Lawmakers debate lifting sex offender residency restrictions

See also: It's time to abolish where sex offenders can't live

3-1-15 New Hampshire:

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — New Hampshire's legislature is once again debating measures that would ban municipalities from restricting where sex offenders can live, even as some other states are making such restrictions tougher.

The legislature's Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee is expected to send the proposals to the full House this week. The House last year supported the ban on residency restrictions by a vote of 231-97, but the Senate killed the bill by consigning it to an interim study.

New Hampshire state police support eliminating residency restrictions, saying they make it harder to keep track of offenders. Some citizens at a public hearing in January — the bills' only public airing — said they're adamantly opposed.

Sen. Lou D'Allesandro, a Manchester Democrat, predicts the measure will again fail in the senate.

"We're talking about two significant situations — sex offenders and sex offenders against children — that touch the core of society," D'Allesandro said.

State Trooper Rebecca Eder-Linell, who maintains the state's sex offender database, says the restrictions make it harder to monitor the state's 2,700 sex offenders.

"They go underground," she said.

New Hampshire communities that have residency restrictions typically bar sex offenders from living within 2,500 feet of a school, playground and other places where children gather.

Derry Republican Rep. Katherine Prudhomme-O'Brien vowed to vote against banning residency restrictions, saying most of her constituents "would consider it preposterous."

Derry resident David Lowe agreed.

"I'm appalled that anyone would introduce a bill like this," Lowe said. "We need to protect our kids."

Devon Chaffee, executive director of the New Hampshire Civil Liberties Union, said five municipalities still have residency restrictions: Tilton, Holderness, Bridgewater, Northfield and Boscawen. Tilton will vote on whether to repeal its ordinance at this spring's town meeting.

"They don't work and they don't protect children," Chaffee said of the restrictions.

The civil liberties union won lawsuits that challenged the constitutionality of residency restrictions in Dover in 2009 and Franklin in 2012. The Franklin restrictions were struck down in 2012; Dover's in 2009.

New Hampshire's proposal to ban residency restrictions runs contrary to recent legislation in other states. Last year alone, Alabama, North Carolina, Rhode Island and Tennessee all added tightened residency restrictions. North Carolina, for instance, added Boys and Girls Clubs of America to the 1,000-foot zone where sex offenders can't live. Connecticut last year formed a task force to create zones to protect senior citizens.

"If you're forbidden from living where you have an opportunity to live ... you go back to living under a bridge," the bill's lead sponsor, Rep. Tim Robertson, a Keene Democrat, testified. He said the restrictions often prevent offenders from living with family members who can provide a support system.

Robertson is also sponsoring a bill that would eliminate the $50 fee sex offenders must pay to register with police annually or when they move. He says the fee discourages registration.

"A guy coming out of prison as a sex offender is going to have a hard time getting a job, a harder time finding some place to live," Robertson said. ..Source.. by Fosters.com