Shady panhandlers

[Dreamstalker]

I mentioned in my nonprofit thread about panhandling "scammers". I've come across a few in particular:

--The scruffy guy walking around with an AIDS Ride/etc donation clipboard in the middle of November. I fell for that once when I was young and less wise to their ways--didn't lose much money, but boy was I pissed when I figured out I'd been fleeced. I noticed that if you look at the donation sheet closely, all the names will be in the same handwriting (some people are just not good forgers).

--There's an older guy who hangs around Park St. Station (usually on the lower level) with a laminated, poorly written paper about stopping racism. There's no group name or anything to make it look even remotely legit. A very fast-talker who gets right in your face (I once had to scream on a crowded platform to get him to back the fark off). He wears a fairly distinctive satin jacket so again is easy to spot. I didn't really know what his deal was until one day when I spied him counting a HUGE wad of cash--looked like more than I see in a month--then had the gall to come up to me and ask for a donation. Harvard Square has a similar guy...dunno, maybe it's the same one with a new shtick.

[Sylvia727]

One of my sister's classmates earns her spending money by panhandling. She lives in a decent house, in an okay neighborhood. Always has food to eat, even if it's sometimes store-brand. Two cars in her family, the mom's ok car and the brother's junker. They have two computers, both running Windows XP...hmm, I'm running out of social status markers. Lower middle class, in other words.

Every Saturday and Sunday, this girl grunges down; she musses her hair, doesn't shower, and dons ripped jeans and a stained t-shirt. She goes to a certain shopping center (high end mall in a low rent neighborhood). She has a cardboard sign about needing money for food. She makes $40-$50 a day in loose change. She gets $100 a week, which she spends on designer jeans and steak dinners. Makes me sick.

I had a professor a few years ago who kept $5 McDonald's gift cards in his wallet for panhandlers. His rationale was that they could get some food in their belly, at least. Even if it wasn't the healthiest, it was one of the few restaurants that is (a) universal and (b) cheap.

[Dreamstalker]

I used to know someone who did that. A friend and I couldn't figure out if it was some weird little social experiment or he really was that obnoxious (the kid was fairly well-off, lived with parents and got an allowance, so what was he doing panhandling?).

[Sylvia727]

I think they do it because it's damn good money. $50--at minimum wage in my state you'd have to work 8 hours, and that's not counting taxes. It's cash up front, no hard labor, set your own hours...a dream job, in other words, and all you have to do is deceive and defraud well-meaning fellow citizens.

[tropicsgoddess]

What irks me and my fiancé is how we constantly see the people from "The Homeless Voice" organization panhandle for money on the medians on all the major intersections. That organization is nothing more than a sham. Worse is how you have some of the well off people who panhandle for more money when they already have enough!!!

[Dreamstalker]

The Spare Change newspaper around here has had problems with people stealing papers, selling them and pocketing the cash (vendors employed by the paper must have ID badges). There's one vendor that I'll buy from (he's a good guy who we've actually known forever), the others around here are a bit sketchy.

We'll also see people panhandling at stoplights (walking between lanes/cars/etc...especially at the entrance to the expressway)...what I really don't understand is the school groups that do it. You'll have ten-year-olds going up to cars and asking for donations for the track team or whatnot. While I admire their initiative in some way, that's damn dangerous.

There will be at least one occurrence in the summer of kids stealing full boxes of candy bars and trying to sell them on the T for "fundraisers", as well as homeless panhandlers on the trains (the Red Line seems to be the greatest offender at letting them do this).

[Saydrah]

I have a family member who at one time had to panhandle for food and to buy the drugs that he needed to keep him alive-- to an addict with no treatment options, drugs ARE as important as food, because going through withdrawal sleeping on the street corner with no doctor in sight is likely to be fatal. He now makes nearly six figures in the IT industry. So, I tend to give the benefit of the doubt to most panhandlers.

However, I rarely carry cash, even spare change, which makes me feel a little bit badly about passing panhandlers by when I'm in my car and can't stop to offer to buy them lunch. If I do have cash, I give some.

I keep dog food sample bags in my car for homeless persons who have doggies with them- it touches me when I see a fairly healthy dog with a very thin, homeless owner, because you just know that the dog has been eating most of the food people bring the owner.

My philosophy is, if I help panhandlers and spend $5000 during my lifetime supporting scammers, lazy bums, jackasses, and hopeless cases, but I give $5 to a man whose circumstances left him on the street but who is carefully socking away a portion of his panhandling earnings each day, working toward treatment for any addictions he has, and who eventually is able to move into an apartment, clean up, and get a job where he works his way up to become an important contributor to his field, that's $5,005.00 well spent.

[Dreamstalker]

I'm reasonably good at reading people (so much for "unable to read nonverbal cues"), and will help out the ones I can guess truly need the help. When I was at the game store and passed a "regular" panhandler sitting outside the 7-11, I'd buy them a bottle of water and apple/granola bar in addition to giving a buck or two.

So I will give money/food, what I can't stand are the ones you can just tell are running some sort of scam. I've tended to notice (YMMV) that the more they badger you the more likely it is they're up to no good.

[Seshat]

The ones I quite like are the buskers and the street artists. They're making the world a bit brighter and more cheerful, and they accept whatever the public thinks their work is worth for pay.

And if their 'pay' ends up being good money - so what? They earned it.

[Saydrah]

I agree, Seshat! I live near Boulder, Colorado, which has one of the largest street festivals in the world focusing on the art of busking. It's great!

[Dreamstalker]

The ones I quite like are the buskers and the street artists. They're making the world a bit brighter and more cheerful, and they accept whatever the public thinks their work is worth for pay.

I love the buskers; there are a few that I'll go slightly out of my way to seek out (one of the few reasons I venture into Quincy Market anymore is a breakdancing troupe that sets up there). There used to be (haven't seen him for quite awhile) a guy in Harvard Square with trained domestic rats.

There are also a couple panhandlers with amusing shticks (like the guy I saw last year near tax time "I'll put your spare change to better use than the IRS will!" or the older black guy on Newbury St who does awesome freestyle rap). I'll always give something to those guys.

[Saydrah]

Oooh, if you see the rat guy again, take photos for me! I have 13 rats with a litter on the way.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Buskers are not the same as panhandlers. Buskers offer you something and hope maybe you'll like it enough to pay them for it. Panhandlers want something for nothing. Big difference. Buskers are like sweet suprises you find in your everyday existence as you go about your business. They add something, they have some value. They give far more than they get back, in my opinion.

Most panhandlers are just parasites.

[tropicsgoddess]

The ones I quite like are the buskers and the street artists. They're making the world a bit brighter and more cheerful, and they accept whatever the public thinks their work is worth for pay.

And if their 'pay' ends up being good money - so what? They earned it.

Amen to that! Las Olas and Bayside are the two known places for buskers and the like. Buskers = Panhandlers = in my book.