A city ordinance designed to keep people from begging for money or jobs on the side of some Austin roads has been declared unconstitutional for the second time in less than three years.
In an opinion that criticizes the ordinance as overly broad and questions the city’s argument that it is necessary to ensure traffic safety, Travis County Court-at-Law Judge J. David Phillips upheld a 2005 Municipal Court decision that overturned the city’s sidewalk solicitation rules.
“This ordinance reaches conduct that has little or nothing to do with traffic safety and very much to do with constitutionally protected speech,” Phillips said in an opinion issued Thursday. Existing state laws seem to cover the traffic safety issues that the city raised, he said.
The city legal department was reviewing the opinion Tuesday afternoon to decide whether to appeal again, rewrite the ordinance or repeal it, city spokesman Gene Acuna said.
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