If I'd known it was illegal to feed the homeless in Orlando, I would have been proud to stand on trial, too. Here's the story in its entirety, courtesy of WFTV.com. Go ahead and read; I'll wait.
Incredible. I cannot believe that Orlando has an ordinance like this. Granted, I could probably think of a few reasons why this is so, but that doesn't excuse the fact that there are poor people who depend on the generosity of others for their livelihood.
I decided to research this ordinance further. Then I found this on the ACLU of Florida site, which apparently, only a year ago, it was legal to feed the homeless *twice* a year (and as we all know, we can live on eating only once every six months).
From the looks of it, Orlando has a long history of anti-homeless ordinances, including laws against panhandling. Scott Maxwell of the Orlando Sentinel had it right when he wrote this little op-ed.
We are called to feed the homeless and clothe the naked, but in this day and age, all people in America have the means to break the cycle of poverty. As a nation, we need to figure out how to do it, instead of throwing the homeless in jail for a night because they were panhandling, and then letting them out a few days later, only to be back to no home, no money, no means of feeding themselves.
I found another article from the Associated Press that sums up the actions of the ordinance here, begining with this opening sentence: "ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) - City officials have banned charitable groups from feeding homeless people in parks downtown, arguing that transients who gather for weekly meals create safety and sanitary problems for businesses."
Ah yes. Those dirty, disgusting homeless people slopping their wares in public places. How dare they un-beautify the city of Orlando! Have they no shame?!
Well, it's not just happening in Orlando, apparently. Last August, a report from The New Standard covered the disturbing trend, which includes Las Vegas passing a simiar ordinance, with a related article here. If you're a law buff, the relevant Orlando ordinance text can be found here:
So let's sit and think for a minute. It's very possible that these people on the City Councils are embarrassed that millions of people visit their cities every year and are met with the sight of those in more dire need. Perhaps they are thinking of their tourist appeal, which I am quite sure they are. Businesses are embarrased by the fact that homeless peddle at their street corner or near their storefront. Many people wonder what happened that put them on the street. Can't they get a job somewhere?, they wonder.
Yet our attitudes towards the American homeless are getting more and more crass, as they seem to arrest our nation's development and advancement. Yet it is this very active development and advancement that leaves the weakest behind, instead of including them in this network, this opportunity, this nation under God.
But there's a fine line between letting those live their own life and helping others in need, because invariably, there will be those who always milk the system, which angers me even more, these people biting the hand that feeds you (or attaching like a leech to the hand that feeds you until running it dry and dead). I believe there are some good people in our goverment(s) that really do want to help, but we're doing it all wrong. Electronic food stamps are a currency that shouldn't exist; why can't we find a way to enter the homeless into our working system? Are the pork barrelers in D.C. too concerned with their own private needs that we can't figure out a way to enable the homeless to work for themselves, to give them a way to not be shoved into smaller and smaller spaces as we did with the Native Americans?
Being homeless is not a crime. We need to stop treating it that way and get these people off the streets by allowing them to begin working for themselves again. And I do agree that perhaps it would be an unnecessary burden for the government to force private businesses to hire at least one homeless person each, so how about the government offering their available jobs to the homeless? By using the system that has abandoned them, perhaps this is the answer to empowering these people again.
I found an interesting blog, called the 13th juror, and it's written by a woman who is a poverty lawyer. Check it out here .
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