To the editor:

I don’t like the idea of walking into a store in downtown Lawrence and being presented with a card presuming to tell me how to deal with “panhandlers.” It suggests that I am some rube come to ogle the big city.

Having lived in several European capitals, where hordes of professional beggars often roam the streets, I doubt that Lawrence has much of a panhandling problem. We see a few kids with dogs, mothers with babies and guys with a habit asking for money. This goes with the territory of a college town. It poses less an impediment to passage on the public sidewalk than the labyrinth of outdoor café enclosures, merchandise racks and food wagons one must stumble through to get anywhere downtown on some days.

The card suggests that panhandlers are a rabble of druggies, alkies and — perish the thought — smokers! But these are tough times, and respectable people down on their luck may need a few bucks to tide them over until the vaunted “social services” mentioned elsewhere on the card have time to kick in. If we cannot spare Buddy a dime, we might at least give him the benefit of the doubt

Bill Getz,

Lawrence