New job program tackles begging
Road litter crews add panhandlers
HOT SPRINGS — Enjoined by the courts from criminalizing panhandling, Hot Springs last week announced the coming rollout of an anti-poverty program that puts panhandlers to work.
City Manager Bill Burrough told the Board of Directors that the city and Jackson House expect to start the Hope Works initiative by the end of the month, offering homeless people and panhandlers minimum wage to pick up litter along roadways and in public areas.
Modeled after a program that began in Albuquerque, N.M., that’s since been adopted by numerous cities, Hope Works uses employment to build relationships that can steer participants to resources such as substance-abuse treatment and mental-health services.
“That’s really the core of the program,” Burrough told the board, explaining that the decision to adopt the program stemmed from a poverty meeting that the city held in June to better coordinate work among charities and nonsecular groups that serve the poor. “Hope Works is another tool to help impact the citizens with the services they need while offering them the opportunity to achieve some type of employment and beautify the city,” he said.
Because the program involves litter abatement, Burrough said money set aside in the city’s solid waste fund will pay for the litter crews. The city will also provide a vehicle, and Jackson House will staff and oversee the program. Jackson House provides emergency assistance to people in the community, according to the mission statement listed on informational forms it files annually with the Internal Revenue Service.
Executive Director Janie Smith said the nonprofit serves about 60,000 meals a year in addition to providing other assistance.
In years previous, after a federal judge invalidated the state’s loitering statute, the city board passed two anti-panhandling ordinances because people soliciting money or other items from drivers became prevalent near busy streets and intersections. A lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Arkansas led to the board’s repeal of a 2016 ordinance prohibiting soliciting near roadways.
Then in April, U.S. District Judge Robert T. Dawson ruled that the ordinance the board adopted in December 2017 unduly burdened what courts have said is the constitutional right to beg. The ruling enjoined the city from enforcing the ordinance and required it to pay ACLU of Arkansas $30,702 in attorney fees.
A Facebook page created earlier this year urges people to lobby the city for prohibitions on begging in public. It features photos and videos of panhandlers and people confronting panhandlers. Andy Anderson, the page’s creator, told the board Tuesday that an anti-poverty program won’t curtail such soliciting, explaining that most panhandlers he’s talked to have no interest in working.
“Some of these individuals I have run across do have mental problems,” he said. However, he said, many of them are young individuals who are able to work but have drug and alcohol problems. “Multiple people have messaged me on Facebook about how they’re being threatened in our marketplaces, downtown and on our street corners. You’ve got to do something,” Anderson said.
Others shared similar sentiments during the public comment period at last week’s board meeting, recounting how they have been accosted and threatened by panhandlers while their vehicles are stopped at busy intersections.
Some framed the problem as a societal failing instead of a character deficiency. They encouraged kindness toward panhandlers, telling the board that many people in the city are one financial emergency away from finding themselves in reduced circumstances.
Smith said money paid to panhandlers would be better spent supporting social services
Modeled after a program that began in Albuquerque, N.M., that’s since been adopted by numerous cities, Hope Works uses employment to build relationships that can steer participants to resources such as substance-abuse treatment and mental-health services.
providers.
“People who are giving them money are wasting their money,” she said. “I think there’s a better solution, like the one we’re going to start where people work and earn money. There’s a certain sense of pride you get from earning money. It’s totally different from just standing there and hoping someone will give you something.”
Smith said an outreach program at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church will focus on case management, including referring participants to services offered by other area nonprofits and faith-based groups.
“Just giving someone a job is not going to solve all their problems,” Smith said. “You have to transition them from homelessness to a sense of selfworth, responsibility, working on a schedule and in a team environment.”
Burrough told the board that the program will operate three days a week, with participants working four to five hours a day and focusing on litter along state and federal highways inside the city.
“We have litter crews who work on interior arterial streets or most of our heavily trafficked streets that aren’t state highways,” he said. “The city is full of state highways we don’t have control over. This program will focus on those particular areas.
“Hopefully we’ll be able to break this cycle of poverty by getting people connected into resources that can help them break the poverty chain. We can also beautify the city. We’re very proud of this program.”