There's panhandling, and then there's aggressive panhandling.

It's no secret that Urbana is experiencing serious crime and quality-of-life issues in the city's southeast neighborhoods or that Mayor Laurel Prussing is attempting a broad-based attack on the problems.

Most of her initiatives, including a stepped-up police presence and working with property owners to minimize nuisance violations, have been received without complaint. But a key component of the city's plan last week drew a crowd of jeering critics who characterized the proposed ordinance to outlaw aggressive panhandling as an oppressive measure aimed at the poor and the homeless.

The complaints included the usual rhetorical overkill that minimized the problems the city is facing while maximizing the alleged impropriety of the techniques the city wishes to use to address them.

Two former city council members — Esther Patt and Danielle Chynoweth — vehemently objected to the ordinance as an inappropriate infringement on the legitimate free-speech rights of panhandlers.

"To make unlawful the utterance of words is reprehensible. It's un-American," Patt said.

That's not quite right. After all, using the words "your money or your life" could get a person arrested, and properly so.

What Patt and Chynoweth presumably are concerned about is outlawing the conduct of individuals who politely request financial assistance from passers-by and are willing to take no for an answer.

The courts have ruled this is permissible free speech, and the proposed ordinance would not bar this lawful behavior. Indeed, acting city attorney Curt Borman said that kind of behavior will be permissible "on virtually every street" in Urbana even if the ordinance is adopted.

The ordinance is aimed at aggressive panhandling — the kind where people requesting money make physical contact with their quarry, use abusive language if turned down, walk alongside while refusing to take no for an answer or stop traffic to solicit motorists.

The ordinance would punish that kind of behavior with a $50 fine for the first offense and go up from there.

One of the city's hot spots right now is the Sunnycrest shopping area surrounded by Florida Avenue on the north, Mumford Drive on the south, Cottage Grove Avenue on the west and Philo Road on the east. The ordinance would prohibit panhandling there.

Alderwoman Diane Marlin, who represents the area, said many of her constituents, particularly the elderly, have complained to her about intimidating panhandling that has made them reluctant to shop at Sunnycrest anymore.

"It's to the point where it's impacting business," Marlin said.

The ordinance also would establish other panhandling-free zones, such as within 20 feet of an ATM or on private property without owner permission.

Many of the restrictions would expire in a year. If they're problematic, the council could choose to revise them or not renew them.

These are reasonable, legally permissible, proposals. That's because the city took a cautious approach in drafting the ordinance. To be on the safe side of the law, it adopted language from ordinances in other cities, including Indianapolis, that have survived legal challenge.

University of Illinois law Professor Steve Beckett said the danger of an anti-panhandling ordinance, like anti-loitering or vagrancy ordinances of the past, is that it will be "too broad" and "proscribe protected speech in the name of proscribing unprotected speech."

The constitutional right to free speech is, of course, precious and must be zealously guarded. But the courts have ruled that it is not absolute. Government has the undisputed right to establish reasonable regulations on time, place and manner.

But more importantly, aggressively seeking money from strangers, and doing so in an overt, or even vaguely, threatening manner is not an exercise of free speech. It is what is known as speech-plus, in the same manner that the use of so-called "fighting words" is speech-plus and subject to legal penalty.

To contend otherwise is simply not to be in touch with legal realities, the critics notwithstanding.

The city council is scheduled to meet Monday in a committee of the whole to discuss and vote on the measure. Depending on what happens, the issue could come up for adoption by the full council on July 25.

It's our hope this measure becomes law in Urbana. Residents of the southeast Urbana neighborhood have to put up with a lot these days, including shootings, fights and the gathering of unruly crowds.

Aggressive panhandling may not rise to the level of those more serious problems. But quality-of-life issues cover a panoply of problems. It's time to get this one fixed in a way that is both effective and respectful of everyone's rights.