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For some, the Park Blocks aren’t a land of opportunity Three homeless men hang out with their dogs down by Pioneer Courthouse Square. Do you have a quarter? Could you help someone in need? Daily, as students walk around campus, panhan­ dlers ask for their assistance. Time and time again, the responses sound the same: Sorry, I have no money. A first-year student. Heather Do- browolski admits to having regularly given change to panhandlers. "I felt I should," she says, realizing that she was giving away several dollars a week and often hungry herself by week's end. She too has come to adopt the common response: Sorry, I have no money. Most panhandlers are homeless. Some can be recognized pushing shop­ ping carts filled with personal belong­ ings, others by the worn-out and torn clothing. Jack Monterey, an unkempt homeless person told me why he fre­ quents PSU. "I can usually get a couple dollars out of the younger students, then I can eat something for breakfast. They also throw away a lot of good food that I can salvage, not to mention the things they drop and lose. When it's cold, I try to get inside and grab a warm place to sit and take a nap," Monterey says. Monterey can't understand why he gets escorted off campus. "I have never hurt anyone; why do they treat me this way?" he asks. The Campus Safety and Security Office at PSU views panhandlers not only as a menace, but as potential per­ petrators of theft, rape and assault. "One time a bum snuck into one of my classes, fell asleep and start­ ed to snore," says Javier Mena, an Inter­ national Studies major. "The security had to come and take him out. On the way, he tried to grab another student's backpack. The homeless should not be allowed on campus." James Hunt, a marketing major says, "I don't mind them digging through the garbage cans, but when they start asking for money, I get an- : noyed. Besides that, they smell bad." "Panhandlers were here 20 years ago when my father attended Port­ land State College," says Kevin Dugan. "They are here to stay, we just have to learn to live with them." —^Theo Smith 38