FY 24 Invited to Apply- Sex Offender and Registration Notification Act (SORNA)

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The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act of 2006 is designed to protect children and adults from sexual exploitation and violent crime, prevent child abuse and child pornography, promote internet safety, and honor the memory of Adam Walsh and other crime victims. The Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act was enacted to protect the public from convicted sex offenders by establishing a comprehensive, national system for the registration of and notification about those offenders. The Adam Walsh Act established a penalty for jurisdictions that failed to substantially implement SORNA by July 27, 2011, and for any year thereafter. For those jurisdictions that did not substantially implement SORNA by July 27, 2011, the SORNA penalty was first applied in fiscal year (FY) 2012. It will continue to be applied each subsequent year in which the recipient has not substantially implemented SORNA. See 34 U.S.C. § 20927(a) for details. The Attorney General delegated the task of determining when a jurisdiction has substantially implemented SORNA’s requirements to the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART Office). Consistent with prior years, the SORNA penalty is calculated by subtracting 10 percent from the state government’s JAG allocation (60 percent of the total award) after deduction of the “mandatory variable pass-through” that states are required to send to local governments. Note: The penalty applies to the portion of JAG funding awarded to the state to be shared with local governments not eligible for a direct JAG award (“less than $10,000 jurisdictions”) because the states retain control over these funds and may award them to another state agency (i.e., state police) in lieu of awarding them to a local government in localities where the state provides them with direct services. The penalty is not assessed against the mandatory pass-through, which is the portion of JAG funds awarded by states to local law enforcement, because the state cannot retain any portion of that award. While BJA will be administering the SORNA reallocation funds awarded to eligible SAAs, OJP’s SMART Office will assist jurisdictions with developing and/or enhancing programs designed to implement the SORNA portion of the Adam Walsh Act (34 U.S.C. § 20901, et seq.). SAAs must pass through these reallocation funds to the designated SORNA contact agencies to carry out the activities described in the individual reallocation requests as previously approved by OJP. BJA strongly encourages all jurisdictions that have not yet substantially implemented SORNA to continue to work expeditiously to implement SORNA’s requirements to better protect their communities from sexual violence and exploitation. For additional information about SORNA implementation, please see https://smart.ojp.gov/faqs.