To applause, lawmakers unanimously advanced a bill Wednesday morning that brings significantly tougher sentencing for sex offenders who commit certain crimes against children.

Those offenses are rape of a child, object rape of a child or sodomy on a child. While the bill would bring tougher sentencing for convictions, it also ratchets up minimums for plea deals to a recommended 15 years.

Parents of victims often would rather see a plea deal to save their children the grief of testimony, Wimmer said, "but they want justice at the same time."

Courts would still have some flexibility in sentencing, to as low as three years "in the interest of justice."

The proposal is called Jessica's Law, named after 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford.

The Florida girl was raped then murdered by a convicted sex offender.

The bill has been questioned as being softer than the Florida law that many other states have followed, mainly in its lack of GPS tracking should an offender get out of prison. Wimmer said previously that other bills would have to take care of that aspect. One such bill, House Bill 109 (Sex Offender Law Amendments), was taken off the agenda when its sponsor was unable to be in the meeting.

With the costs of tracking sex offenders not in the bill, the cost isn't expected to be felt for nine years. That's the average amount of time sex offenders who commit rape of a child, object rape of a child or sodomy on a child now get. If the longer sentencing goes into effect, the expected cost is about $50,000 per year to house the prisoners.

The bill is now headed to the House floor for debate.