We see them on street corners holding signs asking for help, but now that’s against the law; and those who ask for help at the intersections are now being arrested as criminals.
One Monroe man, Demetrius Walker, has been arrested once each of the last three months, standing at the same spot, 18th and Louisville, holding up a sign with two words: “Dollar Help.”
In the past, a few people rolled down their windows and gave him a dollar to help. At the end of the day, he’d usually get enough to get some food. If he were lucky, he’d get enough for a cheap room for the night.
Now, he’s a criminal who faces a $200 fine or six months in jail for each offense.
Homeless to jail
Since Louisiana revised its solicitation statute last year, individuals experiencing homelessness—many simply seeking help at street corners—find themselves increasingly at risk of arrest and jail time. Instead of getting a “Dollar” donation, they get a month or more in jail, get released, and the cycle repeats.
Ironically, if you are not homeless, you can stand on the same corner where Walker stood and raise funds for charity, school, or community projects, and it is perfectly legal. If you are a firefighter in a “Boot Campaign,” you can walk up to cars stopped at traffic lights and ask for charity donations.
That leads many to believe that the expanded purpose of the law targets the homeless.
Panhandling and Policy Collide
In recent months, officers with the Monroe Police Department, enforcing the new law, have booked an increasing number of homeless individuals for solicitation, a crime once defined only by actions on interstate highways.
Now, because of the 2024 revision of Louisiana Revised Statute 14:97.1, arrests for “begging” can occur on nearly any major street—thanks to new language making it illegal to “request anything of value on any interstate highway, public right-of-way, or any entrance or exit ramp of an interstate highway.”
What counts as a “public right-of-way” includes state highways like Louisville Avenue, where much of Monroe’s street-level poverty is most visible. Louisville is not an interstate highway but is actually the state highway 80. The addition of the term “public right of way” makes the interstate law apply if local police want to use it.
Arrested for Asking
Demetrius Walker, 49, has become a symbol of this shifting landscape. He is not a thief, violent offender or drug addict. He’s poor. Now, added to his problems, he’s a repeat offender for the crime of asking for help. He can’t pay the fine or make bond, so he serves time in jail, and when he’s released, he goes to the only place that has worked for him, 18th and Louisville Avenue, where he has been repeatedly arrested each month since September. His most recent arrest was on Friday, November 15, 2025.
Each time, Walker was taken into custody under the updated statute, which carries possible fines and up to six months jail time.
It costs $35 a day to house an inmate at the Ouachita Parish Correctional Center.
Communities Respond
Advocates for unhoused residents argue the policy change criminalizes poverty, turning ordinary survival tactics—asking for spare change or a meal—into reasons for incarceration.
“People aren’t looking for trouble; they’re looking for shelter, for food, for dignity,” said one local aid worker. “It’s humiliating to have to beg for food, and it’s merciless to jail those who ask for help.”
Police and city officials counter that such laws protect public safety and prevent dangerous situations at busy intersections, though the arrests have reignited debate about the root causes of homelessness and the limits of enforcement.
They don’t explain why public safety is not a concern for other groups, but only the unhoused poor.
Quoting the Law
The central piece of legislation, sponsored by Rep. Dixon McMakin, adds the phrase “public right-of-way” to a law that used to apply just to interstate highways. It now reads:
“Solicitation on an interstate highway or in a public right-of-way is the intentional act of soliciting, begging, panhandling, or otherwise requesting anything of value on any interstate highway, public right-of-way, or any entrance or exit ramp of an interstate highway…”
While most Democrats in the legislature voted against the law’s expansion, including Senator Katrina Jackson, Representatives Adrian Fisher (D-16) and Rep. Pat Moore (D-17) who are both Democrats, voted for the new expansion.
Legislators opposed to his idea said the new law criminalizes poverty. Those supporting the law say it is a public safety issue.
A Crossroads of Need and Policy
As the city weighs how best to assist those at the margins, critics warn that jailing people for begging at intersections is a costly and ineffective solution.
Supporters of the law urge continued vigilance at major traffic sites.
For people like Demetrius Walker, each day he stands at the intersection of 18th and Louisville Avenue holding his “Dollar Help” sign is not only a plea for help but also a new risk: the possibility that asking for a dollar could lead straight to a jail cell.
