Kathy Stewart, wtop.com

BETHESDA, Md. – Some Montgomery County residents are complaining that panhandling at major intersections has become way more aggressive and seems to be getting more organized.

“Everyone talks about it now as being an urban obstacle when you drive in Montgomery County,” says Kim McGettingan, who lives near one of the intersections people are complaining about at Connecticut Avenue and Jones Bridge Road.

McGettigan adds that it can be frightening.

Residents are also complaining about aggressive panhandlers at Old Georgetown Road and Democracy Boulevard and Connecticut and Beach Drive.

McGettingan and her neighbors initially thought the bad economy was causing the panhandling. But it seems the homeless are being pushed off the corners by well dressed, able bodied people looking for a quick buck, she says. McGettingan has noticed folks are wearing expensive tennis shoes and Northface jackets. Then at 5 p.m., they head to a parking lot and get into a car.

Some say they are also seeing what “seems to be a growing business.” McGettingan thinks they might be “family members or part of an organized group.”

“The women are all dressed the same way,” she says. “The exact same types of coats, same types of skirts, the same kind of headdress.”

But she says she fears for the children who are with the woman, especially when the light changes and they have not made it back to the pavement.

In Montgomery County it is illegal to approach drivers by walking into the street. The county did look at a permitting process for anyone asking drivers for spare change, but the measure failed. Montgomery County spokesman Patrick Lacefield says they do get complaints about panhandlers once a week.

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