Four child sex offenders were placed in a Whangarei house overlooking a children's playground.
Four child sex offenders were placed in a Whangarei house overlooking a children's playground.
The Department of Corrections is moving four convicted child sex offenders from a house near three child care centres.
It is a good response to a bad situation and in moving the offenders, hopefully the Department of Corrections examines why on Earth it thought it was appropriate to put themen in a bungalow that has a front porch overlooking a children's playground, next to a thoroughfare for school children.
Not to mention the three childcare centres within a 300m radius - the closest being about 100m away.
In answering questions from the Northern Advocate, Corrections indicated that the bungalow was in a commercial area.
Whether that is a mitigating factor in the decision is debatable, because Dent St - aka Fire Brigade Hill - is also a residential area.
Norfolk St, a stone's throw away, was predominantly residential until a few decades ago when people realised that its proximity to town allowed businesses to operate from its many character bungalows and cottages.
It is a desirable location - commercially and residentially.
Corrections say consultation was carried out - it would be interesting to know who by and what was said. Because there are three surprised childcare facilities in the vicinity.
Would you house a recovering alcoholic 100m from a bar overlooking a brewery? No.
There are no parallels, by the way, between a person who chooses to drink themselves to a life-threatening point of damage and danger, and a child sex offender.
None. Also, one is primarily hurting themselves, the other hurting a child for narcissistic means that disgust right-thinking people.
There are people within Corrections who were satisfied it was okay to place these offenders in Northland for rehabilitation.
But that place is not a cute bungalow on the top of Fire Brigade Hill with three childcare centres in a 300m radius - it is somewhere with little or zero proximity to children.
Perhaps the objectivity that allowed the decision makers to consider "we can do this, but should we?" went missing.
