Culpeper considers anti-loitering ordinance

Council delays decision after county attorney raises legal concerns.

Date published: 3/12/2008

BY DONNIE JOHNSTON

Culpeper town attorney Bob Bendall was frank last night about the possibility of writing an anti-loitering ordinance—aimed primarily at Hispanics gathering to seek work—that might have teeth.

It almost certainly wouldn’t stand up in an appeals court, he told the Culpeper Town Council.

Still, Bendall said that it was the town’s money at issue and if the Council wanted him to draft such an ordinance he would do it.

After listening to the attorney’s arguments, however, council members decided to hold off for the time being.

The Council had asked Bendall about the possibility of modeling an ordinance after one the town of Warrenton recently passed.

Further, members had suggested that Bendall write the state attorney general to find out if such an ordinance would stand up in court.

“Loitering ordinances must be written very narrowly,” Bendall said. “The Warrenton ordinance is very broad.”

He cited several other instances where localities passed loitering ordinances only to have them shot down in court.

In particular, he discussed a Virginia Beach law which prevented groups from handing out literature on a bridge and an Alexandria statute that prohibited people from gathering on street corners to sell drugs.

Bendall said that the Virginia Supreme Court ruled that citizens had the right to assemble on a bridge and that the Alexandria law was struck down because it was feared than innocent people would be swept up in street-corner raids.

He also reminded the Town Council that both houses of the General Assembly had recently passed a bill that would help localities strengthen loitering laws. The bill must still be signed by Gov. Tim Kaine.

Bendall was leery about whether even that law would be ruled constitutional.

“I’d like to see a test case defended by the attorney general’s office before you write an ordinance,” he said.

Even Councilman Steve Jenkins, who has long pushed the illegal immigrant issue, agreed this was a good idea.

“I think your suggestion is appropriate,” Jenkins said.

In other action last night the Council agreed to accept and maintain a 10,000-square-foot donated lot in the Lakeview Subdivision that contains a monument dedicated to the first Culpeper Minutemen.

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Date published: 3/12/2008