2y ago

Houston to refile cases against Food Not Bomb volunteers feeding homeless

www.chron.com

Houston to refile cases against volunteers feeding the homeless

Cases against volunteers with Food Not Bombs were dismissed on Thursday, but the city attorney said he intends to press the issue.

13 comments

Are they blocking an entrance or something? You’d think the city would set up a location for them to do their thing if it’s such a “nuisance”.
- If I'm not mistaken, they made it illegal to feed the homeless without jumping through a bunch of stupid hoops. Ah, here it is.
  
  Those regulations don’t sound egregious to me:
  if you’re going to feed more than five people at a time, ask for a permit and attend our seminar so we can advise you how to do it safely and meet health code
  if you’re going to do it on public property, do it at the site we’ve set up for this purpose
  if you’re going to do it on private property, go for it after you get permission from the property owner
  Instead, the people who got in trouble set up a food truck at a public library.
- The city has had an ordinance restricting how volunteers can feed people since 2012, but it's gone largely unenforced until recently, The Houston's Chronicle's R.A. Schuetz wrote. The rule stipulates that a person must obtain permission from a property owner before providing food to groups larger than five.
What about double-jeopardy?
- I'll take 'Ways to kill homeless people' for 600, Alex.
  
  I mean, I don't take issue with the concept of making sure food served is actually safe. But the US Constitution says you can't be prosecuted twice for the same crime. Not being a lawyer, I don't know where the boundary exists for that though. The original filing was dismissed, so maybe it has to actually go to trial in order for the protection to kick in at a second attempt to prosecute.

13 comments