City of Gainesville Rolls Back Sex Offender Residency Restrictions
Effective immediately, the City of Gainesville has rolled back it’s sex offender residency restriction to fall inline with the State’s law. The change, which reduces the exclusion zone from 2500 feet to 1000 feet, was unanimously voted in favor of by the City Commission, who did the right thing when faced with a lawsuit brought by a registrant who was unable to live with his wife because their home was inside an exclusion zone.
For years, they lived apart, but when his health began to deteriorate and he could no longer live alone, the couple had enough and fought to live together so he could receive necessary care. The lawsuit was necessitated after their requests for an exemption to the ordinance were denied.
Here is a situation where the City Commission did the right thing. Hopefully other cities will follow. Congrats to the couple and the paralegal who assisted them. Congrats to all who posted comments online in support of the change (notably, nobody posted public comments in opposition). Congrats to the registrants in Gainesville who now have more housing options than they did this morning.
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Here is another Florida article that mentions overcrowding of offenders in Tampa. “Tampa City Council Members will study the findings of a report from the Tampa Police Department on Thursday about a high concentration of sex offenders living in a one-block stretch of Nebraska Avenue in the city’s V.M. Ybor neighborhood”. Should be a short report with conclusion report should be a sentence long. Tampa City Council Members will study the findings of a report from the Tampa Police Department on Thursday about a high concentration of sex offenders living in a one-block stretch of Nebraska Avenue in the city’s V.M. Ybor neighbor found residency restrictions caused this.
https://www.baynews9.com/fl/tampa/news/2022/12/01/tampa-city-council-to-hear-report-on-concentration-of-sex-offenders-in-v-m–ybor
https://www.clickorlando.com/news/local/2022/11/30/florida-gators-quarterback-jalen-kitna-arrested-on-child-porn-charges/
Goes to show it can happen to anyone
Yes, it can. Hope that he gets some good legal counsel.
So does Gainesville have a separate 1000 foot rule created of their own or are they just relying on the state law of 1000 feet? If it’s just the state law then everyone convicted before 2005 would have no zone exclusion to worry about. Mine is from 1998 and it would be great if I need to move to not have to worry about all these exclusion zones. I had to move last year and it was pretty tricky to find a home that was acceptable and not in a bad neighborhood.
We shouldn’t have to fight, sue claw and scream for what others take for granted.The registry and all it’s myriad of overly-excessive rules, restrictions, requirements and guidelines is an unnecessary evil.
Great news! Residency restrictions are totally ineffective, as we all know. New Mexico has no such restrictions and disallows counties and cities from adding any requirements on registrants not specified in state law. This is true in a handful of states. These states can essentially act as a “control group” for any statistical studies.
As for New Mexico, I’ve not read of any correlation between having no residency restrictions and an increased number of child sexual assaults. Gainesville certainly did the intelligent thing. Whether or not it would have gone to zero in the absence of Florida state law is unknown.
And on we go to do away with certain counties and their “exclusion zones.” They, too, are ineffective in any new crime prevention.