Panhandling Bylaws
The regulation of panhandling as a street activity constitutes a pressing and substantial concern. However, such regulation must balance the competing rights of all people who use the streets including pedestrians, panhandlers, and those who derive their business from street traffic such as merchants and shop owners.
Section 70 of the Street and Traffic Bylaw (Bylaw 2869) contains of provisions which regulate the solicitation for donations carried out in a manner which obstructs free movement on streets and sidewalks and obstruction in the form of "persistent" panhandling. Their objective is to regulate the use of city streets in a manner that acknowledges the varied interests of all people who use the streets. This bylaw conforms with the Vancouver Transportation Plan which recognizes the pedestrian mode of travel as the most fundamental transportation mode and establishes pedestrians as the top transportation priority.
LOITERING
70. No person shall stand or loiter on any street in such a manner as to obstruct or impede or interfere with traffic thereon.
OBSTRUCTIVE SOLICITATION
70A. (1) For the purpose of this section 70A,
"cause an obstruction" means
(a) to sit or lie on a street in a manner which obstructs or impedes the convenient passage of any pedestrian traffic in a street, in the course of solicitation,
(b) to continue to solicit from or otherwise harass a pedestrian after that person has made a negative initial response to the solicitation or has otherwise indicated a refusal,
(c) to physically approach and solicit from a pedestrian as a member of a group of three or more persons,
(d) to solicit on a street within 10 m of
(i) an entrance to a bank, credit union or trust company, or
(ii) an automated teller machine, or
(e) to solicit from an occupant of a motor vehicle in a manner which obstructs or impedes the convenient passage of any vehicular traffic in a street;
"solicit" means to, without consideration, ask for money, donations, goods or other things of value whether by spoken, written or printed word or bodily gesture, for one's self or for any other person, and solicitation has a corresponding meaning, but does not include soliciting for charity by the holder of a license for soliciting for charity under the provisions of the License By-law;
"trust company" means an office or branch of a trust company to which the Trust and Loans Company Act (Canada) applies and in which deposit accounts are held.
(2) No person shall solicit in a manner which causes an obstruction.
