Is Feeding the Homeless in Public Parks Legal?

[Ivan Seeking]

District Judge Robert Jones has struck down the city ordinance that attempted to stop food being distributed to homeless people in public parks.

http://www.kvbc.com/Global/story.asp?S=6975614

Wow, talk about a story that is hard to give positive spin!

 

[Math Jeans]

My opinion on this is that giving food to a homeless person is like giving food to a random person walking down the street. They are human, but they are just looked down upon.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I'm just about positive the problem wasn't feeding the homeless, but attracting them in large numbers to the park. As you see later in the article they wanted to designate the park "Children Only". I know from experience here that anywhere these nice churches set up free meal give aways for the homless pretty much become unusable by other people. You can no longer lounge around the park enjoying it cause you're getting hit up for change, and you also see a lot of disturbing behavior you wouldn't want your kids to see.

It's great that people do feed them, but some thought should be given to how they are affecting the area where they distribute the meals. They used to do it downtown here in a vacant lot. The homeless would start gathering before the meal, and some pretty much never left the block.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I'm just about positive the problem wasn't feeding the homeless, but attracting them in large numbers to the park.

No doubt. Nonetheless, passing a law that exclusively forbids feeding homeless people is really too much to believe. The law was struck down because you can't single out a particular group for non-feeding.

 

[zoobyshoe]

The law was struck down because you can't single out a particular group for non-feeding.

I doubt if there's a specific law prohibiting this, but it's clear from existing anti-discrimination laws that such a thing would be against the grain. Whoever proposed this law lost sight of that and has probably now lost credibility in future attempts to keep the parks family friendly.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Whoever proposed this law lost sight of that and has probably now lost credibility...

I should hope! They ought to be tossed out on their butts for being idiots; not to mention heartless.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I should hope! They ought to be tossed out on their butts for being idiots; not to mention heartless.

It's more complex that that:

Not so says Mayor Goodman. He says people who feed the homeless in the parks really aren't helping them.

"What we're trying to do is get the homeless to be fed in a social service environment, within a faith based environment, where there's a social worker, a doctor that puts them on meds, you get them back into society, instead of feeding them and running and leaving them there," said Goodman.

However, the homeless don't like the control this gives the social service agencies:

But Huff, who used to be homeless, says there's a reason some people don't want help from those agencies.

"They're treated less than human down there, it's not helping, that's why we have chronic homeless in Las Vegas, because they go down there and are pushed around, they have their little rules and they're treated like dogs," said Huff.

http://www.kvbc.com/Global/story.asp?S=5235763

 

[Evo]

"Not so says Mayor Goodman. He says people who feed the homeless in the parks really aren't helping them. What we're trying to do is get the homeless to be fed in a social service environment, within a faith based environment, where there's a social worker

I can't believe a government official would say "within a faith based environment". WTH??

But Huff, who used to be homeless, says there's a reason some people don't want help from those agencies.

"They're treated less than human down there, it's not helping, that's why we have chronic homeless in Las Vegas, because they go down there and are pushed around, they have their little rules and they're treated like dogs," said Huff.

I guess Huff has never been to the DMV or ANY government agency.

 

[rewebster]

My guess is that the 'someone', who originally wrote the law, saw that special on the tourists feeding the bears at Yellowstone (and why they banned that and garbage dumps)

 

[zoobyshoe]

I can't believe a government official would say "within a faith based environment". WTH??

Especially in Las Vegas. You may recall Stephen King chose that city as the gathering place of the forces of Evil in The Stand.

Anyway, I, too, found that to be hard to believe coming from a government official's mouth. I'm thinking it was meant as an attempt to make sure he hadn't just alientated church groups who feed the homeless by having just ascribed responsibility for this to Social Services. In other words, he hadn't completely composed the thought before he started speaking.