## Facts

- Rochester enacted City Code § 44-4 to address “aggressive panhandling,” including § 44-4(H), which prohibits any person on a sidewalk or alongside a roadway from soliciting any occupant of a motor vehicle on a street or other public place.
- The ordinance defines “solicit” broadly to include spoken, written, printed words, or gestures done to immediately obtain money or other things of value.
- The City stated purposes included protecting people from threatening or harassing behavior, keeping public places safe and attractive, maintaining peaceful public interaction, and ensuring the free flow of pedestrian and vehicular traffic.
- Michael Barton received a ticket under § 44-4(H) after allegedly entering an exit ramp area and soliciting money from motorists.
- The ordinance provides for fines and, for repeat violations, potential short jail terms.
- The city court dismissed the ticket on the ground that § 44-4(H) was facially overbroad under the First Amendment and the New York Constitution.
- The county court reversed and upheld the subsection; Barton appealed to the Court of Appeals.

## Issues

1. Whether § 44-4(H) is a content-based restriction on speech or a content-neutral time, place, and manner regulation in a traditional public forum.
2. Whether § 44-4(H) is facially overbroad because it burdens substantially more protected speech than necessary or fails to leave open ample alternative channels for solicitation.
3. Whether § 44-4(H) violates the free-speech protections of the New York Constitution independent of the First Amendment.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals affirmed the county court and upheld § 44-4(H).
- The court held the subsection is content neutral because it regulates the act of soliciting vehicle occupants from specific locations, regardless of message or viewpoint.
- The court found traffic safety and orderly traffic flow to be significant governmental interests supporting the restriction.
- The court held the regulation is narrowly tailored because it targets a specific, safety-related context rather than banning solicitation generally.
- The court concluded the ordinance leaves open ample alternative channels, including solicitation of pedestrians and solicitation in other locations not involving approaching vehicle occupants from sidewalks or roadways.
- The court rejected the facial overbreadth challenge and held the subsection does not violate either the First Amendment or the New York Constitution on the record presented.

## Legal Principles

- Sidewalks and similar public ways are traditional public fora; restrictions there are valid if they are content neutral, narrowly tailored to serve a significant governmental interest, and leave open ample alternative channels of communication.
- A regulation is content neutral when it applies without regard to the topic or viewpoint expressed and instead controls the location or manner of expressive activity.
- Narrow tailoring in time, place, and manner analysis does not require the least restrictive means; the restriction must not burden substantially more speech than necessary to further the governmental interest.
- Facial overbreadth requires a showing that the law substantially reaches protected speech relative to its legitimate sweep; speculative or marginal unconstitutional applications are insufficient.
- State constitutional free-speech provisions may be analyzed in parallel with the First Amendment where no distinct state-law basis warrants broader protection in the circumstances.

## Conclusion

The court sustained Rochester’s prohibition on soliciting occupants of motor vehicles from sidewalks or alongside roadways, treating it as a content-neutral time, place, and manner restriction justified by traffic-safety concerns and leaving adequate alternative avenues for solicitation.


People v. Barton, 8 N.Y.3d 70, 861 N.E.2d 75 (N.Y. 2006)