FAYETTEVILLE, Ark.-A federal judge in northwestern Arkansas has overturned an anti-panhandling ordinance in Rogers.
The Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports that U.S. District Judge Timothy Brooks on Monday ruled that the ordinance unconstitutionally violates the right to free speech.
The ordinance prohibited people from approaching vehicles in traffic on city streets. Brooks wrote that the city's claim of addressing traffic safety "is totally unsupported" by research and that "it would curtail, if not eliminate, free speech on the streets of Rogers."
A federal judge in Little Rock previously overturned a state law that banned public begging.