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Health & Fitness

Six Sevenths of a Safety Plan?

Panhandling ordinance disregards the safety of newspaper employees.

The Tampa City Council is dealing with a thorny problem right now--homelessness. At the bottom of this recession, with many more people struggling to make it on just one income or public assistance, we have seen a rapid rise in the homeless panhandling on our streets. What should make this issue thorny is how do we as a community respond to this need and help these citizens?

However, it doesn't look as if that is where the debate is centered at all. In fact, the debate is centered over finding the right lever by which we might pry the homeless from our streets and out of sight while still allowing other organizations to conduct commercial business in an otherwise similar fashion.  

for the safety of its citizens. On the seventh day, panhandlers, unions, and charities can return to the streets. Newspaper employees are exempted from the restrictions. If safety was our primary goal, we'd want people to be safe all seven days of the week and we would care about the safety of newspaper employees just as much as the homeless, labor unions, and charities.  

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