Bertolt Brecht said it best: "The powerful of the earth create the poor but cannot bear to look at them." This was evident June 10th when Victoria City Council passed an anti-panhandling by-law to begin their now annual spring economic

cleansing of the city streets.

Fines of $5-10 will be issued for panhandling within six meters of ATM machines, bus stops, banks, liquor stores and parking ticket dispensers. The National Anti-Poverty Organization (NAPO) is expected to make a court challenge under the Charter of Rights and

Freedoms, as they have in Winnipeg and Vancouver which recently passed similar by-laws.

There have been ongoing consultations, workshops and public forums on this issue in Victoria, all showing vigorous opposition to any by-law against pan-handling. However, business interests in Victoria have a perception that beggars will "threaten tourism dollars." Opponents of increased harassment of the poor include a wide variety of groups including students, street youth, anti-poverty organizations, disability groups and members of the religious community.

Both sides aired their views at the June 10th council meeting. About 100 people were in attendance, including three police officers who sat at the back of the room. Ten people spoke in favour of the bylaw, and seventeen against.

"Suits speaking for the by-law threw around the word `Democracy' a lot. Yet opposition against the by-law has been overwhelming at every public forum," said Dave Nash, activist and former panhandler.

One individual wanted all money spent on social agencies in Victoria to be redirected to increased policing. Representatives from Tourism Victoria and the Business Improvement Association stated repeatedly that there was an 81% increase in complaints to the police about panhandlers in the past year.

Anti-poverty activist Shane Caulder pointed out that these complaints could stem from a small number of individuals or businesses, and that the police themselves admit that the rise could be due to increased media coverage of the issue.

Every speaker against the by-law was loudly applauded, including Ben Isitt who promised a major fightback by a coalition of anti-poverty activists in Victoria.

Together Against Poverty Society coordinator Jacquie Ackerly, recently elected president of NAPO, emphasized that people should not have their human rights removed just because they are poor: "This is also how the poor, homeless and work shy were treated in under the Nazi Poor Laws in Hitler's Germany. It is not widely known that they were one of the first targeted groups of undesirables."

(The author of In the Racial State: Germany, Michael Burleigh, states that the Nazis justified raids against beggars in 1933 as needed to "present an image of a `cleaner' Germany to foreigners and to help channel charitable donations into worthwhile causes.")