Update November 8, 2006
Proposition 83 was passed by 70.6% of voters.
Proposition 83 in Plain English
Also known as Jessica’s Law, Prop. 83 proposes sweeping changes to state policies on sex offenders. It will introduce stronger sentences and longer parole periods. Registered sex offenders will be required to wear an electronic tracking device for life. They will be banned from living within 2000 feet of a school or park, which means most parts of Los Angeles and San Francisco. There are about 90,000 registered sex offenders in California. The precise cost is unknown, but the estimates suggest several hundred million dollars.
Official Title and Summary
Sex Offenders. Sexually Violent Predators. Punishment, Residence Restrictions and Monitoring. Initiative Statute.
- Increases penalties for violent and habitual sex offenders and child molesters.
- Prohibits registered sex offenders from residing within 2,000 feet of any school or park.
- Requires lifetime Global Positioning System monitoring of felony registered sex offenders.
- Expands definition of a sexually violent predator.
- Changes current two-year involuntary civil commitment for a sexually violent predator to an indeterminate commitment, subject to annual review by the Director of Mental Health and subsequent ability of sexually violent predator to petition court for sexually violent predator’s conditional release or unconditional discharge.
Summary of Legislative Analyst’s Estimate of Net State and Local Government Fiscal Impact:
- Net state prison, parole, and mental health program costs of several tens of millions of dollars initially, growing to a couple hundred million dollars annually within ten years.
- Potential one-time state mental hospital and prison capital outlay costs eventually reaching several hundred million dollars.
- Net state and local costs for court and jail operations are unknown.
Analysis
- Official Legislative Analysis, California Legislative Analyst’s Office (PDF)
- In Depth Nonpartisan Analysis, League of Women Voters Ca.
Articles
- Offending the law. Los Angeles Times
- Editorial: No on Proposition 83. It provides a false sense of security. Sacramento Bee
- Another View: Yes on 83: Make California’s communities safer. Sacramento Bee
- A no-brainer on sexual predators. Orange County Register
- Sex Offender Crackdown Measure Ties Into a National Trend. Proposition 83 restricts where the ex-cons can live, requires electronic monitoring for life and lengthens sentences. Opponents say the measure is based more on emotion than facts. Los Angeles Times
- The Predator Next Door. Opponents of Prop 83 claim the proposition language is unclear and could cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars for no greater public safety. They also fear residency restrictions will force sex offenders out of cities and into suburban and rural areas. California Connected
November 6th, 2006 at 10:11 am
I am a registered sex offender living in Fresno. If prop 83 passes I will have to move out of the city. I was planning to continue working on my psycology degree at Fresno City College. now those plans are up in the air. I can’t afford to go to college while living in a rural area. I am barely getting by living in the city. I am one of the lucky few sex offenders to be enrolled in a treatment program which I was in for three years. I was also on a cable TV show about sexual predators which I agreed to do while I was on parole. The treatment program really changed my life. It helped me deal with my insecurities when I was bullied at school and feelings about when I was sexually abused by my mother and other people close to me. I personally feel that I am cured from committing another crime. I also feel that I still have problems in my life which I am working on - like having a girlfriend and starting a family. This new law will smash most of my endevors to get back to a normal life. I want to be accepted as a contributing member of the community, not a burden.
November 13th, 2006 at 12:19 pm
One of the initiatives on this November’s ballot is Proposition 83. Sadly, very little public discussion has been focused on this initiative. Dubbed “Jessica’s Law,” this is another misguided attempt to try to make our children safer, but it plays on public hysteria to no real benefit. It is difficult to argue against something as positive as child safety, but this proposed law would spend billions of dollars to implement a Buck Rogers system of global positioning satellite ankle bracelets for all of California’s 90,000 plus registered sex offenders—for life, yet. The estimated costs for this hair brained scheme cannot possibly be accurately calculated or projected into the future, but it figures to be huge. As it is, the authors of this initiative think that about one billion dollars should probably cover the costs for the first year. Our long history with governmental cost estimates makes the fuzziness of this figure clear. Huge cost over-runs are almost guaranteed.
Some vague idea that the costs of this law might be paid by offenders themselves is the funniest thing I’ve heard in a long time. Blood out of a turnip, anyone?
As cogent as this idea may seem at gut level, the illogic of this plan can be seen in the following: First, this proposition makes no distinction at all between sexual offenders. It lumps them all into one big pile. Some sex offenders are forced to register for even misdemeanor crimes such as urinating in public. To pay the exorbitant cost to place lifetime GPS tracking devices on these people is plain ludicrous. The wording of this proposition is typically vague (as are most proposed laws written by amateurs). At one point the proposal says something about “Violent Sexual Predators”, but later it mentions “High Risk Sex Offenders” as somehow equivalent. The voters might read this and think, ”Yeah, let’s put this bracelet on the worst of the worst.” But in California there are only two classifications for sex offenders: SVP—or sexually violent predators, and HRSO–high risk sex offenders. Despite the suggestion to the contrary, there is no such thing as a “low risk sex offender” in California; the lowest one can be is “High-risk”. So, while perhaps suggesting that only the worst and most dangerous offenders will be targeted for this draconian and astronomically expensive treatment, it, in effect, makes this program mandatory for absolutely every registered offender in the state!
Another intelligent question would be, “How does knowing the exact location of 100,000 registrants twenty-four hours a day make children (or anybody else) any safer?” Will this device tell us which ones have a kid tucked under their arm? No, of course not. A kid goes missing after school. His parents aren’t sure anything is wrong until several hours later. So, we track the movements of all the several thousand offenders in a hundred mile radius, and come up with a solid red blotch on the computer screen, there’s so many. Plus, what if somebody not registered did it? Even a child could see that this supposed “solution” is of very little use at all.
Iowa is one of several states ahead of us in implementing this law. At first, their police, prosecutors, district attorneys, etc. were in favor of this legislation. But after having to wrestle with the awkward and impossible implementation of these provisions, they now favor the repeal of “Jessica’s Law.” Additionally, the mandated “offender free zones” created by this law (no offender can reside within one-half mile of a school, park, playground, daycare, etc.) have shown to have had absolutely no impact on the statistical incidence of child abduction or other crimes against children (or anyone else). It turns out that if you’re a sex offender determined to grab a kid, you can simply drive past a school or grab a kid as he walks past your house or anywhere else.
California prisons are overcrowded to an all-time record. The Federal Courts are poised to perhaps Federalize the operation of the California Dept of Corrections (as they already have done with CDC Medical operations). Recently, the CCPOA (the powerful prison guards’ union) lobbied Sacramento for 6 billion dollars for new prison construction. They were turned down, because this is simply not a responsible use of the limited tax dollars in our state. The state legislature is very favorably inclined to the prison industry in this state, but enough is sometimes enough.
Prop 83 mandates one half billion dollars in the first year alone for new prison construction, to house all the offenders who will be given greatly longer sentences under its provisions. This is potentially an end-run around the state legislature, who for once failed to give the CDC whatever it asks for.
Lastly, the offenders who are registered are those who are already complying with the restrictions placed upon them. We know where they are because they’ve followed the rules. There are many more offenders who fail to register. We don’t know where they are. Many states require registration for ten years. After that, the previous records of offenders are certainly available, should any repeat offense occur. California already requires lifetime registration for these people—even 90 and hundred year old geriatrics living in nursing homes. The cost of this extreme and shortsighted current law already costs taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars to pay the salaries of law enforcement personnel to simply file paperwork all day long. To add the almost unfathomable cost of outer space technology and the thousands of additional employees to install, monitor and maintain such equipment is money very poorly spent.
One way to make children safer would be to require all kids to wear safety helmets when riding in automobiles. The incidence of child traffic injury and death would definitely be lowered by this. Where do I go to start a petition to put that into law? And where do we draw the line? Face it, everyone wants kids—and everybody else—to be safe. There’s just a big line between what’s reasonable and efficacious, and what is not. Prop 83 is a disaster waiting to gum up the works here in California. With a fraction of the money Prop 83 will spend, we could immunize every child in the state. That would help kids too. Really.