Hand Up Ministries, an Oklahoma City nonprofit agency that seeks to help sex offenders re-enter society, has faced challenges after a 2012 law added manufactured homes to the list of living quarters where two or more sex offenders could not live together.
David Nichols drives through his trailer park on the southeast side of Oklahoma City surveying the seemingly constant buzz of activity. Men toil under the blazing July sun, patching the leaky roofs of trailers, while others try to fix an old car parked in a makeshift garage.
Several of the trailers were donated to the park after they were beaten by tornadoes in Moore, and it shows. Broken windows and siding that bears the scars of extreme weather dot the park. Not only do many of the trailers look ramshackle, they are crammed together. Like tents in a refugee camp, there is hardly more than a few feet separating many of them.
The park wasn’t always this way, Nichols explains over the blaring sounds of a Christian radio station. Despite the dilapidated condition of the park, demand to live here has never been higher. The challenges are compounded by a law passed in 2012.
Nichols’ park houses a specific type of resident — one that law enforcement and lawmakers alike keep a watchful eye on: sex offenders.
