The Grand Junction City Council passed a ban on aggressive panhandling Wednesday night, and, while it was drafted with good intentions, its results will be rather redundant and counterproductive.

The ban aims to prevent more imposing and aggressive panhandling tactics like approaching people during the night or while they are on private property. It also prevents panhandlers from asking for money in an aggressive or obscene nature.

Since we already have laws against harassment, trespassing and disturbing the peace, this ban seems like an easy way to further criminalize homelessness. It’s not like police in Grand Junction ever needed a huge amount of provocation to contact the homeless before this ban was unanimously approved.

However, this ordinance seems to be right on track with a series of other measures enacted by the city that seem significantly less proactive and increasingly reactive. The increase in citizen complaints may very well have been avoided had police not forced the homeless from development areas near the river, dispersing them further into the community. The most visible response thus far has been a series of signs on street corners proclaiming spare change doesn’t help.

Most panhandlers and homeless people are not evil people intent on disrupting our way of life. If they are harassing and intimidating other citizens in any setting, it is usually due to issues of mental illness, substance abuse or malnutrition, rather than malicious intent toward others.

All this ban does is enable the city to criminally punish these individuals for behavior that is a direct result of social condition. It does nothing to address the issues that made them homeless or the obstacles that prevent them from ceasing to be.

Enforcement then becomes a tricky dilemma as police will eventually distribute more fines to individuals who have no means of paying them, resulting in arrests and a spike in incarceration rates—all of which inevitably falls on taxpayers’ shoulders.