Is Florida ready for a sex offense management board?
A few states have sex offense management boards (SOMBs) that have encouraged research-based policies, but some state boards are far from perfect. Should FAC be pushing Florida to form such a board? The concept is surely good, but the results are not always the best.
Ideally, such a board should include stakeholders from all sides of the criminal justice system: a victims’ advocate, someone with a past sex offense who has successfully reintegrated back into society, a prosecutor, a licensed mental health professional with experience in treatment of adult sex offenders, etc. But that does not always happen.
Florida could decide to develop such a board under the jurisdiction of the Department of Corrections, at the direction of the legislature, or appointed by the governor.
The concept of having a management board that bases its recommendations on research sounds good on paper, but it all depends on the make-up of the board. If the appointees are purposely chosen because they are “yes” men or women to the leadership of this state, we would be better off without such a board. If they are independent from politics and are led by research-based policies, they could be an ally for us.
This board also does not have any real authority but makes recommendations to the state.
Utah recently appointed such a board worth looking at to consider if we should push for one in Florida.
I would advise against it. I can see Ron Book buying his way into membership of such a board, or Lauren whining her way into it. Either way, I can’t imagine anything good coming out of a board like that.
Dustin
Excellent point. And with his wealth and influence we could all be sent to the bottom of the ocean to study algae without scuba tanks.
I am NOT a “sex offender”
AND
I don’t need to be “managed”!
You are right. A management board for former sex offenders (FSO) would be counter productive. The mere presence of such a board implies that FSO’s are somehow more of a threat to society than others with a criminal offense. It feeds the myth of dangerousness just as the mere presence of the registry does. Is there no need for a car jacker management board? Having a management board for FSOs would be a mistake for a number of reasons, many of which have been articulated in other posts here.
That’s exactly right! Government labels have been used for the sole purpose of divide and rule for far too long. The job of POLiticians is to POLarize the populations in endless division. It’s evil and lacks even a shred of wisdom.
JJJJ
I was afraid to do so but my last job I should have said that to my manager. I basically did when I had a massive heart attack and he refused to call 9-11 and I have to dial it myself. He ended up getting fired over that (Along with all the other dirt I had on him).
I am not a snitch but in that instance, it was justified. Well all of them would have been but It was hard to find jobs with a sex offense so I endured it. Shame of it was, when raises came out, everyone else got $1 an hour raise while I got .15 cents. That also was brought up in my complaint. And I ran circles around all the other employees and in fact, when the manager was gone, I was the supervisor but got no extra pay. And the 2 Temp employees made twice what I made because they didn’t get health insurance was the bosses reasoning.
I currently earn about 1/3 of what other professionals with my title and credentials do, so I know what you mean…
When you are a registrant you take what you can get.
If I recall correctly, sometime in the last year or two, FAC announced it was going after ending the registry. No more fighting all the endless little battles.
So why even discuss adding more bureaucracy?🤷🏻♀️
There is a SOMB in Colorado and it is not good!
It is made up of people who have an interest in “the industry” such as polygraphers, people who have been victimized or others who have a political agenda. It recently came up for sunset review and despite all of the conflicts of interest, it was renewed. Maybe a different make up would work but….Florida….seems like a lot of downright meanness down there and not much attention is paid to the facts.
The way I see it, any actual oversight would be welcome. Right now all we see as far as changes with the Florida registry are more restrictions added yearly!
Sure there is no guarantee that positive changes would be made however, it seems that having a board would at least provide some transparency which can only be positive.
As it stands we are stuck in a tar pit with no way out except to sink and die. It would be great to have a reasonable way off of the registry (ideally no registry but lets be realistic) so that people can move on after paying their “debt to society” without this lifetime probation that we currently have.
Any board appointed by our current Governor would be a mistake.