Sex Offender Restrictions Eased in Miami-Dade County

"Miami-Dade County has taken the first steps to help convicted sex offenders find places to live that aren't tucked in alleyways or shacks under overpasses like the Julia Tuttle Causeway.

Commissioners on Thursday passed, 12-0, a sex offender ordinance that repeals more than 24 different sex offender laws enacted by municipalities within county borders. The new law creates one standard that it hopes will balance the need to protect children while still giving housing options to sexual offenders.

The ordinance also creates a new provision that supporters say is a more workable and realistic solution to protecting children: child-safety zones.

Almost all the municipal ordinances tend ``to create zones in which sexual offenders are completely excluded from available housing,'' the ordinance reads.

Under the child-safety zones, sex offenders are prohibited from loitering within 300 feet of where children congregate. In other words, it restricts sex offenders from being near children, but doesn't leave them homeless.

About 35-50 sexual offenders still live under the Causeway, mostly in thin tents and cardboard boxes. Their plight generated national debate over the consequences of strict residency requirements. In most cases, the sex offenders were placed under the bridge upon their release by the state Department of Corrections.

Diaz predicted that every municipality in the state will adopt ordinances similar to that of Miami-Dade's by the end of the year.

``Whether you are in Aventura or in Homestead, it provides efficiency to the state attorney and law enforcement knowing that there's now one law across the county,'' Diaz said.

Unlike the county, which bans sex offenders from living within a certain distance of schools only, other municipalities' laws go further, banning them from living within 2,500 feet or more of daycare centers, parks, playgrounds and a myriad of other places where children congregate.

PUSHED OUT

Civil libertarians have argued that this leaves sex offenders virtually homeless, making dangerous offenders more difficult to monitor and more likely to go underground and continue harming children.

Now, the revised law maintains the 2,500-foot rule residency restriction from schools, but uses the state's 1,000-foot buffer zone for all other places where children gather.

City officials and civil libertarians had mixed reactions to the ordinance.

``I haven't been totally satisfied that the county has the authority to do this,'' said Miami Beach City Attorney Jose Smith, adding that it ``waters down,'' their city's stricter law.

``I'm not sure how other cities are going to handle this, but I'm not sure we're going to challenge it,'' he said.

MISGIVINGS

The American Civil Liberties Union of Florida, meanwhile, said the county ordinance is a step in the right direction, but doesn't go far enough.

``This has been going on for years -- it's too late for half measures. We need a solution that doesn't go halfway,'' said Courtenay Strickland, director of public policy for the ACLU of Florida, which has challenged the county's 2,500-foot rule in court.

Thus far, sex offenders have been governed by three levels of laws: federal, state and local laws -- all of which target where sex offenders live, some of them stricter than others.

Miami Beach's law, for example, prohibits sex offenders from living within 2,500 feet of a school, bus stop, park, playground ``and other places where children can congregate.''

The city of Miami sued Miami-Dade County last year because the county was allowing the offenders to live too close to a barrier island that it considers a park."