Florida’s new sex offender registrant restrictions will not improve public safety

Florida lawmakers are preparing to add new restrictions on where certain registered sex offenders are allowed to live, blocking them from housing near public pools, which include splash pads and a variety of water recreation attractions. While presented as a way of protecting children from predators, in truth, these new rules would push registrants farther into the shadows, into homelessness, and in some cases, make it harder to supervise these people because they will go underground or leave the state.

Senate Bill 212 and its companion House Bill 45 passed in March and are now headed to the governor’s desk. At a House Criminal Justice Subcommittee Hearing in November, the House bill’s sponsor, state Rep. Rachel Saunders Plakon (R-Seminole County), explained that the inspiration for the bill was a recent case where a sex offender on probation allegedly attempted to meet with an undercover agent he thought was a 14-year-old child. The probationer had been approved for a residence that was in “close proximity to a community pool where children regularly congregate. In fact, there were floats, animal toys, a water gun, and other items consistent with use by children present,” Plakon said. “The judge ruled the defendant’s residence did not violate any law. So, today’s bill will right that wrong.”

The legislation would accordingly add the new category of “public swimming pools” to residency restrictions for sex offenders with young victims under 16. There are a lot of public pools in Florida, so—not surprisingly—advocates for registrants objected strenuously to the original bill, which was even broader, restricting residency near all state public waterways, not just pools. They argued it would make large swaths of the state off limits and increase housing instability for registrants.

Experts confirm that the proposed policy would, whether intentionally or not, make it harder for affected sex offenders to find places to live. A legislative report found that “The Department of Corrections supervises 6,124 sex offenders, of whom approximately 2,992 could be affected by this bill. The Department states in its agency analysis that 12,985 inmates, when released, would be impacted by the bill. The increased residential restrictions could make it difficult to obtain stable housing. Currently, 334 supervised sex offenders are classified by the Department as homeless and the number will likely increase if this bill takes effect.”

Sensibly, the Senate bill was scaled back in committee so that it only applies to public swimming pools and not public bathing places, among other changes. That said, the calculation of the impacts in the legislative analysis have not been revised since the first version of the bill, so there has not really been a credible analysis of the actual effects of implementing this residency restriction.

Understandably, people aren’t lining up to stick up for people convicted of sex offenses, but it is important to investigate the actual impacts of implementing highly restrictive policies such as this swimming pool proposal. Making it impossible for people to find a place to live after serving their sentences is harsh and counterproductive to preventing further crimes. Stigmatizing and fomenting fear about sex offenders who have served their time also displays cynicism about the human capacity for rehabilitation and change.

And contrary to popular belief, cynicism is largely misplaced: “People convicted of violent and sexual offenses are actually among the least likely to be rearrested, and those convicted of rape or sexual assault have rearrest rates 20% lower than all other offense categories combined,” according to the Prison Policy Institute.

The committee report on the Florida registry bill noted that Florida had a recidivism rate in 2025 of 23.3% for people with a primary offense of sexual/lewd behavior, with 8.4% of these people returning within 12 months after release, 8.8% 13 to 24 months after release, and 6.1% within 25 to 36 months after release. By comparison, Florida’s overall return to prison three-year recidivism rate across all crime categories is about 25%, and 35% at five years out. That is on the very low end of state rates: Florida’s 2024 rate of 21.2% rate was eighth-best in a ranking of all states.

Sex registries don’t operate the way many people believe. They are not limited to people convicted of the most serious sexual offenses; instead, the lists sweep in a much broader range of offenses, including ones that took place decades ago; that did not involve any contact with children; consensual relationships between teens and adults just over the legal threshold; and other less egregious and/or nonviolent charges such as public urination. Because of these broad definitions, there are roughly 850,000 registered sex offenders in the United States, according to the Office of Justice Programs. With the profusion of registries with ever-more-onerous provisions, there are more reasons to be concerned about broadly applicable restrictions on the basic necessities of life.

Public registries have demonstrated little to no evidence of reducing recidivism or providing other benefits. In fact, 95% of sex offense arrests are of people who were never accused of a sex crime before, and most perpetrators of sexual offenses are known to the victim, with 93% of victims under 18 knowing the perpetrator. In addition, some evidence suggests registries may actually increase risk by preventing registrants from maintaining housing, employment, and social ties, undermining principles of harm reduction.

Arguably, laws in Georgia, Oklahoma, Mississippi, and other states’ laws may be comparably as restrictive as the ones proposed in Florida. Georgia’s statute includes a prohibition on loitering at any prohibited site, rather than just restricting living or working there. The broad definitions in that law include recreation facilities, gymnasiums, and public and community swimming pools. A 2024 suit pending in New York state, brought by the New York Civil Liberties Union, claims that the state’s restrictions make most of New York City unavailable to people on the registry—85% of residential areas in the city overall, 95% in Manhattan.

If we keep restricting where sex offenders can live, they will wind up having no viable options in many states. The swimming pool residency restrictions will not accomplish the removal of sex offenders from Florida, if that is the state’s true aim. People will instead simply live in the shadows, which itself unleashes harm on communities, albeit different than the harm Senate Bill 212 and House Bill 45 aim to remedy.

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