NYC Council passes bill to crack down on Elmos in Times Square
Source: Reuters
The topless women, Elmos and other costumed characters who work for tips in New York's Times Square will no longer be free to roam the area under a bill passed by the City Council on Thursday.
In response to scared tourists and annoyed locals, the council's law would restrict the characters to a handful of designated zones, each about the size of a city bus, where they could solicit tips for posing for photographs. Other areas of the Times Square pedestrian plaza would be off limits.
The legislation comes after complaints about aggressive solicitation of money and other behavior in the famed midtown Manhattan crossroads by the dozens of Elmos, Spidermen and other mascots who set up shop there.
In the past two years, there has been a proliferation of costumed characters who pose for pictures with tourists in return for tips in Times Square. Once known for its sex shops, cavernous movie theaters and street crime, the area has been a family-friendly tourist attraction since the 1990s.
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Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-new-york-characters-idUSKCN0X42ND
World | Thu Apr 7, 2016 6:07pm EDT
NEW YORK | BY MARCUS E. HOWARD
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Prudes.
