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Home : News : News : Top Stories
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Sex Offender Ordinance Posed
By: Scott Benjamin
04/24/2009
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A public hearing will held in Brookfield next month regarding the addition of an ordinance to restrict "child sex offenders from entering child safety zones," an issue that former Board of Education Chairman Steven DeVaux presented to the Board of Selectmen this winter.

First Selectman Robert Silvaggi said that the proposed Brookfield ordinance came from documents that Ridgefield First Selectman Rudy Marconi recently provided to him regarding the ordinance in that town.
Mr. Silvaggi said that Police Chief Robin Montgomery and Danbury attorney Thomas Beecher, the town co-counsel, reviewed the documents before the final version of the proposed ordinance was provided to the selectmen at their special meeting last Friday.
The state Department of Public Safety maintains a Sex Offender Registry.
"Brookfield, like it or not, has sex offenders living in town," Mr. Silvaggi said during last Friday's special meeting of the Board of Selectmen.
"They're on the record," the first selectman said. "They don't belong in the parks or where children go to play. The police should be able to issue a citation and a $100 fine for them being there."
Mr. Silvaggi said that the state registry indicates that there are currently four sex offenders living in Brookfield.
The proposed ordinance states: "It shall be unlawful for a child sex offender to be present in a child safety zone."
Mr. DeVaux, who has worked as a business manager in three school districts in recent years, told the selectmen some months ago that several municipalities in Connecticut have adopted a similar ordinance.
A public hearing on the proposed ordinance will be held May 4 at 7:15 p.m. in the town hall, room 133, shortly before the regular monthly meeting of the Board of Selectmen.
"It's getting to be more routine," Danbury attorney Francis Collins, the town co-counsel, said regarding action by municipalities across the state to enact an ordinance.
In response to a question from Selectman Joni Park, Mr. Collins said that in other municipalities the ordinance usually is enforced "after someone who lives in the neighborhood contacts the police and they check it out. The state law says they can't be in certain places."
"So do we need an ordinance if the state law says that?" Mrs. Park asked.
"You do, because somebody has to enforce it," Mr. Collins said.
"It's a no-brainer," Selectman Jerry Murphy said in an interview regarding the need to adopt the proposed ordinance.
When asked whether there was a serious problem regarding sex offenders in Brookfield being at playgrounds or at beaches, he replied, "No.
"But even though there is no problem now, there is the chance that there could be, and this can help," Mr. Murphy said of the proposed ordinance.


©The Housatonic Times 2009


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