Over the weekend, Tim Burgess and his nemesis (at least on this issue) Real Change executive director Tim Harris squared off on Publicola over the super-controversial panhandling ban, which the council is set to vote on this afternoon.

Tim Burgess trots out the tired corpse of Broken Window Theory:

In The Tipping Point, author Malcolm Gladwell describes New York City’s dramatically successful crime reduction efforts in the early 1990s that began with cleaning up graffiti and stopping subway fare jumpers. The literature on policing and criminology is loaded with examples of successful crime reduction that began with seemingly small things, like quelling aggressive solicitation.

The literature recommends other strategies in line with my five-point plan: expanding problem-solving policing, focusing on the few who commit most crimes, and shifting our punishment philosophy from an emphasis on severity (except for violent offenders) to one that favors certainty and swiftness.

Reliance on severe punishment has made our country the largest per capita jailer on earth, a practice that disproportionately harms African American, Latino and Native American communities. Mass incarceration worsens poverty, exacerbates racial inequality and is extremely expensive.

It’s time we turn from the old and tired argument that setting minimum standards for behavior on our streets oppresses anyone.

While Harris assails Burgess for constructing a web of "lies that punish the poor":

Tim Burgess claims that his law has the support of human services advocates, and trots out a handful of providers with unusually close relationships to major downtown business interests as evidence. The human services community is broadly appalled by this ordinance and has repeatedly lined up to say so. Burgess says his ordinance has popular support, and yet his own 36th District Democrats, along with the 34^th, 37^th, and 46^th Districts, have passed resolutions to oppose. The Seattle Community Council Federation, representing 18 community councils, unanimously voted to oppose as well.

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What’s good for business is good for Seattle, and if the Mariners, Starbucks, Samis, Clise, and the Downtown Seattle Association all say jump, the only question our City Council should ask is “how far?”

This law transparently panders to the business interests, punishes the poor for merely making us uncomfortable, and places the burden of the recession on those who have nothing. The Seattle City Council should find their integrity and vote to reject.