Violence and panhandling: Q&A with Todd Wahl of the Fargo Police Department

Several high profile violent incidents occurring in a short amount of time in and around downtown Fargo had many wondering just what was going on in the downtown part of the city and if growth had finally started to show its fangs. Is it getting worse or was this just a coincidence that all these incidents happened in a couple weeks’ time? We’ve also recently seen a few debates on social media about whether or not there are more transients downtown and what to do about it.

For answers, we got the official word from Todd Wahl, the downtown resource officer for the Fargo Police Department, who has to deal with both of these issues on a daily basis. Does the Fargo PD think violence and panhandling are getting worse? How are they handling both?

HPR: Recently we’ve had several incidents in the downtown area. Do you think that downtown is getting more violent, do you think that downtown is safe and what is your opinion on what’s happening in downtown Fargo?

Todd Wahl: I think that downtown is a safe place to come to and enjoy the nightlife or during the day to work and visit. We’ve had some staffing issues downtown, which kind of seemed to cause some problems. We didn’t have the coverage downtown that we generally do during the day. Some of us were on administrative leave due to the Howard Johnson incident so that took a couple officers out of the downtown area that would generally be there. I think that we saw an increase in problems with panhandling and drinking in public due to the lower number of officers on the streets for that time ...

I do think that especially during the evening, there’s getting to be more and more people that come downtown to eat or to shop or whatever it be. Unfortunately, some of those individuals, and this has been going on for quite some time, consume too much alcohol and they cause problems for others. They get into fights, and generally what we see is two individuals may have too much alcohol and get into an argument and someone says something that the other takes offense to, and it ends up where they get into a fight over something that someone said.

Generally, we don’t see individuals that are getting attacked for no reason -- people who are minding their own business, or whatever, and just end up getting assaulted. It’s extremely rare, I would say. But with the number of people we have coming downtown, and some of them not drinking responsibly, that seems to be a factor in almost all of these incidents that we have. And that goes both for the suspect and the victim -- that they’ve had too much alcohol. No one deserves to be beaten up or anything like that, but sometimes people do things that they generally wouldn’t do when they’ve had too much alcohol.

HPR: As far as the issue of panhandling and loitering, some people feel it seems to be more of a problem this summer. I know you mentioned you had some staffing issues with the Howard Johnson incident, where you didn’t have the coverage you normally have, but even without that, it seems like there’s been more. How do you guys deal with panhandlers and people just hanging out without an apparent destination?

TW: It’s fairly common that as the weather gets nicer -- as we move toward summer -- generally we see more people come into Fargo who are homeless or transient individuals. That’s been like that for a number of years. I would say that the number of transients that we get into Fargo probably has increased the last few years due to people looking for jobs. That’s not something that is uncommon for Fargo, to have more transients appear in the downtown area during this time.

The police department generally keeps an eye on those individuals who are causing problems, panhandling, some of them consuming in public, etcetera. If we catch them panhandling or drinking in public we do cite them in the court. One of the duties of the downtown resource officer is to keep track of these individuals who are causing problems in the downtown area. There is no ordinance against loitering downtown. Someone has a right to be on a public sidewalk, so there’s not a lot we can do about that. If they are causing problems with other things, such as panhandling, drinking or something like that, that’s when we can step in and do something about it.

HPR: Is that something you rely on people to report or are there other ways you keep an eye on it?

TW: We do ask that the public, if they see someone panhandling or consuming alcohol in public, that they give us a call, because we can’t be everywhere at the same time. But we generally do foot patrols and we monitor people that we believe may be doing that type of activity, and if we see them do that, we cite them if we are able to do that.

HPR: What advice do you have for the public in dealing with panhandlers? Just ignore them or give them money?

TW: Panhandling is illegal in the downtown area. There is a city ordinance against it. It’s illegal to aggressively panhandle throughout the city, that means following people, grabbing people, that type of thing. But in the downtown area itself, there is an ordinance that says that you can’t basically panhandle at all, whether that be with a cardboard sign or by asking people for money. That is illegal.

What we ask is that if people do see that happening, that they give us a call. Generally these people are asking for money claiming that they are hungry or something like that. Some of them may actually be asking for money for food or whatever. But there’s plenty of services in the downtown area where people can go to get meals, to get food. At the very least if someone sees that and they are able to contact the police department, if we don’t cite them for panhandling, we could at least direct them where to go if they are hungry or need shelter. Oftentimes what we see are people asking for money or holding up a sign saying they are hungry and the money that they are collecting a lot of times is being used for alcohol or drugs.

HPR: Do you think there’s any correlation between more transients being downtown and crime?

TW: Other than the fact that panhandling is an offense, a non-criminal offense, generally we don’t see aggressive-type panhandling, as far as people following people and that type of thing. That’s fairly rare. I can’t say there’s a correlation between panhandling and some more major crime.