Too Many Cons Are Ex - And Here

Sat., Nov. 25, 2000

By Fern Christenson fernc@spokesman.com

Spokane County commissioners and the Airway Heights City Council are to be commended for their efforts to shield our communities from a further influx of released sex offenders. With five of the state Department of Social and Health Services’ 11 proposed sites for a sex offender halfway house located in Spokane County, the moratorium approach is certainly justified and appreciated.

Whether or not this strategy will work remains to be seen, but at the very least a message is being sent.

Apparently, even louder messages need to bombard our lawmakers until they understand our area already has more than its share of sex offenders and others are not welcome. Spokane County is already home to 1,250 known sex offenders. It is unfair and unreasonable for our region to be the dumping ground for sexual deviants from other areas.

When a criminal completes a prison sentence he or she is said to have “paid their debt to society.” Of course, no amount of time spent behind bars can come even close to compensating the victim of a sex crime, but that is the way our law works. As such, it is reasonable to afford a repentant sex offender the means to be rehabilitated and the DSHS demand for halfway houses is understandable. But it is imperative that the communities burdened with their presence be as comfortable as possible with the restrictions placed on such facilities.

One indication that public concerns are not being addressed is the so-called limitation of placing such a facility no closer than one-quarter mile from a “risk potential” community activity, such as a park or school. A quarter of a mile! Sorry, but there is little comfort to be gained from so small a separating distance between sex predators and their potential victims. Neither is there much reassurance from the required “guarantee” of a five-minute response time by law enforcement in the event of an escape. In small communities with already-limited police protection, such a guarantee is extremely unrealistic.

The real solution to this whole mess apparently is being overlooked in the hunt for Band-Aid fixes. Common sense dictates that halfway houses for dangerous criminals are a bad idea in the first place. It should be obvious to lawmakers by now that the sentences for sex offenders are not strict enough. In the more heinous cases, a sentence of life in prison would be appropriate. There is simply no excuse for the number of sex offenders being released with the label “likely to reoffend.”

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