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'Persuasion' new plan for redirecting panhandlers
With ticketing seen as ineffective, city will consider adding caseworkers to find alternatives and coax beggars off the street
JENNIFER LEWINGTON AND JAMES BRADSHAW
The Globe and Mail
April 26, 2008
An ambitious but expensive strategy to end panhandling on Toronto streets announced yesterday proposes to use "friendly persuasion" instead of punitive tactics to help those begging for spare change to find a new life.
The strategy, built on the city's recent success in helping homeless people find permanent housing - 1,700 in the past three years - is set for debate at council's executive committee early next month.
If approved by council, the city would boost funding for its Streets to Homes program to $4.9-million this year from $2.3-million, adding the equivalent of 48 full-time outreach workers, up from 23 at present. The program, which now operates five days a week, would become a seven-day-a week operation with enhanced service in the downtown core.
It would be extended to include panhandlers, some of whom have homes but have mental health issues, and "street-involved" youth such as so-called squeegee kids. The outreach workers would help them find housing if necessary, and provide other counselling and assistance to coax them from the street.
Next year, the budget would climb to $7.3-million, with the city looking for help from the federal and provincial governments and businesses.
For aggressive panhandling - illegal under provincial legislation - the city plans to ask Queen's Park to consider diversion courts or other alternatives because ticketing by the police has been ineffective.
"Panhandling is not a preferred activity by the participants, they need real alternatives," said Councillor Joe Mihevc (Ward 21, St. Paul's), chairman of the community development and recreation committee, citing a first-ever city survey of panhandlers included in the report going to the executive committee. "When most people are given those real alternatives, this activity will stop."
He concedes that it would be "too grand a claim" to say that new intervention efforts, with housing, mental health and other supports, would eliminate panhandling. "But it will certainly reduce it substantially," he contends.
Yesterday, the proposal drew mixed reactions.
Street nurse Cathy Crowe, a co-founder of the Toronto Disaster Relief Committee, was skeptical the city could deliver on the promise of adequate housing.
"There's still not a lot of places out there where people can be suddenly housed," she said. "So people are going into places that have been refused by everyone else under the sun, and that's because they're cockroach infested or whatever," she said.
Terry Mundell, president of the Greater Toronto Hotel Association, praised the proposal as "a real effort to make a significant difference in the panhandling situation." Many of his members are concerned that panhandling creates a "brand-image problem" for tourism.
But Councillor Doug Holyday (Ward 3, Etobicoke Centre) said the city is far too lenient with panhandlers and should emulate New York's zero-tolerance approach.
"They shouldn't have to tolerate [panhandlers], and we shouldn't allow it, but we do," he said. "All you have to do is come to Toronto, find yourself a piece of cement, set up your own encampment down there, and we'll find you a house and job. How many people are going to come here to get that?"
Phil Brown, the city's general manager of shelter, support and housing, which developed the proposal, defended the request for beefed-up funding.
"You do need a major investment to help these people off the street," he said, adding that the new strategy has a payback through less need for police and emergency services and reduced incidents of alcohol and drug use on the street.
Meanwhile, slouched against a fire hydrant in the heart of Toronto's financial district soliciting change in a baseball cap, one panhandler said that access to housing is "the biggest stepping stone" to breaking the cycles of poverty and addiction.
The panhandler, who wanted to be identified only as Mark, said he would be receptive if approached by a Streets to Homes worker.
"Oh certainly. It'd take some time, but yeah, it'd be good," he said.
Mere blocks away, James Ignace huddled with three homeless compatriots, seeking change in an empty coffee cup while warming himself over a current of air flowing from a sidewalk grate.
"Housing is the best; it's not about money," he said. "Say somebody comes by and gives you $200. Where is that going to get you?"
Panhandler profile
Who are the panhandlers? A first-ever city survey carried out in 2007 found:
Of 408 "legal" panhandlers - those not engaged in illegal, aggressive activity - 300 were homeless.
Of the total, 110 had housing but needed additional assistance. With help from city caseworkers, 69 of them were no longer panhandling when a pilot project wrapped up last September.
An intensive survey of 223 panhandlers in the downtown core found that 83 per cent were male; 23 per cent self-identified as aboriginal, and 73 per cent had been homeless for slightly more than two years.
Of the 223, 79 per cent said they wanted to stop panhandling.
The best thing about panhandling, according to those interviewed, is the socializing. The worst thing was the negative reaction from the public. Jennifer Lewington
With ticketing seen as ineffective, city will consider adding caseworkers to find alternatives and coax beggars off the street
JENNIFER LEWINGTON AND JAMES BRADSHAW
The Globe and Mail
April 26, 2008
An ambitious but expensive strategy to end panhandling on Toronto streets announced yesterday proposes to use "friendly persuasion" instead of punitive tactics to help those begging for spare change to find a new life.
The strategy, built on the city's recent success in helping homeless people find permanent housing - 1,700 in the past three years - is set for debate at council's executive committee early next month.
If approved by council, the city would boost funding for its Streets to Homes program to $4.9-million this year from $2.3-million, adding the equivalent of 48 full-time outreach workers, up from 23 at present. The program, which now operates five days a week, would become a seven-day-a week operation with enhanced service in the downtown core.
It would be extended to include panhandlers, some of whom have homes but have mental health issues, and "street-involved" youth such as so-called squeegee kids. The outreach workers would help them find housing if necessary, and provide other counselling and assistance to coax them from the street.
Next year, the budget would climb to $7.3-million, with the city looking for help from the federal and provincial governments and businesses.
For aggressive panhandling - illegal under provincial legislation - the city plans to ask Queen's Park to consider diversion courts or other alternatives because ticketing by the police has been ineffective.
"Panhandling is not a preferred activity by the participants, they need real alternatives," said Councillor Joe Mihevc (Ward 21, St. Paul's), chairman of the community development and recreation committee, citing a first-ever city survey of panhandlers included in the report going to the executive committee. "When most people are given those real alternatives, this activity will stop."
He concedes that it would be "too grand a claim" to say that new intervention efforts, with housing, mental health and other supports, would eliminate panhandling. "But it will certainly reduce it substantially," he contends.
Yesterday, the proposal drew mixed reactions.
Street nurse Cathy Crowe, a co-founder of the Toronto Disaster Relief Committee, was skeptical the city could deliver on the promise of adequate housing.
"There's still not a lot of places out there where people can be suddenly housed," she said. "So people are going into places that have been refused by everyone else under the sun, and that's because they're cockroach infested or whatever," she said.
Terry Mundell, president of the Greater Toronto Hotel Association, praised the proposal as "a real effort to make a significant difference in the panhandling situation." Many of his members are concerned that panhandling creates a "brand-image problem" for tourism.
But Councillor Doug Holyday (Ward 3, Etobicoke Centre) said the city is far too lenient with panhandlers and should emulate New York's zero-tolerance approach.
"They shouldn't have to tolerate [panhandlers], and we shouldn't allow it, but we do," he said. "All you have to do is come to Toronto, find yourself a piece of cement, set up your own encampment down there, and we'll find you a house and job. How many people are going to come here to get that?"
Phil Brown, the city's general manager of shelter, support and housing, which developed the proposal, defended the request for beefed-up funding.
"You do need a major investment to help these people off the street," he said, adding that the new strategy has a payback through less need for police and emergency services and reduced incidents of alcohol and drug use on the street.
Meanwhile, slouched against a fire hydrant in the heart of Toronto's financial district soliciting change in a baseball cap, one panhandler said that access to housing is "the biggest stepping stone" to breaking the cycles of poverty and addiction.
The panhandler, who wanted to be identified only as Mark, said he would be receptive if approached by a Streets to Homes worker.
"Oh certainly. It'd take some time, but yeah, it'd be good," he said.
Mere blocks away, James Ignace huddled with three homeless compatriots, seeking change in an empty coffee cup while warming himself over a current of air flowing from a sidewalk grate.
"Housing is the best; it's not about money," he said. "Say somebody comes by and gives you $200. Where is that going to get you?"
Panhandler profile
Who are the panhandlers? A first-ever city survey carried out in 2007 found:
Of 408 "legal" panhandlers - those not engaged in illegal, aggressive activity - 300 were homeless.
Of the total, 110 had housing but needed additional assistance. With help from city caseworkers, 69 of them were no longer panhandling when a pilot project wrapped up last September.
An intensive survey of 223 panhandlers in the downtown core found that 83 per cent were male; 23 per cent self-identified as aboriginal, and 73 per cent had been homeless for slightly more than two years.
Of the 223, 79 per cent said they wanted to stop panhandling.
The best thing about panhandling, according to those interviewed, is the socializing. The worst thing was the negative reaction from the public. Jennifer Lewington
