Registered sex offenders thinking about moving to Westbrook might want to reconsider, now that the Westbrook City Council passed an ordinance Monday night banning sex offenders from living in most of the city.
Offenders are not fully banned from the city. About 2 1/2 miles of Methodist Road, a half mile of Bridgton Road, a half mile of Duck Pond Road and two-thirds of a mile of Brook Street are still open for offenders looking for a home or job. Additionally, some 29 registered sex offenders already living or working in the city will be grandfathered and will not have to leave their current residences. All but one of those offenders live within the restricted areas.
Any registered sex offender whose crime was committed against an individual under 18, however, and does not currently reside or work in Westbrook will be restricted from finding a home or job within 2,500 feet of a school, child care center or home, park, playground, bowling alley or any other location frequented by children. The ordinance bars these sex offenders from the most densely populated residential and business districts in the city, including all of downtown. The ordinance also bans offenders from loitering in these same areas. The ordinance goes into effect Oct. 1.
The ordinance, originally based on one passed by Gorham in July, has been through a number of revisions during the past two months. It is likely the strictest of its kind in the state. Gorham rejected a proposal to add workplace restrictions in its ordinance, while Westbrook’s ordinance includes such a restriction. In addition to restricting places where sex offenders can live, work and recreate, the ordinance imposes a fee of $25 per year that offenders must pay to mitigate the cost of enforcing the ordinance.
One Bridgton resident and registered sex offender, Calvin Shelton, Maine representative for SOHopeful.org, sent the Westbrook councilors some 40 e-mails during the past few weeks containing reports from Human Rights Watch, court rulings and news articles from around the country that he believed made a case against the ordinance. Shelton said he tried to convince Westbrook sex offenders to come forward to argue against the ordinance. None did.
Councilors received loud praise at meetings from citizens speaking in favor of protecting the community’s children. The ordinance was originally referred to the Public Safety Committee by Councilor Ed Symbol, whose friends – the Wescott family – had suggested at a Fourth of July barbecue that Westbrook look into it.
The Wescotts’ daughter had been a victim of sex abuse by a member of the family, and mother Jen Wescott, who also runs a child care business out of her home and attended every meeting on the ordinance, spoke tearfully several times, urging the council to protect the children of the city from sex offenders.
“We don’t need them. They need to be on their own island,” she said the first meeting on Aug. 13. She added, “I know that’s not fair,” but she was not the only one with the sentiment to ban offenders from the entire city.
Local radio talk show host and Westbrook resident Ray Richardson was also at the first meeting, and suggested the city go through a legal showdown to fight the standing court ruling that banishment is unconstitutional. The staunch Republican even went so far as to suggest, “if it required a few extra taxes to throw (sex offenders) out of town, I’d be willing to pay them.”
Susan Bouchard, who attended nearly every meeting on the ordinance, also spoke repeatedly about the need for the ordinance, identifying herself as a survivor of abuse at the hand of people known to her, starting when she was 9. She said she had gone in front of the state Legislature in May to fight for legislation, but to no avail.
“I guess I need to go back to Augusta, because I guess I didn’t make my point clear enough,” she said at the Aug. 13 meeting.
At Monday’s meeting, John Wescott, husband of Jen Wescott, shook Symbol’s hand after the council gave the ordinance final approval.
Westbrook Police Chief William Baker has asked for a meeting between the city’s Planning and Engineering Department, the city solicitor and the public safety officials responsible for registering sex offenders in order to discuss the implementation of the ordinance. Baker said he expects that registrants would first come into the city to register then be referred to the engineering department in order to check the geographic information system to ascertain where they can and can’t get homes or jobs.
Baker said that it is sometimes the case that sex offenders moving into the city will register after arriving. In that instance the offender will have to change their plans in order to stay in compliance with the ordinance.
Baker said the department will in part be relying on tips from citizens and other departments to find out if a sex offender has moved into a restricted area or if they have failed to register. Complaints will be given to a detective who will investigate.
One of the most common concerns with sex offender residency restrictions for law enforcement agencies is the supposed tendency to drive offenders underground, leaving them in violation of the law by their failure to register and hidden from enforcement agencies. Baker said it is an unfortunate by-product of the restrictions where the problem seems to exist, but a balance must be made between the rights of sex offenders and the tools given to law enforcement agencies to protect children from potential abuse.
There are a few kinks left in the ordinance concerning how sex offenders will be notified of the areas in the city from which they are banned. The council passed the ordinance on Monday to get something on the books, and will open it back up and tweak it as needed over the coming weeks and months.
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