City gets tough with street beggers
Problems caused by vagrants in Waterford city have reached the point where the city’s chamber of commerce, through its CEO Frank O’Donoghue, has written to its members and asked them to refuse to serve them alcohol or give money.
They should also report such panhandlers to their local Garda station if they witness what he has termed “unsavoury behaviour.”
His strongly-worded memo titled “Problem with winos in city centre” was e-mailed to chamber of commerce members.
Mr O’Donoghue, brother of Waterford Wedgwood CEO, Redmond O’Donoghue, says the problem with the behaviour of what he terms “winos” has escalated to the extent that American tourists were physically attacked recently when they refused to give a “wino” money.
The memo says the behaviour presents “an extremely bad image of Waterford and of Ireland to visitors and it is bad for Waterford.”
The memo also confirms the chamber has been in contact with the Garda authorities asking them to take “stern action to eradicate the problem.”
The final section of the memo urges a ban on serving vagrants. “We would also like to strongly request that off-licences and licensed premises not sell drink to these people.”
Yesterday, Mr O’Donoghue said that while people had a right to be served in pubs, the city and its business people also had rights. “I’m standing over what I said. Other people have rights, too. We are trying to cultivate our tourist industry and we jealously guard the reputation which we have as a safe and comfortable city.”
Mr O’Donoghue insisted that just a handful of vagrants were causing trouble for people and that he was not insisting that all were creating a menace in the boom city.
The local St Vincent de Paul shelter at Lady Lane in Waterford caters for 47 men each night. But nobody at the shelter was prepared to comment on the chamber stance last night.
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