Research shows that such restrictions greatly diminish housing availability and increase transience, homelessness and instability — as evidenced by the situation under the Julia Tuttle Causeway. These laws interfere with effective tracking, monitoring and probation supervision. This undermines the very purpose of sex-offender registries. Research also shows a clear link between housing instability and increased criminal recidivism.
Laws that foster instability for criminal offenders simply do not serve the best interest of public safety.
However, 24-hour loitering zones are a feasible alternative to residence restrictions and are more likely to accomplish goals of public protection. Such a proposal is pending in the Florida Legislature. Some jurisdictions, such as Hillsborough County, elected not to enact municipal residence restrictions and instead created loitering zones. Instead of regulating only where sex offenders sleep at night, child-safety zones actually keep sex offenders from frequenting places where they can cultivate relationships with children during the day.
We all have a common objective — to protect children and others from sexual violence. The crucial question is how best to accomplish this goal. As a parent, a woman, a taxpaying voter and a social worker who began her career in child-protective services, I advocate not for sex offenders but for public policies that are based upon scientific data. They are more likely to result in enhanced public safety and reduced sexual violence.
Residence restrictions, at best, promote a false sense of security for residents. At worst, they undermine sex-offender registration and interfere with effective management of sex offenders by decreasing stability and fostering risk factors known to facilitate recidivism — thus increasing the likelihood that these offenders will resume a life of crime.
JILL S. LEVENSON, Fort Lauderdale