Source: Illinois Voices for Reform and Chicago 400
A message from Adele Nicholas, Executive Director, Illinois Voices for Reform:
Illinois residents, please click here to support SB2158 now!
Everyone needs a place to live. People who’ve done their time should have the opportunity to establish stable homes for themselves and their families.
Illinois’ wasteful and counterproductive registry and residency laws too often prevent people on the registry from building a foundation for a positive future.
It’s time to stand up for real change. You can help us get there!
Our colleagues at the Chicago 400 are leading the charge on a bill to significantly reform these discredited laws. If passed, SB 2158 would make the following changes:
• reduce residential banishment zones to 250 feet;
• remove home daycares from the list of zones around which banishment zones are imposed;
• grandfather in existing residences so you can’t be kicked out of your home if someone establishes a new daycare near you;
• allow waiver of the registration fee for those who can’t pay;
• get rid of weekly registration for those who don’t have a permanent address; and
• lower the penalties for failure to register.
Your state lawmakers need to hear from you!
We need everyone’s support. Please take this simple one-minute action to tell your lawmakers to stand up for these commonsense reforms.
Illinois residents, please click here to act now!
With gratitude,
Adele Nicholas, Executive Director
Illinois Voices for Reform
Read more on the Chicago 400 website
Read about more important Illinois bills that may affect you (ilvoices.org website)
It sure is curious how the phrase “banishment zone” is just accepted. There are states with no residency restrictions at all. Why is a change to the law that’s supposed to be beneficial include such punitive zones of banishment? Isn’t banishing a punishment? What safety is there in these zones beyond a feel good measure for politicians? And about the reduced penalties for not registering, why have any “punishment” at all? Instead if any portion of the registry is violated, correct it and include a fine of a certain amount for each required correction? Forgot an email address? Correct it, pay the fine, like a ticket and move on. Or is the temptation to throw people in prison too irresistible for these lawmakers?
This effort ignores the reality of registries. Registries cannot be reformed. They must be abolished.
Anyone living on the registry in the “progressive” state of Illinois needs to do everything that they can to make sure this law is passed. I firmly believe that if it does, and LE sees that the law that they have been backing for all these years is BS, then the next shoe to drop is a tiered system with a way off this thing.