower, do laundry and enjoy companionship, could do ‘‘quite a lot’’ with $18,000.

Mash was keen to work with the council to find the best way to tackle begging issues.

Both women said they supported the principles of the Give Wisely campaign, which encourages people to give to organisations that help the needy, rather than beggars, that would be promoted by the hosts. But neither were aware of any agencies that had received extra donations as a result of an earlier trial of Give Wisely.

And when Cr Aleisha Rutherford asked how agencies would be chosen to be promoted through the campaign this time, Safety Advisory Board member Steve Williams said those decisions had not been made yet. If the trial had been supported to go ahead, it was planned to begin in July.

City libraries and community services general manager Debbie Duncan said the Safecity day host trial had not been designed to address the wider social issues that surrounded begging.

‘‘The term ‘security guard’ has been bandied around, and that gives connotations of someone in uniform standing over people looking very grim.’’

Duncan said that was not the intention. She said the hosts were experienced in dealing with many difficult and challenging situations, and their role would be to have conversations with people, suggesting alternative ways to help rather than giving money to beggars.

She said the board was made up of representatives of a wide variety of government agencies, including those involved in social services.

She said if the trial went ahead, there would be daily reports and weekly monitoring, and its success would be judged by whether there were fewer beggars on the streets.

While, elsewhere, people may shy away from working together, 2016 has seen choral groups within our city reach out to choirs in other