That's a donation meeter in Denver, CO. Here's the explanation from the mayor:
As of September 2007 Denver has eighty-six meters downtown. Within the first month they raised $2,000.The donation meter program is designed to increase awareness about Denver’s Ten-Year Plan to End Homelessness, and it is also an effort to redirect the money given to panhandlers into initiatives that provide meals, job training, substance abuse counseling, housing, and other programs for those in need. This grassroots campaign is projected to raise roughly $100,000 per year giving the general public a constructive way to help Denver’s homeless. “The donation meter demonstrates yet another innovative way in which this community is responding to Denver’s Road Home and our commitment to ending homelessness”
Love the plan. Here's an side note though. Each of the donation meters causes a negative externality. It's like those signs that say, "this house is protected by Viper Security." It doesn't necessarily reduce crime it just moves it to someone else's house.
ReplyDeleteNow, the Denver plan is better than security systems since it actually does give food and other services that might reduce panhandling, but it is likely that the program won't get rid of all homelessness/panhandling and the meters are really going to just start pushing these people to the edges of the city.
Any thoughts on how to efficiently correct for this?
Great! I wonder how many months it will take to pay off the cost of 86 of those meters...
ReplyDeleteBryan,
ReplyDeleteWell if they can put enough, it will start to diminish actual panhandling. There is only so rural a panhandler is willing to go.
It also helps to educate the public on the problems involved in giving out money.
Kev,
Hmmm, good point.
If there were a dislike button I would have used it on this post. I don't feel like struggling to find the words, so I'll take the lazy way out and say that it's simply a terrible idea.
ReplyDeleteOh come on! Kev brings up a good point about the upfront costs. What else are we missing?
ReplyDeleteThe plan sounds good and looks good. I'm from Chicago and would love to see this take action here. It's coming out of our pockets one way or another.
ReplyDeleteThanks HW. And this way the money goes to something positive.
ReplyDelete