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Sex offenders should pay for monitoring equipment, says
Smith
Legislation would take into consideration
offender's ability to pay
A bill to require some sex
offenders to pay for their own electronic monitoring passed out of committee
today. House Bill 3161 is sponsored by
Rep. Norma Smith.
Some sex offenders
released to community custody by the Department of Corrections (DOC) are
required to be outfitted with a global positioning system for electronic
monitoring. House Bill 3161 would require the DOC to recover the cost of
electronic monitoring from offenders who have the ability to pay.
"This is a very
straight forward bill," said Smith. "In a world of unfunded mandates and
taxpayers being forced to pay for so many things, it makes sense that
sex offenders pay for their electronic monitoring."
Smith noted that the
governor authorized $400,000 in emergency funds last year to pay for
electronic monitoring of 50 sex offenders. However, she's concerned that
more than half the money is being spent on adding public employees to
the state payroll instead of putting more community corrections officers
on the street to physically monitor dangerous sex offenders.
Smith also believes the
state should look at contracting with a private company to lower costs
and provide more services, such as real-time monitoring. Real-time
monitoring sends an immediate alert to law enforcement if an offender is
in violation of the terms of their community custody. The state plan
currently uses passive monitoring which doesn't spot a violation until
an employee downloads and reviews the information, usually every 24
hours.
"The cost for a sex
offender to be on electronic monitoring under the governor's plan is
twenty-five dollars a day, but a private company would cost as little as
ten to fifteen dollars a day," said Smith. "Either way, it's a small
price for sex offenders to pay for the freedom to live and work outside
of prison after committing what I consider to be one of the most heinous
of crimes."
House Bill 3161 awaits a
vote in the House.
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For more information, contact:
Bobbi Cussins, Public Information Officer:
(360) 786-7252
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