A day after a 5-foot-tall (1.52m) yellow contraption appeared on the immaculately kept sidewalk outside the Hilton hotel, doorman Howard Golden walked circles around it, eyeing it suspiciously.

Then he pronounced his verdict on Atlanta's latest jab at its runaway panhandling problem: donation meters.

"This is one of the dumbest things I've seen in my life," said the New York City transplant. The way he figures it, nothing will stop a determined panhandler from making a day's pay. Certainly not a meter.