The St. Augustine City Commission listened to over four hours of testimony about the city's panhandling problem on Monday night.
Special Constitutional Law expert Michael Kahn called city officials with the St. Augustine Police Department, Fire Department, and Solid Waste and Sanitation Division along with area residents and business owners to testify about their experiences with solicitors.
Among their testimony were details of panhandlers openly urinating, defecating, and vomiting on themselves and on public property used by residents and tourists.
Richard Stevens with the Solid Waste and Sanitation Division even detailed an incident where a solicitor was misting an unidentifiable liquid onto people on St. George Street.
Kahn says the goal was to show the commission that this was not just a nuisance, but a public health, safety and welfare issue.
After discussion, the commission agreed to repeal and replace the current panhandling regulation. The new regulation will ban aggressive panhandling. Aggressive panhandling was described as when a panhandler asks a person for money, the person declines, and the panhandler persists in asking.
The new regulation will also establish a 100-feet no-panhandling buffer around schools and a 20-feet buffer around other places. Kahn listed ATMs and bus stops, and commercial properties as examples.
St. Augustine Police Chief Barry Fox says he believes this will help.
"Twenty feet is consistent with other state statutes," Fox said. "One hundred feet gives us a safe enough distance, and we're talking about the safety of our children. Right now with everything going on in our nation, safety of our children must be priority number one."
The regulation should go into effect in 10 days.