Well, it was bound to happen.
The state of Georgia can now boast their own version of the Julia Tuttle Causeway.
For those persons deemed sex offenders who are unable to locate housing due to residency restrictions, state probation officers have directed these now homeless offenders into the woods outside Atlanta.
I'm wondering just how long before encampments start popping up in next-door neighbor Alabama or Tennessee or the Carolinas. Because that's exactly what happened with residency restrictions. State officials throughout the United States sat back, watched the legal on Iowa and once restricting someone's freedom to life and liberty appeared to hold legal muster, the wildfire of NIMBY thinking spread throughout this country.
I would guess Georgia figures Miami dodged a legal bullet with the dismissal of the ACLU case against the city or at the very least, bought a little time before the case is heard on appeal. Until then, off to the woods you go, those without a roof to call your own.
If any good has come out of the newest Tent City, it's the fact the new digs are located in Georgia.
The home of the Southern Center for Human Rights.
(...)
The muddy camp on the outskirts of prosperous Cobb County is an unintended consequence of Georgia's sex offender law, which bans the state's 16,000 sex offenders from living, working or loitering within 1,000 feet of schools, churches, parks and other spots where children gather.
(...)"The state needs to find a responsible way to deal with this problem," said Sarah Geraghty, an attorney with the Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights who represents another man living in the camp. "Requiring people to live like animals in the woods is both inhumane and a terrible idea for public safety."The outpost also illustrates the unique dilemma the law creates for homeless sex offenders, who unlike other homeless people, cannot take shelter in a church or curl up in a park because they are barred from both. (9/28/09)
What will it take to right these wrongs?
