BATTLE CREEK (WKZO-AM) — The Battle Creek City Commission has planned a second workshop on proposals to regulate panhandling downtown.
Among the proposals: Setting up begging-free zones near outdoor restaurants and ATMs, creating loitering and aggressive begging laws and other measures. The ACLU said the proposals would probably not survive constitutional scrutiny.
Similar measures in other communities have already been struck down as violations of the First and 14th Amendments.
The ACLU also claimed it would also send a message that poor people aren’t welcome in Battle Creek.
It will give commissioners something else to consider this evening.
The workshop begins at 6 p.m. at the Deptartment of Public Works, 150 S. Kendall St.
