I agree with what Don Firth said about choosing who to give to, and more often than not recommending the Night Shelter here in town. But there is a price at that shelter--it's in downtown Fort Worth, it's the Union Gospel Night Shelter and they harangue those folks before dinner with their religous beliefs--there is no free dinner at the Night Shelter.

As a matter of curiosity, pretty much knowing the answer but knowing that to test my theory I must come up with some cash, I recently gave a Mexican man a couple of dollars and change (he spoke little English, he said, just enough to convey that he wanted to catch a bus to a specific destination and it would cost this much). No he didn't get on the bus--as I drove from the parking lot he approached someone else. So much for just standing there and catching the bus he said he wanted. There's a law of averages--I probably won't respond favorably for the next few panhandlers I run into because of his routine.

Several years ago I was travelling with the kids (ages 4 and 7 at the time) through the Southwest and we stopped for dinner at a McDonalds in western New Mexico. A big guy approached the side of the car as I was helping the 4-year-old out and started into his spiel. I have to admit that it was quite scary to have him come over when I was alone with the kids--and I was loud and angry and probably pretty fierce when I told him to back away from the car and the never approach someone who had small children. Maybe some other mother traveling alone with small children might feel differently, but I'd be surprised. What a simple matter to grab a child as hostage, and this guy came into my "space"--walked closer than one would normally walk to talk to a stranger in public. I perceived a real threat and I didn't have a weapon except my voice, and I used my fear (disguised as anger to show less vulnerability) to make a scene that he and a few diners probably didn't forget for a while.

Depending on where I am, under other circumstances, if I have a few coins in my pocket so I can reach in without pulling out a wallet, I have been known to drop coins in a cup. In New York City, capital of the panhandling scam, there are some who really look the part. Even if it's a scam, for someone to sit in the filth of the subway and other places with a cup for several hours a day, that's a pretty horrific "job," my coins may lead to addictive behavior, but since I don't know, I have to simply choose to decide whether those coins are truly "spare" or not.

SRS