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Youth Curfew Approved for Nighttime Hours
August 13 update: After removing daytime school hours from the ordinance, the City Council approved the youth curfew on second and final reading last night at the regular council meeting. The vote was 7-0 in favor of the nighttime youth curfew, which will go into effect on August 27.
The provision for daytime school hours from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. was removed from the ordinance prior to approval. An exception for youth on a parent-directed errand also was added and approved at second reading.
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A youth curfew for nighttime and school hours was approved on first reading by the Georgetown City Council at the meeting on July 22. A second and final reading is scheduled for August 12. The curfew was initially proposed by Pat Berryman, mayor pro tem and District 5 council member.
According to the proposed ordinance, a curfew would be in effect in the city for anyone under the age of 17 for these hours:
11 p.m. until 6 a.m. on Sunday through Thursday
12 a.m. (midnight) until 6 a.m. on Friday and Saturday
9 a.m. until 2:30 p.m. on Monday through Friday when school is in session
An ordinance to establish opening and closing hours for parks is in development and will be brought to the City Council in the coming weeks. The park hours will apply to everyone, not just those under 17.
The curfew applies to public places such as common areas of schools, hospitals, apartment complexes, office buildings, and shops, as well as vehicles on streets.
A parent or guardian can be cited under the ordinance if he/she knowingly permits a youth to remain in a public pace during curfew hours.
The ordinance lists several exceptions, including situations when a youth is in a car on the interstate, going to or from work, in an emergency, or with his or her parent or a spouse who is 18 or older. Attending or going to or from an official school or religious activity or a recreational event sponsored by the City or a civic organization are situations that are also exempted from the curfew rule. Youths traveling to or from an exempted event must do so “without detour or stop.” First Amendment rights, such as the exercise of speech, religion, or assembly, are also exempted.
The enforcement section of the curfew states that a police officer should not issue a ticket or make an arrest unless the officer reasonably believes that an offense has occurred and that no exception applies.
Violation of the curfew would be a class C misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of up to $500.
Cities that have enacted curfews for youths include Austin, Cedar Park, Leander, Round Rock, and Taylor.
The youth curfew ordinance will be considered for second reading at the City Council meeting on August 12, which begins at 6 p.m. at the Council Chamber and Courts Building, located at 101 E. Seventh Street.
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No Responses to “Youth Curfew Approved for Nighttime Hours”
This curfew ordinance is useless there is no point to it. Georgetown police officers rarely have problems with the kids being out late, most night calls are domestic desputes. this is point less. all this is going to do is broden the patrol and waste more gas, and in the end the people of georgetown are going to be paying for it. the only problem is those kid walking from the city lights theater to wal-mart. that is dangerous.
I do not understand the purpose of the daytime curfew and like Cheryl above says, I worry about the implications it has for homeschoolers. I feel as though our community’s children are being over-policed and that it is taking away from my responsibility as parent. Is there that big of a problem with kids causing problems during the day that we need to waste valuable resources attending to such issues? I am out and about a lot and have never been witness to any situation that has warranted kids being removed from a public place. Also, I have lived in another area that took such curfews to an extreme and it turned the whole town, which had previously been very child-friendly, into an oasis for older, reserved people. Is this ordinance to accommodate a certain over-60 population in an effort to curb a young and vibrant atmosphere in our town? Please don’t weed out the families. Absolutely ridiculous.
I am adamantly opposed to the curfew and the restrictions it will place on law abiding citizens.
1. Daytime curfews violate the fundamental legal principle of the presumption of innocence. This presumption is protected by the Due Process Clause of the 14th and the 5th Amendments to the US Constitution.
2. Daytime curfews interfere with the parents right to direct the upbringing and education of their children, especially for parents with children in small private schools and homeschools that are not restricted only to the confines of the classroom to provide a quality education for their children.
3. Daytime curfews are in essence, beefed-up truancy ordinances. All states have already addressed the area of truancy in a comprehensive way. There is no need for new laws addressing the issue of truancy. The present laws addressing minors in the Education Code simply need to be enforced.
4. The serious juvenile law-breaker will not be deterred by the daytime curfew. However, innocent minors will suffer the inconvenience of unwanted stops, detentions and harassment, not to mention the added cost for taxpayers for the enforcement of the curfew.
I would ask you to seriously reconsider your introduction of this bill and not trample on the rights of the innocent.
I see no reason for a curfew. Especially a daytime one. Truancy laws take care of that, and as others have said might interfere with homeschoolers. The night time curfew while reasonable with the exceptions still will more than likely encounter problems. There is no way an officer could know if a teenager is really going to work or not and thus may not trust them. If a teenager is expected to act like an adult (have a job) then they should be treated like an adult. Adults don’t have a curfew so why should teenagers, if they are acting like adults.
Beyond that, I doubt that Georgetown is having such a problem with teenage law-breaking that we need a curfew. Most parents know their children well enough to know where they are at what time.
Most teenagers have cellphones or friends with cellphones so a parent can call and check up on their child.
Ha. “Jim Conners” seems to be a troll. Perhaps need a little more moderating of these things. I’d agree with some of the points above. Youth curfews had been tried in the past in Georgetown and were eventually done away with. Unless a city is having a real issue then a curfew does seem a waste. Perhaps more through reasons could be listed as to why the city feels the need to do this again. Job justification, boredom or pandering to demographics isn’t good enough. There have been plenty of attacks on fun things for youth to do in this city and that’s finally changing with the new bowling alley etc…Let’s not reverse this and go back to the way things were years ago when a certain sunny city moved into our city.
Mr. Boswell, thank you for having identified that comment which had appeared on the site. You are correct. That comment does not fit within our moderation guidelines and has been removed.
Daytime curfews in my opinion are uncalled for if there are truancy laws on the books. The City Council should worry about lowering taxes by keeping the cost of goverment down instead of passing overly restrictve ordinances.
I totally disagree with a curfew.
Installing a curfew is another freedom/right taken away. The more controls the govt. puts on us the “safer” we may feel but the less freedoms we have. And regardless of how you look at it, the children would be considered “guilty” until proven innocent (CPS and other institutions contribute to that and would become involved with this issue most likely). Finally, It will put undue stress on the police and increase taxes. Enforce the existing truancy laws and don’t try to build a fence around our homes and freedoms.
I am in 100% agreement with all of the above. I am going to make an assumption–which is not always wise–I know. The daytime curfew is to run 9 a.m. until 2:30 p.m. on Monday through Friday when school is in session. My assumption is that this curfew is to target public schooled children who choose not to attend school. Since we already have existing truancy laws which state the same, what is the daytime curfew really adding? Nothing to help stop truancy, but it will add stress to parents and to students who have a legitimate reason to be out in public during those times.
I just do not see any justifications for this daytime curfew. However, I do agree with the nighttime curfew for children’s safety. I am also a homeschooler and spend a great deal of my time (and money) shopping in Georgetown during the day. I have never seen one child under 17 causing any sort of problems or damge or distress to anyone or anything. Shouldn’t we have problem before we propose a solution??
Upon hearing about this pending Curfew I requested from our local Police Department a number of incidences over the past year where they had a situation of a school age child causing a problem in the City during school hours. As of today, I have not received a response. I have a feeling that the reason is, they have no records of this as a problem, and don’t want to let us know this. If someone in the Georgetown Police can justify a need for this type of daytime curfew, well then lets see some evidance. Otherwise, there is no need to make this a controversial issue.
As a homeschooling family, I totally disagree with this proposed proposal. When taking advantage of educational moments, ours are varied and wide reaching— it could be in a retail store practicing math with my two small children, going to the library to get books or getting together with other homeschoolers to participate in cooperative education functions or just going to the local beautiful parks to discuss, nature, animals or mans effect on our globe.
It seems truancy policies should be enforced and kept in effect if there is such an issue.
It would seem a shame to have to take tax and revenue dollars out of Georgetown because homeschoolers would be not willing to be fined $500 for an innocent act as going to the the grocery store during curfew hours.
We also are opposed to this daytime curfew. Our homeschool group has over 100 families with anywhere from 1 – 8 children per family. We have many activities going on during school hours right here in Georgetown – PE, volleyball games, Library Day, Museum Day, Field trips, academic classes, etc. Many of our teenage students drive themselves or their siblings to these activities as well as to their own jobs or volunteer service. As homeschoolers, we do not always stay home with school hours from 9am to 2:30pm. One of the great things about homeschooling is the freedom we have. Please don’t infringe on our rights and freedoms.
For more information, please see these two articles on the web:
How Daytime Curfews Impact Home Schoolers
http://www.thsc.org/Getting_Started/CurfewsImpact.asp
Legal Opinion on the Constitutionality of Daytime Curfews
http://www.thsc.org/pdf/DaytimeCurfew.pdf
Thank you
I am adamantly opposed to the curfew and the restrictions it will place on law abiding citizens. Everyone before me has said a great deal. I am a Homeschool Mom, who child will be in private school for the 1st time this year. His private school does NOT run on the same schedule as Georgetown schools. However, we are in Georgetown many many days of the week. Daytime curfews interfere with the parents right to direct the upbringing and education of their children, especially for parents with children in small private schools and homeschools that are not restricted only to the confines of the classroom to provide a quality education for their children.
I too have requested the information from the Georgetown Police department for the statistics, I have not recieved these as of this time.
The serious juvenile law-breaker will not be deterred by the daytime curfew. However, innocent minors will suffer the inconvenience of unwanted stops, detentions and harassment, not to mention the added cost for taxpayers for the enforcement of the curfew.
I would ask you to seriously reconsider your introduction of this bill and not trample on the rights of the innocent.
As has already been stated in many of these posts, there seems to be no justification to passing a daytime curfew. To do so, would be governmental intrusion on our rights as private citizens.
We would also like to comment on the statement from the city above that, “Cities that have enacted curfews for youths include Austin, Cedar Park, Leander, Round Rock and Taylor.” Well, that’s fine, but it’s our opinion that a lot of Williamson County cities rushed to be just like Austin. Georgetown has been a city in it’s own right since 1848. We can think for ourselves and if people want to be like Austin, they have the option of moving there.
It is our hope, that the Georgetown City Council members will take into serious consideration, all the public input on this issue. A daytime curfew is NOT needed. Please, DON’T pass it!
I have reviewed the Texas Education Code and found that section 25.094 lalready mandates school attendance and provides penalties for failing to attend. Texas State Law also allows parents the opportunity to personnally educate their children by homeschooling.
The proposed Daytime Curfew in Georgetown seems to be redundant when applied to public and parochial school students since State Law already mandates school attendance. In fact, it could potentially punish parents twice if their child were to skip school: once for violating the City’s curfew law and again for violating the State’s truancy law.
When applied to homeschooling familes, the law appears disproportionate at best. The truancy law imposes no new requirement on parents of public or parochial school students. It does however, restict the ability of parents to personnally direct and provide education to their own children, as permitted by state law.
In the strongest possible terms, I oppose the Daytime Curfew and urge the council to reject it.
This has also been emailed to the City Council Members:
To whom it may concern,
I am not often moved to write in to my City Council, but this time I feel that this proposed curfew is something that I must respond to. I have been a resident in Georgetown for the past two years and found it to be a great town with a very open and friendly people. We’re purchasing a house here and look forward to making Georgetown our long term place of residence.
Thew new city ordinance that is being proposed for the Juvenile Curfew certainly has some merits, however I also believe that it impunges upon the right to freedom that we hold. I have no concerns with the night time curfew aspect of the Juvenile Curfew proposal. The primary area that I have concern with is that the daytime curfew imposes that parents of people in non-traditional public schooling be restricted. As a parent of a home schooled child who we take on field trips, touch-and-feel learning at public locations, and is not restricted to the standard “9 – 3″ school time frame, I believe that the curfew has a significant impact on our freedom of movement. In addition to this, as he gets older, part of his schooling will be to explore assigned locations and spend time within his own understanding. Restricting his movement will be a violation of his rights to be in a public location. As the curfew proposed has not made any exceptions for private schools or home schools unless we are traveling for “official” school activity, this curfew is not appropriate for the situation that you are making an effort to curb.
Daytime curfews result in the violation of a minor’s right regarding to their freedom of movement. They violate my right to direct the upbringing and education of my child. They violate the right of the minor to be secure against unreasonable search and seizure. Travelling throughout the day is an assumed right and I believe that this action will significantly cause an increased level of difficulty for children and parents.
I urge you not to vote for this curfew and to reconsider the negative impacts that this has on both the community and the opportunities for individuals to exercise their rights. The Georgetown City Council should consider that the Officers of the Law have more important things to do than police those that may, or may not, be in the area.
Sincerely,
Philippe
I have two teen-aged daughters who drive their younger siblings to school events, appointments, etc. While they are out-and-about they will also be running errands. According to the youth curfew ordinance, this is not allowed (”with his or her parent” and “without detour or stop.”) They also wouldn’t be allowed to be out with a grandparent, an aunt, or an adult friend as these would not be their parents.
Please reconsider the daytime curfew as there are already laws regarding truancy on the books. This ordinance is just too restrictive on those who home school or are in a private school who don’t follow the public school calendar.
As many others here have stated very well, consider what the purposed Juvenile Curfew would mean to many homeschooling families of Georgetown and Williamson County. A daytime curfew in particular would put a great deal of undue strain on homeschooling families in Georgetown who are often out and around Georgetown during normal schooling hours. We are enjoying local parks and historical sites, the library and engaging in other activities around town to give our children the best education that we can. To have to constantly be on guard and ready to defend our children who may be out in public, with our permission, and causing no harm or problems during typical school hours puts a great deal of burden on law abiding citizens who we hope continue to reside in and move to our community.
Our family moved to Georgetown two years ago and has enjoyed this community and what it has to offer our family. We have met many wonderful homeschooling families from Georgetown and the surrounding area. We would hate for this wonderful community to become a place where homeschoolers do not feel welcome because of a feeling of oppression for our children to be out and around our community actively engaged in “schooling”. We take our responsibility as parents to train our children to be good citizens and an active part of our community very seriously.
Grandparents in Georgetown also need to take notice of this type of ordinance. If your grandchildren visit you during a school break whether homeschool, private, or public you would be in violation of the curfew by being out in public places during school hours with your grandchildren. The curfew requires minors to be with a parent or legal guardian if in a public place unless they meet one of the exemptions. Grandparents don’t meet any of the exemptions of this ordinance.
We urge the city to take the interests of law abiding citizens into consideration.
I am a grandparent of a child, who is being homeschooled, in Georgetown. Since we live in Sun City, we are privileged to be able to interact with him and do not want to see that changed by an ordiance passed by the Georgetown City Council. I have been a public school teacher so I realize the importance of school attendance, but we do have a very large and active homeschool community here in Georgetown. We don’t want that to change as a result of such restrictions imposed by the city. It would, also, affect our large retirement community. Many of us now enjoy the freedom of entertaining our grandchildren at different times during the year, and not everyone has the same school schedule as Georgetown. We don’t want to loose that freedom, or have that freedom restricted. We are enjoying a very family friendly town; so please don’t change that with this restrictive ordiance.
My husband, Brian and I have several school-age
grandchildren and great-grandchildren who visit
us at school breaks here in Sun City. If there is
an enforceable curfew and we are out during these
times, it would be difficult and troublesome to
prove they were not residents of the community, thus not required to be in local schools at those times. I undertand curfews after dark and after hours, but this seems to portend to be a hardship
type legal entanglement. Aren’t there other ways
to ensure school attendance?
Phyllis Moses
As a former teacher, coach, school administrator and juvenile probation officer in Texas, I am opposed to a proposed daytime curfew for those under 17 years old. The law is already in place for those who fail to attend school so in my opinion no additional law is needed. We should not take this responsibility away from parents and place it in the hands of law enforcement.
I don’t see a need for this rule, I question whether it is constitutional, and I believe the daytime portion of it may become an avenue for harassment of homeschool families.
I am not aware that we have a problem in Georgetown that requires a curfew law. I live and work in Georgetown and I am not aware of any problems with youth day or night that requires additional laws. Enforcing existing laws would be sufficient. If youth are out breaking the law that is one thing but this only provides the police an opportunity to stop any youthful looking person without other cause. I am not satisfied with myriad “exceptions” that have been suggested be written into the law as they would only apply after someone is stopped by the police.
The constitutionality of curfew laws, particularly daytime curfews, has been called into question. I would hate to see Georgetown tax dollars used to argue this in court in the future, especially since there does not appear to be any need for this law in the first place.
Georgetown has many homeschooling families (ours included) that will be inconvenienced by the daytime portion of the proposed law. There have been many instances of disgruntled neighbors or relatives mis-using government agencies such as CPS to harass families including homeschooling families. The proposed law is a step in the wrong direction. Causing homeschool families go about their business in fear of the Georgetown police sends the wrong message to our citizens and especially our children.
I am personally of the opinion and belief that many of the problems with Americas youth are caused by society taking away the responsibilities of youth and families, and giving those responsibilities to government. The proposed curfew law adds to that problem.
While I am not opposed to curfews as a whole, the daytime curfew does not take into account the rights and responsibilities of parents. I ask that you reconsider this motion and provide exceptions for homeschooled/private schooled children or strike the daytime curfew out entirely.
A very large group of people in the Georgetown area (either residents or those doing business in) have chosen to not use the public school system and educate their children in an alternate fashion. For many of us daytime trips are a common tool of education. Having restrictions on how and when our children can learn is certainly not something that I can imagine the Council desires.
Please reject this proposal in its current form.
Once again I am sad to see where “a few” are causing restrictions, unnecessary ordinances, busy work and expense for many. Apparently recent vandalism has brought the proposed curfew to the City Council. If this is true, no doubt this will be an expensive but mere Band-Aid solution.
What has happened to teaching values and respect of property? Truth is, this has been a problem for years. As long as parents/guardians are not teaching the Golden Rule, individual responsibility, and to accept consequences this matter will not be resolved. It’s the caring families teaching right from wrong, the inncent who continue to suffer the consequences becuase of the “few”.
My head spins from the extensive list concerning this proposal. With truancy laws and designated officers in place, situations between school and parent/guardian during the school year should be sufficient. Summer is probably a different story but one would think with all there is to do in the 21st century, kids would not be bored!
Why do we as a society continue to believe that more regulations….more government…..more lack of freedoms…is the answer.
Maybe we could be different from the norm….give parents the right to be parents. There continues to be a “Death of Common Sense”.
We agree with the Council that a nighttime curfew may be necessary for some Youth in the area. However, we strongly oppose the suggested daytime curfew for those under 17. As implied above, we think the world outside the school room offers much value for educating our youth.
We have always taught our children not to be afraid of, but to honor and respect men and women in uniform. We’ve taught them to seek out their help. We’ve taught them that they can trust officers of the law. The proposed ordinance suggests that might not be totally true anymore. It suggests that maybe our children will be detained or harassed by an officer just because they are checking out books at the library, volunteering at The Caring Place, or delivering Meals on Wheels. Wouldn’t that be going backwards instead of forward? That can’t be what Georgetown wants.
Our family chooses to spend our lives out and about in Georgetown. We love this city. Please don’t make us lawbreakers because we want our children to experience it during the day.
Please reject the proposed ordinance. It’s unnecessary, in that those teens already skipping out of school and breaking the law will be undeterred by your actions; however, those respectable teens who are obeying the law now will be unduly harmed.
This is not well thought-out.
Panama City, due to very high violent crime rates, does not have a curfew this strict.
The daytime curfew is ill-advised and should be challenged in court should it pass (home-schoolers, work-study). There are a number of homeless teens in Georgetown, who, like adults, sometimes have to take care of a myriad of personal business items (unfortunately) during the day. This section should be removed: 9 a.m. until 2:30 p.m. on Monday through Friday when school is in session
Also, since I work, attend online classes, and manage a number of children who are active in after-school programs, evening access to the parks for exercise is important to me. Would hope that the park hours are extended to allow for access as late as midnight.
Since as a society we have chosen to stop taking responsibility as parents and require the world to raise our children, it seems appropriate we would arrive at the need for a curfew. Our educators struggle every day with our “spoiled children” who receive everything they want, and act like brats at school and on the streets. When the school attempts to discipline and regulate the actions of these children, those who fail to act like parents are the first in line to whine and protest. Now we have arrived at a need for a curfew because you can drive the streets of this city in the early morning hours and find 12 year old children roaming the streets. I am sure the important business that would find them on the street at 3 a.m. in the morning could probably wait until daytime. Yet instead they roam the streets and my neighbors and I find our yards strewn with toilet paper. We wake to find our yards destroyed after being driven through by their vehicles and our mailboxes and homes vandalized. Maybe its time we issue a curfew…and maybe it is time we start acting like parents who raise children instead of acting like they have the same rights as adults. They are your children; maybe if you could control them, we would not need laws to do your job. I believe this curfew will enable the Officers to stop and visit with all children out after curfew and find the problems and possibly force those who would not act as parents, to change their behavior and teach their children respect for both the law and the others with whom we share this city.
I want to thank the Council and Mayor for deleting the Daytime Curfew. Thank you for listening to our concerns and doing jobs that may not always be appreciated.
I grew up with a curfew rule.Me and my siblings have to abide our fathers’rule,”the curfew.” During school days or no school days, we had to be home before six o`clock p.m. hit.My father would be waiting at our doorstep,if one of us is late, the leather belt is waiting.Unless there is special event like choir practice at our church every Saturday.But we will be accompanied by them.
So much to that,I think it is the parents responsibility to impose some kind of curfew rule at home.I applied that now to my children at their early age. They want to visit their friend next door,I said its okey as long as they will be home after an hour and thats before six p.m.I train them on how to be responsible with their curfew time. If they do not listen,I give them consequence,me and particularly my husband.
That is probably be good so no kids under eighteen would still be in the street wandering.In fact one time I smelled marijuana as I drove home from walmart.That was when I lived in the apartment complex.And a group of kids under eighteen years old were smoking marijuana.And one kid approach me and said, you are not going to tell … I told him, its none of my business. But the day after, someone scratch my car.He was my next door neighbor.I was glad I moved and bought a house and still even in my neighborhood I smelled some marijuana as I was driving home one time,as I was passing this two teenager that i do not know.It was in a day time.Another event,somebody was knocking in our door after eight p.m. as we looked and search out all we found are teenager wandering in our block.So I think that is probably a good benefits for everybody,exept those that have homeschool children.
I don’t mind having a curfew, but question how this will apply to home schooled children especially teens. Part of their schooling experience takes place at work, shopping or picking up younger siblings when I am not always able to be present. I would hate to add to our police force’s overloaded list of responsibilities. What is the purpose of this curfew? Is there a specific problem that needs to be addressed?