Wake County passes panhandling ordinance

Americans need licenses to drive, to fly and to serve alcohol — and soon, Wake County residents will also need one to beg.

At an Oct. 17 meeting, the Wake County Board of Commissioners approved an ordinance requiring panhandlers to obtain permits to beg in public places.

Cities within Wake County, including Raleigh, already have limits on panhandling, but Chairman Paul Coble said there have been problems with aggressive panhandling outside of city limits.

“There were instances of people aggressively approaching cars, coming out into the intersection and banging on the glass,” he said. “It’s dangerous for the drivers, so the ordinance was created in response to that.”

With the permit requirement, Coble said it will be easier for law enforcement officers to target those panhandlers who are belligerent.

The ordinance passed in a 6-1 vote.

Chapel Hill has also experienced consistent problems with aggressive panhandling, but town Councilwoman Penny Rich said she thinks it’s unlikely the council will implement similar restrictions any time soon.

She said she thinks the goal of Wake County was to make it harder for people to panhandle.

She added that improving safety in downtown Chapel Hill is a priority to the council, but she thinks requiring permits for panhandling would not be effective.

“Panhandling is an issue that doesn’t go away,” she said. “As much as you try to put ordinances to stop it, people have the right to panhandle.”

But Wake County officials hope the accessibility and ease-of-use of the permit will help decrease aggressive panhandling.

Coble said the law draws a distinction between panhandlers and groups like school charity organizations.

For those who are begging for personal profit and need permission, the permit is free, can be renewed annually and requires photo identification.

He said not all panhandlers are homeless, and some solicit as a source of income.

“If people are truly in trouble, we have programs in the county to help them,” he said. “But there is a group who are doing this purely as a business proposition.”

But Neil Donovan, executive director of the National Coalition for the Homeless — a Washington, D.C.-based organization whose purpose is ending homelessness — said he thinks the distinction looks to criminalize homelessness itself.

He said many communities that struggle with homelessness try to restrict actions associated with the homeless.

“We think that whether it’s a homeless person who needs some income or an activist … or a faith-based organization, all of them have history of aggressive panhandling,” Donovan said. “I believe that there needs to be things in place that prevent that from happening as well.”

Coble said James West, the one commissioner to vote against the new ordinance, opposed it for similar reasons.

And the John Locke Foundation, a conservative think tank based in the Triangle, joined the dissent.

Daren Bakst, director of legal and regulatory studies at the foundation, said he thinks the law doesn’t address the problem of panhandling and at the same time creates problems for the truly needy.

“The permit itself may be free, but you have to present an ID to get the permit, which people might not be able to get,” he said. “It’s really overkill to require people that have little to no money to have to get a permit to simply ask for money to survive.”

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