Re: “Ramsey supports sex offender restrictions.” I know for a fact that there were numerous experts in the field of sex offender management, law enforcement, victim advocates who spoke to Mr. Ramsey’s committee and they were IGNORED.

This is why the five members who voted not to send the bill to the House floor issued a Minority Report (you can find that here at http://sosolutionsnetwork.org/docs/HB908_MinorityReport.pdf).

If I may ask you a question, how many of your tax dollars are you willing to spend on needless defense to court challenges? Is $1 million enough? How about $2 million, or $5 million? Do you know how much has been spent to date defending HB1059? Couldn’t this money be better spent on other needs? Why don’t the media, as our public watchdog, hold these irresponsible General Assembly members accountable for passing laws that will not pass constitutional muster?

No one is talking about being “soft” on sex offenders, but since when is a person who urinated behind a building the same risk as a serial rapist?

Or when is someone convicted of consensual sex as a teenager the same as someone charged with multiple counts of aggravated child molesting?

According to Mr. Ramsey and HB908 they are the same. Is this common sense or is political ego now involved? Just remember, not everyone on the registry is a child molester, regardless of what Mr. Ramsey tells you.

Additionally, the continual use of the term “dangerous sexual predators” and “convicted sexual predators” in your article to describe everyone on the registry is inherently dangerous. As of a few moments ago, there were only 56 people listed on the GBI Sex Offender Registry as a PREDATOR.

By ascribing the term to all 15,007 registrants, we dilute the meaning of the term and the end result is women and children are less safe.

HB1059 set up a Sexual Offender Review Board, and the General Assembly did not adequately fund or staff it. HB908 does not address this problem. In place of solutions we are being sold a bill of goods by the General Assembly, and the media is a willing accomplice, rendering a false sense of security and making women and children less safe.

We need to protect our children, but we need to do it right. After the Georgia Supreme Court stuck down Georgia’s residency restrictions for sex offenders last November, one would think that Georgia’s legislators would have connected the dots and got the message.

Evidently, some of legislators are not that smart or just too arrogant. Either way, the taxpayers will have to pay for defending avoidable lawsuits.

As an example, in HB908, the legislators are attempting to reinstate where renters may live, ignoring the fact that under Georgia’s Constitution, renters enjoy the same rights as property owners.

This is nothing more than a modern “poll tax” that treats people according to what they own. At the very least, the voters of Georgia should send these “public servants” home.

Speaking against the bill, law enforcement, treatment providers, and victim advocates testified to the House Judiciary (Non-Civil) Committee hearing on HB908. Yet the committee, except for five members, passed it, sending it to the House floor. It appears the majority just cannot get it right.

One can only hope the Georgia taxpayers will contact their representatives, and tell them to VOTE NO on HB908. Should the bill pass, there will certainly be court challenges. This will cost taxpayers money that could be spent on the Sexual Offender Registration Review Board, health care, water conservation, school programs, or roads and bridges.

It’s time to tell the General Assembly, “Either connect the dots or go home!”

Please visit the Sex Offender Solutions Network website to find out more about this important issue, and for the sake of our women and children, please report this issue in a truthful and responsible manner.

Kyle Paul Sandusky

Marietta, Ga.