City Hall advises against new panhandling bylaw, instead offers alternate strategies to address poverty in Windsor

After much debate over whether the city should crack down on panhandling, city staff has come back with a report against a new panhandling bylaw.

In a staff report that will go before the Environment, Transportation & Public Safety Standing Committee next Wednesday, city staff wrote: “there are no quick and easy strategies to reducing panhandling. The most effective way to reduce panhandling is to address the root causes.”

The report says a new Windsor bylaw would be difficult to enforce and The Safe Streets Act of Ontario already exists to provide enforcement tools against aggressive panhandling.

Ward 1 Coun. Fred Francis, who initially requested the report, is frustrated by the response.

“There's someone in the median in the centre of the streets, knocking on car windows asking for money and that's unsettling for some people,” he said.

He was hoping for something with teeth that could prioritize public safety for both the panhandlers and the public at large.

“You should not be able to do it anywhere you want, to do it however you want to do it,” Francis said Friday. “There are safety concerns on both sides that need to be addressed in my opinion, and that's what I'm hearing from my residents.”

City staff is instead urging council to advocate to upper levels of government for increased funding and systemic changes to things like affordable housing and increases to ODSP and Ontario Works.

According to Joyce Zuk of Family Services Windsor-Essex, those benefits pay below what they did prior to a 21 per cent provincial cut by the Mike Harris government back in 1998.

“If you factor in cost of living, by far, folks are worse off than they were even prior to 1998. And that's not even talking about the increase in housing prices,” Zuk said.

As part of the city report, Family Services Windsor-Essex surveyed panhandlers over the summer, finding that 50 per cent were actually housed, but living in deep poverty and panhandling because they were unable to make ends meet.

Zuk says the focus should be on actually helping them — not cutting off a potential revenue source.

“The reality is those that are living in deep poverty are a growing group. And unless there are movements to increase rates, like Ontario Works and ODSP, the issues just going to get worse,” Zuk said.

The city already spends millions annually on homeless initiatives like the H4 Hub, emergency shelters, affordable housing and an increased number of outreach workers.

“I don't think we can rely on Toronto and Ottawa to fix what's in Windsor. And it needs fixing,” said Francis. “Obviously, we welcome their support and their resources, but we have to be innovative on our own.”

But Windsor needs big and impactful solutions, argues Zuk.

“Trying to look at bringing forward a bylaw which would be unconstitutional anyways, is just a very modest, modest tool,” she said.

“If they're concerned that people are living in poverty, start thinking about what the municipal role is to take a bite out of poverty.”

The committee meeting takes place Wednesday, Oct. 25 at Windsor City Hall at 4:30 p.m.