A Gainesville nonprofit has filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of two Seminole County residents, arguing that a county ordinance criminalizes the act of seeking charity donations in public spaces in violation of constitutional rights.
The group Southern Legal Counsel filed the lawsuit challenging Seminole County’s anti-panhandling ordinance on June 5 in the Middle District of Florida. The plaintiffs – homeless individuals who depend on solicitations to obtain necessities such as food, water, clothes and hygiene products – contend the ordinance is not narrowly tailored and violates the First Amendment.
“A person seeking to engage in other forms of speech under similar circumstances as those seeking charity – such as asking for votes, requesting signatures on a petition, encouraging people to join a church or picketing – may do so without impunity or fear of arrest,” the lawsuit states. “Because the ordinance restricts only certain types of speech, it is content-based and subject to strict scrutiny.”
The plaintiffs are also subject to a continuing threat of arrest by law enforcement officers in the county, according to the complaint. The lawsuit challenges only those sections of the ordinance that relate to public forums, not the private property provisions of the measure.
The legal action comes in the wake of similar anti-panhandling ordinances in Florida cities, including Fort Lauderdale, Tampa, West Palm Beach and Miami, being repealed, struck down or no longer enforced, according to Southern Legal Counsel (SLC).
Seminole County deputies have arrested at least 130 people for violations of the ordinance, according to the nonprofit, and 92 of those taken into custody were homeless or did not have a home address on their arrest forms.
“Those exercising their First Amendment right to request charity have been sentenced to approximately 858 days in jail and been assessed approximately $39,147 in court costs, fees and fines after being arrested for violations of the ordinance,” SLC said in a news release.
Seminole County officials declined to comment on the lawsuit, but SLC reported an attorney in the County Attorney’s Office said in a letter that the measure was constitutional and that county officials would defend it against lawsuits.
SLC attorney Daniel Marshall said the county has other ways to deal with panhandling that is confrontational or threatening.
“For conduct that is truly ‘aggressive,’ the county could simply enforce other laws that are already in place, such as assault for threatening behavior, battery for unwanted touching and disorderly conduct,” Marshall told the Florida Record in an email. “However, the county's ordinance also sweeps up speech that is not actually aggressive, even though it's defined that way.”
He suggested that county officials would do better to use the funds it spends on enforcement and incarceration for more meaningful ways to deal with the county’s homeless problems.
“We are bringing this lawsuit to force Seminole County to focus on constructive solutions to homelessness rather than arrest and jail,” SLC Executive Director Jodi Siegel said in a prepared statement. “Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Reed v. Town of Gilbert (in 2015), every ordinance that prohibits charitable solicitation that has been challenged in federal court has been found unconstitutional. There is no carve-out in the Constitution for Seminole County.”
The plaintiffs are asking the court to issue a preliminary and permanent injunction preventing the enforcement of the anti-panhandling measure, a declaration that the provisions in question violate the First Amendment, attorneys’ fees and costs, and compensatory damages for humiliation, emotional distress and lost opportunities to seek charitable donations.