Virginia

From the 50 State Visitor Guide :

Va. Code Ann. 2019 §§9.1-900 through  9.1-923 and §18.2-472.1.  Va. Code. Ann. §§18.2-370.2 through 18.2-370.5.

AWA Compliant

Registration Triggers and Deadlines:

Initial registration and updates for residents, in-state employees, and students within 3 days. Those employed in state for more than 14 days or more than 30 days in a calendar year must register within 3 days of arrival. §9.1-905.

Visitors on “an extended visit” of “30 days or more” must register within 3 days of arrival.  §9.1-905.  Per Virginia SOR response letter (2019), a procedure is available for removal from registry after departure.

Residency/Presence and Other Restrictions:

Residence restriction:  Certain adult offenders with convictions involving minors sustained after July 2006 may not reside within 500 ft. of a school or parks adjacent to schools.  §18.2-370.3.

Presence restriction:  Certain adult offenders with convictions involving minors sustained after July 2006 may not loiter within 100 ft. of school, day care center, playground, athletic field or facility, or gym.  §18.2-370.2.  SVPs may not enter school grounds, with exceptions.  §18.2-370.5

Duration & updates:

Lifetime. Petition to remove –15 years §9.1-910.  SVPs update every 90 days; all others annually. §9.1-904.

Mount Vernon - George Washington's Virginia plantation

Most recent visit: December 2023

I don’t know if registered people talk much about Virginia where you live, but people travel back and forth quite a lot between Florida and Virginia.  They have family there, they find work there.  Virginia’s reputation as a decent place to visit that allows registrants to stay up to 30 days seems pretty well known here.  Thirty days is the longest statutory specified time period of any state.

However, be careful of residence, presence and loitering restrictions if they apply to you, because Virginia is a state where they will apply while you’re visiting.  And as with so many states, be careful of local sheriffs & police departments.

Having said all that, Virginia has a lot to offer visitors – history, national parks and forests, vacation resorts, theme parks, and beaches.  I have visited many of these places, but that was before - - before I wrecked my life.  Now that I’m traveling again I plan to go back and visit many of those places again.  In December 2023 I traveled from Florida with my now ex-wife but still Best Friend Forever to visit relatives and participate in a Wreaths Across America event on Long Island.  We had decided ahead of time to slow down and spend one night in Virginia so we could take in a few sights. 

On the day we arrived I convinced my BFF that Montpelier, James Madison’s plantation home, would make a good stop.  I had been there once before in the early 2010’s but since then they, like many other of the founding fathers’ plantations, have undertaken archaeological digs, added exhibits and updated the mansion tours to address the enslaved people who after all were the majority of those living there and whose labor supported our founding fathers’ lifestyles.

The following morning we visited Mount Vernon, George Washington’s plantation, where the same archaeology and tour updates have been made since my early 2010’s visit.  Both I and my BFF, who had never seen these great historic sites before, were incredibly impressed with both of these places.

The Space Shuttle Discovery at the National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center

When passing anywhere near Washington DC my ex always wants to stop at the Smithsonian, and especially the Air & Space Museum.  The problem always is that traffic is a nightmare in downtown DC and parking is hard to find.  On this trip, as she was searching her phone looking for options she came across the “National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center” which turns out to be an absolutely enormous, entirely separate air & space museum on a huge campus in suburban Fairfax, Virginia.

With the Space Shuttle Discovery, an entire Concorde Jetliner, the actual Enola Gay, a Lockheed Blackbird, every other kind of air and spacecraft imaginable, and an IMAX theater with a James Webb Space Telescope movie among the features available, the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center satisfies.  We may never need to fight downtown DC traffic again.

But by now it was late afternoon and we had to get going – we had a hotel reservation in Philadelphia that night.

Previous visit: October 2020

Luray Caverns, Virginia

In October 2020 I was “just passing through” Virginia on my way back to Florida from my brother’s house in New Jersey.

However, I wasn’t in a huge hurry so I decided to visit two places I’d never been.  I drove the length of the Skyline Drive, which was beautiful with many scenic overlooks and lots of fall color.  From a registrant’s point of view it also offers another positive attribute – Skyline Drive and Blue Ridge Parkway are both under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Parks Service rather than the state police or local sheriff’s departments.  Neither you nor I have any intention of violating any law while traveling, but it was still nice to know I was under that much reduced threat of police harassment.

I also made a side trip to Luray Caverns.  If you have read my other state blogs you’ll know by now I am a cavern junkie.  Luray Caverns was my second cavern on just this trip (the other being Diamond Caverns in Kentucky).  It’s a great place to visit even during a pandemic.  Unlike most caverns they don’t have tour guides; instead they hand you a brochure to use during your self-guided tour (maintaining social distance of course). 

By late in the afternoon I was starting on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  There are national forest campgrounds along the way so I found one and bedded down for the night.  The next morning I was off to North Carolina.