Call to Action: Oppose HB 45 / SB 212 – “Sexual Offenders and Sexual Predators”
HB 45 and SB 212 are dangerous, extreme, and counterproductive. SB 212 would banish more than 30,000 Floridians from “being” within 200 feet of a body of water and both bills would make 80% of Florida uninhabitable, displacing thousands of families from their homes and causing thousands to lose stable employment. These bills undermine public safety by increasing homelessness, instability, unemployment, and monitoring challenges.
The bills will:
- Push thousands into homelessness by making the majority of Florida off-limits for housing.
- Prevent tens of thousands of individuals from ever going to a beach, fishing in a lake or “being” near waterways or swimming pools for life.
- Make supervision harder and reduce public safety.
- Increase the financial burden on Florida through higher incarceration and enforcement expenses and mass unemployment.
- Risk a certain constitutional challenge.
- Do absolutely nothing to meaningfully prevent abuse or protect children!
Evidence is clear: residency restrictions and banishment do not reduce re-offending. They increase instability, homelessness, unemployment and risk.
The Florida Action Committee urges you to contact Florida legislators and urge them to VOTE NO on CS/HB 45 and CS/SB 212.
Protect children through education, prevention, treatment, and effective supervision—not by creating homelessness and chaos.
- The bills seek to expand exclusion zones to banish registrants from living within 1,000 feet of Florida’s 8,426 miles of shoreline along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts; more than 7,700 lakes that are 10 acres or larger (including Lake Okeechobee); over 30,000 other lakes and ponds; approximately 12,000 miles of rivers, streams and canals; and hundreds of thousands of swimming pools. The swimming pool restriction includes apartment complexes, motels, mobile home parks, etc.
- SB 212 creates an expansive proximity ban that would criminalize the mere presence of certain individuals within 200 feet of a wide range of everyday public places, including swimming pools (even if in a residential community or hotel) and beaches, regardless of intent, probation status or whether the offense was committed decades ago.
- Residence restrictions and proximity ordinances “increased isolation, created financial and emotional stress, and led to decreased stability” and reduced housing options for registrants. (Jill S. Levenson & Leo P. Cotter, The Impact of Sex Offender Residence Restrictions: 1,000 Feet From Danger or One Step From Absurd?, 49 Int’l J. Offender Therapy & Comp. Criminology 168 (2005)). Broward County, FL study (N≈109) showed that residency restrictions were associated with increased transience, homelessness, and difficulty securing employment and treatment. The study documents registrants’ self-reports and local enforcement perspectives. (Jill S. Levenson, Collateral Consequences of Sex Offender Residence Restrictions, 21 Criminal Justice Stud. 153 (2008)).
- FDLE research/survey of probation/parole officers in Florida reporting that officers view residency restrictions as a top obstacle to finding housing for supervised offenders; officers linked restrictions to homelessness and recommended risk-tiering and supervised/shared housing as remedies. (Amy L. Datz, Sex Offender Residency Restrictions, Sanity or Inhumanity (research paper), Fla. Dep’t of Law Enforcement (FDLE) (2009)). Homeless people are hard to monitor as they move frequently and are hard to locate (OPPAGA, 2024).
- If the amended statute is challenged, which it almost certainly would be, a Court may find that the exclusion zones are tantamount to banishment. That could result in the entire statute being declared unconstitutional and Florida would be left without any residency restriction.
You can find contact information for all Florida Senators here: https://www.flsenate.gov/Senators
And for all Florida Representatives here: https://www.flhouse.gov/representatives
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Banishment is punishment as defined by criminal law.
Therefrore it cannot be defined as remedial.
Having just read the Senate Bill SB 212 Amended dated 1/20/26, I am even more horrified! Obviously I am behind the curve. In case I am not the only one…This newest version which was just read in Tallahassee appears to be completely different (WORSE!) than what was initially presented. I’m not an attorney, but if I’m interpreting correctly, it appears that most location restrictions which existed for individuals on probation or community control have been revised and replaced by a new “simplified” section s. 775.216, F.S. which “establishes a 200-foot restricted zone around schools, child care facilities, parks, public swimming pools, public bathing places, and playgrounds, and prohibits certain offenders (I read ALL) from visiting or being within these areas, with specified exceptions such as attending religious services, voting, or conducting official business.”
I do not find in the bill any retroactive statements in the bill. Does it still only apply to those after 2004? Also in light of Ellingburg, this should not pass.
I understand the same. A 200 foot proximity zone we may not exist inside of. Apparently we cannot even drive through them.
I just realized I live in a closed community with 2 exits. 1 exit forces you to pass by a school, while the other forces you to pass by a daycare. Am I now under house arrest?
To Florida legislators:
Re: H 45TH/SB212
Please show some compassion for those people who already are not only restricted in so many ways in Florida but most of the individual states in the U.S. have travel restrictions/need to register after staying so many days. Bottom line, registration is a punishment in itself.
Why are you heaping more punishment on them? The recidivism %, esp. for more mature men is less than 1%.
Please vote NO on both these bills.
FAC-3. Question when we email should we include the recent Holsey Ellingburg v. United States (No. 24-482) Ruling? Maybe if they realize good chance this gets shot down before launch they will drop this stuff.
It certainly can’t hurt.
I have no words except: unbelievable. And I thought AZ laws were bad. FL is ridiculous. I will write to them. Thank you for all you do.
Having adjudication withheld in 1993, I was still registered since I pled guilty. My supervision ended two months too late to be left out of the first retroactive punishment passed by the Florida legislature. I have watched my freedom and rights continue to erode for 23 years of increasing punishments for no additional crimes. Dehumanizing laws like these harm us all. We would do better to legislate away all of the sex industry, which profits from the mind-sickness that leads to these crimes. Enabling legislators, industries and profiteers have not been punished at all.
And yet it is illegal to treat pets like this. I have no words for how we treat our registered citizens. How do we get our legislators to stop being brainwashed and seek truth in this matter?
I heard a quote once that has stuck with me
“Our hearts should break, with the things that breaks God’s heart”. I am certain this breaks God’s heart. Does it break yours?
You can write to them Carole. Send them all an email. Now is your opportunity to put your opposition on the record and do something.