EDITORIAL: Coins for meters, not handouts

The Laguna Beach City Council is taking an unusual but not unprecedented approach to encourage people not to hand cash to panhandlers on sidewalks. The council plans to use old parking meters as alternatives in areas where homeless people tend to put a hand, hat or cup out to the public for offerings.

It’s a creative way to recycle those old meters and should be an attention-getter in town.

It will also spread the message that giving cash to panhandlers is not desired in the city, and that using your “spare change” to help those who help the homeless is a much better use for that money.

Providing alternatives to handing change or bills to street dwellers is one of the basic tools cities have used to handle the difficult problem of people living on the streets.

In one L.A. county city, dolphin sculptures have been used for years as “banks” for collecting spontaneous donations from good-hearted people who want to help those less fortunate than themselves.

The dolphin bank collection sites represent real money to the organizations that use it to provide emergency assistance or transitional housing services to truly help people get off the streets and out of harm’s way.

Most homeless advocates agree that giving people money on the streets is enabling and encouraging of a deleterious existence and that people should be given incentives to seek help, even in the form of some “tough love” — particularly in cities like Laguna Beach where real help is available.

That coin or dollar bill is not going to be a salvation to the person who seeks it; it will most likely be used to purchase an intoxicant that will only serve to keep the person from making a better life decision.

Laguna Beach has some well-known and, dare we say, well-loved street-dwellers and those who try to “help” by handing out cash to strangers are not doing them any favors.

Better to give your cash to those who will spend it to truly help people in need.