NJ- Less restrictive sex offender bill passes hurdle

6-9-2009 New Jersey:

TRENTON -- State lawmakers are moving forward with a bill that would allow municipalities to restrict where convicted sex offenders may live, but the measure is less strict than ordinances adopted by Hamilton and Robbinsville.

Drafted in response to a recent state Supreme Court decision striking down ordinances in about 118 municipalities, the bill would allow towns to bar high-risk offenders from living up to 500 feet from playgrounds, schools, and other places where children gather.

Hamilton and Robbinsville had made it illegal for certain sex offenders to live within 2,500 feet of those areas, but the court ruled that laws adopted on a town-by-town basis conflicted with Megan's Law, the state's scheme for regulating sex offenders.

The proposed law has bipartisan backing from local lawmakers and was approved 6-0 by the Assembly Judiciary Committee yesterday, meaning it can be called to a vote in that house of the state Legislature. A similar bill has been introduced in the Senate.

"While every town should be empowered to make the decision as to whether a predator-free-zone makes sense for their community, those rules must also follow a common thread," Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein, D-Plainsboro, who chairs the judiciary committee and sponsored the bill, said in a news release.

"By laying down these guidelines, we can not only protect families but also guarantee that each local ordinance that is written is consistent, clear-cut and will stand firmly on its legal merits," Greenstein said.

Assemblyman Wayne DeAngelo, D-Hamilton, who sponsored the bill and also voted for Hamilton's ordinance as a councilman there, said the legislators had to adopt rules that would work across the state.

"The important thing is that we're giving New Jersey municipalities an opportunity to sign on to a pedophile-free zone that is going to protect your kids," DeAngelo said. "It's not the extreme that I wanted," but the bill is a "compromise that was made to serve the 566 municipalities."

Among area Republicans, state Sen. Bill Baroni of Hamilton sponsored the Senate version of the bill and Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande, who represents Hightstown and East Windsor, voted to advance the bill from committee to the general Assembly.

The bill would allow towns to adopt ordinances that apply to offenders over the age of 21, except those who are determined to be low-risk under state guidelines.

Any ordinance would have to be tailored so that it does not prohibit those offenders "from residing in every residentially zoned area within the municipality," according to a copy of the legislation.

The New Jersey League of Municipalities expressed concern that the bill as it stands would still leave municipal ordinances open to legal challenges that can be costly.

The league is "recommending language that would make it a uniform standard" across the state, said executive director Bill Dressel.

Under the proposed law, "there are aspects (of an ordinance restricting sex offender residency) that could still vary from town to town, and that is what made the ordinances that were previously adopted vulnerable to court action," Dressel said.

If the law were statewide, he explained, the state would assume the cost of defending it.

Megan's Law was named for Megan Kanka, a 7-year-old who was murdered by a convicted sex offender who lived in her Hamilton neighborhood. ..Source.. by RYAN TRACY, STAFF WRITER