"Ban pervs as supers: Schumer"

The title of this post is the (pitch-perfect?) headline from this story in today's New York Post, which documents the latest concern about the working habits of sex offenders. Here are the basics:

There ought to be a law against giving convicted rapists the keys to tenants' apartments, Sen. Charles Schumer said yesterday.  "The fact that these sex offenders have access to apartments where there are children present is beyond scary," Schumer said.  "We must take immediate action to stop it."

Schumer was reacting to a Post story about William Barnason, a registered, high-risk sex offender who works as a super at several Upper West Side buildings where tenants have said he tried to shake them down for sex in exchange for help with their rent.

Barnason, 57, who spent more than 14 years in prison for attacks on three Long Island girls, has access to keys for more than 50 units in three buildings.

Schumer unveiled proposed legislation outside one of the buildings that Barnason oversees.  The bill would prevent a sex offender from becoming a superintendent or manager in any multifamily apartment building across the country.

This longer article from the Epoch Times reports on some of Senator Schumer's additional comments in support of his new legislation:

"Unfortunately it’s completely legal for a convicted sex offender to become the superintendant or a building manager in any multifamily apartment building in New York, and the jobs almost always provide the offender with keys to the renters’ apartments in the buildings. Given the large number of sexual offenders in New York—there are 6,000—this is an issue that has to be dealt with immediately.”...

“There is no issue more important to New York than safety and security of our children and our homes. We just can’t allow sex offenders to have unfettered access to our apartments and our homes, but that’s what William Barnason, the super for these two buildings, had,” he said.

“My legislation will ban any sex offender from working as a superintendant and having keys to New Yorkers’ apartments without their explicit permission. Which means, in effect, it won’t happen. My bill builds on the work that is being done in New York and takes it nationwide.”...

Sen. Schumer said that not only do sex offenders often repeat their crimes after having served time for previous offenses, but also typically cross state lines, where the local law enforcement has no record of who they are. “They can be convicted of a sex crime in Idaho, they serve 20 years in jail, they get out of jail, and then they come to New York. Because when you cross state lines neither local law enforcement nor state law enforcement knows who you are and what you’re doing,” Schumer said. “I have led the charge in Washington [D.C.] to create a national registry to make sure that even when sex offenders cross state lines that local law enforcement and local communities know that they are here so that they can take the appropriate action.”

Schumer’s legislation would hold landlords, property managers, and property maintenance companies liable and subject to substantial fines for providing the keys of the residents to a sex offender without disclosing the convictions of the offender and obtaining signed consent from the tenant.

Despite all the talk of gridlock in Washington DC, I suspect Schumer's new sex offender bill has a real chance of generating bi-partisan support and finding its way into law.