The City Council of Palmdale will formally consider during its May 1 meeting a complete repeal of its sex offender ordinance. The ordinance is broad in that it includes both residency and presence restrictions.
“It is essential that the City of Palmdale repeal the ordinance on May 1 in order to correct the mistakes made in its passage,” stated President Janice Bellucci. “The current ordinance violates both the federal and state constitutions.”
California RSOL met with city officials in early April to discuss the ordinance and stated that the ordinance would be challenged in court if it was not repealed. During that meeting, the officials agreed to work with California RSOL and to recommend repeal of the ordinance to the City Council.
The City Council meeting will begin at 7 p.m. at City Hall which is located at 38300 Sierra Highway.
Hallelujah! The Palmdale ordinance is one of the most bizarre pieces of legislation out there.
http://www.codepublishing.com/ca/Palmdale/Palmdale09/Palmdale0910.html#9.10
It includes presence restrictions (from pretty much everything, including bus stops and video arcades (that would take care of public transportation and most movie theaters) and residency restrictions (3,000′!) from ‘sensitive uses’ that include school bus stops.
The best part is 9.10.020 (D) which prohibits residence 1000′ from another registrant. Whoever gets there first is safe. Keeping in mind that not all registrants are listed on the web site. Keeping in mind that it is a crime for a registrant to go on-line to find out where the existing ones may be.
Truly bizarre. And unbelievable that it has existed this long unchallenged (since 2008). Kudos to CA RSOL for rectifying this absurdity.
I am sooo glad that CARSOL has met with the City of Palmdale and “forced” them to take action to repeal this ordinance. Too bad CARSOL couldn’t talk some sense into the AV Press. Front page headline today – “Deputies flush out sex offenders on Facebook” Needless to say they are talking about people who are allegedly violating their parole conditions – not all ex-offenders, but of course they are trying to sell newspapers here in Klancaster.
Good news! The City Council of Palmdale voted 4 to 1 tonight to repeal the city’s sex offender ordinance. The sole dissenting vote was cast by Councilman Hofbrau who is reported to be running for the State Assembly seat won by a narrow margin by Steve Fox. The City Council is expected to give final consideration to the repeal at its next meeting on June 4.
These laws all seem to have something in common, the very least being practicality and
accomplishment of the touted goals of safety.
They are really about:
* Political Viability and Survival of Public Servants
* Propagation of invalid statistical data to create panic
* Obfuscation of facts regarding “lack of clear and present danger”
* Instilling Fear and Hate Mongering under the color of law
* Inflicting severe social and emotional harm to children of registrants
* Devising specific ways to make registrants’ lives unbearable
* Calculated mechanisms to destabilize the lives of registrants
* Denial of housing for registrants and their families
* Denial of employment for registrants to support their families
* Ability for LE to grandstand by using this group as convenient targets
* Denying of constitutional rights of registrants
* Denial of social re-integration resources to registrants
* Creating broad based discriminatory policies
* Calculated mechanisms to force registrants out of a community
* Imposition of ex-post-facto punishment
* Breach of constitutional protections against the Tyranny of the Majority
These are but a few of the aspects of the hidden agenda of these statutes. The only
way these facts can stand a chance of working against the senselessness of these
statutes is to repeat them over and over in the same manner that opportunistic public servants echo their lies and exaggerations.
I’m so glad! Tried to watch the video but couldn’t get it to work… Will try again later. Thanks Janice and Frank!
After reading this ordinance, I am not sure what the consequence is for non-compliance. Lets say I meet the conditions and go to a movie theater. There are no consequences for this. No crime, no punishment is outlined. No punitive language is present.
Can someone point to any teeth in this ordinance? Has anyone suffered any consequences to these or ordinances?
I am glad it has been rescinded but would love to hear from someone that knows the answers to my above questions.
Well, I really can’t imagine being a sex offender in Palmdale. This is a very hateful city. I mean, how could anyone be banned from visiting parks, pools, movie theaters and ect ect. Its hateful and hurtful. I’m honestly in a bit of shock that cites could pass such ordinances? Surreal. Can you imagine anyone being banned due to a criminal conviction? (would you have ever guessed this could have happened 10-years ago/I couldn’t have)? Its very disturbing. I truly have to commend Janice. I mean, I can only imagine what cities must think when she comes to town. So much has been accomplished due to her. Truly. Thank you Janice
These Ex Post Facto Laws they have against Sex Offenders in a Blanket Law style which doesn’t Analyze each individual situation are completely INHUMANE and unhealthy for any society as a whole. What we need is to discover better ways to treat our citizens, ESPECIALLY after they have served their sentence, parole, etc and gone thru some type Therapy and have shown substantial rehabilitation…we need to be fair and allow them opportunities to be a productive member of a society and offer a route for forgiveness and hopefully one day build a better Life for themselves and maybe learn a way to give back to the Community. Instead we trample over the rights of many who don’t deserve such improper treatment…each person needs to be accountable for their actions, but also with an understanding that their is opportunity for stopping the behavior and not the dehumanizing a person who made a Terrible Mistake:( Thank God for Janice and I commend her for her efforts for a more Humane treatment of ex offenders….how can anyone allow such laws that cripple a person for Life and being Judged improperly on a daily basis FOR THEIR ENTIRE LIVES???? Come one there has to be a better way to handle this. Janice is a beautiful person who saw something wrong,went against great odds to change it…I respect that and her very much for that!
We need people like Janice out here in Florida, their laws concerning sex offenders are getting out of control. I’ve heard that Florida is one of the worst in the country when it comes to laws concerning sex offenders even those who have already completed their time and therapy.