Proposed Health Department regulations on outdoor food handouts in Philadelphia should be the catalyst for more community and church-based volunteer groups to move indoors with their laudable efforts to aid the homeless.
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The city's top health official, Deputy Mayor Donald F. Schwarz, insists that his main objective is food safety - and not coming up with just another fee to fatten the city's treasury.
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And, yes, moving the Parkway handouts indoors would remove them from the museum district - a venue where vast public and private investments are being made to promote the city's tourism economy. There's no need to apologize for trying to meet the twin public-policy goals of making the city attractive to visitors and also showing compassion to the homeless.
It isn't about money, but it is about "cleaning up" an area for (mostly) tourists. It has nothing to do with "food safety," and everything to do about ratcheting up the harassment of groups trying to provide for the homeless until they do it somewhere else.