You see him standing on the corner with a ragged hand-lettered sign. You see but pretend not to. You make no eye contact. You sit in your car at the stoplight and stare straight ahead, or fuss with the radio. You feel guilty.
Soon enough, the light turns green. And off you go.
Trade places with that person on the corner. What’s life like?
“On a good day I make 60 bucks,” said Ivan Johnson, 62. Friday morning, he was sitting on the sidewalk along Smith Avenue near the Everett Gospel Mission Men’s Shelter. In his hand was a piece of cardboard, the tool of the part-time gig he calls “flying sign.”
“I only do it when I need money — I’ll say, ‘I only need $35 today,’” said Johnson, whose sign reads “Old Vet Waiting on Disability.” He said he served five years in the Army as a combat engineer and later worked for a restaurant chain and as a truck driver. Divorce, he said, led to homelessness.
Johnson is dead-set against an ordinance expected to be voted on Wednesday by the Everett City Council that would limit where he could stand with his sign. One of three ordinances tied to the Community Streets Initiative, the proposal would ban solicitation or other transactions between drivers and pedestrians within 60 feet of intersections with signals or in median strips.
“It’s an infringement on our personal rights,” said Johnson. “You know, they call it the land of freedom. What happened to my freedom?”
With him on the street Friday was Jeff Pointer, 45, who said he was “too proud” to hold up signs for money. But he, too, was upset about the panhandling ordinance. “Leave us the hell alone,” said Pointer, who claims he has lost seven toes to sleeping outside in icy weather.
The Everett council also is likely to act on the establishment of an alcohol impact area downtown and in other targeted locations. It would ban sales of certain cheap, high-alcohol beverages in those places.
A third ordinance wouldn’t allow sitting or lying on sidewalks along Smith Avenue between Pacific Avenue and 38th Street. And it would prohibit anyone from feeding people or distributing other goods there without a permit.
All three proposals came in response to recommendations from the streets initiative task force, a group that met over the past year to seek solutions to homelessness, addiction and other problems in Everett’s core.
David Hall, Everett’s deputy city attorney, said the ordinances are scheduled for final reading and action during the City Council meeting at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday. There will be time for public comment. Asked Friday if any homeless people had voiced their opinions yet to the council, Hall said, “not to my knowledge.”
The ban on transactions within 60 feet of signaled intersections doesn’t just target panhandling, Hall said. It wouldn’t allow Girl Scouts to sell cookies on those corners. The ordinance wouldn’t keep politicians from holding signs on busy corners on Election Day, but they couldn’t hand leaflets to drivers, Hall said. City traffic engineers wanted the distance greater than 60 feet, he added.
Violation of the panhandling ordinance would be a misdemeanor punishable by “not more than 90 days in jail, or a fine not to exceed $500, or both.” The Everett Municipal Code already has rules addressing aggressive begging and people obstructing streets.
To Johnson, it’s laughable to expect homeless people to pay $500 fines. And jail? “Taxpayers aren’t going to want to pay for that,” he said. “By passing an ordinance like that, you’re forcing people to steal.”
On the Everett corner of 41st Street and Colby Avenue, Ken Milton was out Friday waving his sign at cars. “Homeless Plesa Help God Bless,” his sign said — and Milton insisted the misspelling was on purpose.
The 48-year-old said he sleeps, with a pastor’s permission, behind an Everett church. “I do this so I can drink and be stupid,” Milton said. “I just want to stand here and fly sign.”
Surprisingly, he believes the city has the right to limit where he stands. “I agree with it,” Milton said when told about the panhandling ordinance with the 60-foot limit.
Milton said he once made $150 in a day with his sign — on Christmas. “Other days, I’m lucky even to get a cigarette,” he said.
Sabrina McLean, 37, thinks Everett’s best spots for sign fliers are near the McDonald’s and the QFC store on Everett Avenue, and on Broadway near the southbound entrance to I-5. She stood along Smith Avenue on Friday with Jeannette Bauman, 44, who said she has been homeless but now has a place to stay.
When it comes to sign messages, both women believe honesty works best. “If they put ‘Need money for beer,’ I think they get the most,” said Bauman, who sees no need for a new rule limiting panhandling.
“If it bothers you, keep driving,” she said.
Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460; jmuhlstein@heraldnet.com.
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