diff --git a/compass/scripts/download.py b/compass/scripts/download.py
index 9199eed8..213ada92 100644
--- a/compass/scripts/download.py
+++ b/compass/scripts/download.py
@@ -2,14 +2,6 @@
 
 import logging
 from contextlib import AsyncExitStack
-from urllib.parse import (
-    parse_qsl,
-    quote,
-    unquote,
-    urlencode,
-    urlparse,
-    urlunparse,
-)
 
 from elm.web.document import PDFDocument
 from elm.web.search.run import (
@@ -32,6 +24,7 @@
     JurisdictionWebsiteValidator,
 )
 from compass.web.website_crawl import COMPASSCrawler, COMPASSLinkScorer
+from compass.web.url_utils import _sanitize_url
 from compass.utilities.enums import LLMTasks
 from compass.utilities.io import load_local_docs
 from compass.pb import COMPASS_PB
@@ -804,22 +797,6 @@ async def _contains_relevant_text(
     return found_text
 
 
-def _sanitize_url(url):
-    """Percent-encode spaces and unsafe characters in a URL path"""
-    parsed = urlparse(url)
-    safe_path = quote(unquote(parsed.path), safe="/")
-    query_params = parse_qsl(parsed.query, keep_blank_values=True)
-    safe_query = urlencode(query_params, doseq=True)  # cspell: disable-line
-    return urlunparse((
-        parsed.scheme,
-        parsed.netloc,
-        safe_path,
-        parsed.params,
-        safe_query,
-        parsed.fragment,
-    ))
-
-
 def _sanitize_doc_sources(docs):
     """Rewrite source attrs on documents returned by ELMWebsiteCrawler
 
diff --git a/compass/web/url_utils.py b/compass/web/url_utils.py
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..2eeb464d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/compass/web/url_utils.py
@@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
+"""Shared URL utilities for COMPASS web modules"""
+
+from urllib.parse import quote, urlsplit, urlunsplit
+
+
+def _sanitize_url(url):
+    """Encode unsafe URL characters while preserving URL semantics"""
+    parsed = urlsplit(url)
+    path = quote(parsed.path, safe="/:@-._~!$&'()*+,;=")
+    query = quote(parsed.query, safe="=&;%:@-._~!$&'()*+,;/?:")
+    fragment = quote(parsed.fragment, safe="")
+    return urlunsplit((parsed.scheme, parsed.netloc, path, query, fragment))
diff --git a/compass/web/website_crawl.py b/compass/web/website_crawl.py
index a5fd2093..ccda23ff 100644
--- a/compass/web/website_crawl.py
+++ b/compass/web/website_crawl.py
@@ -9,15 +9,7 @@
 import operator
 from collections import Counter
 from contextlib import AsyncExitStack
-from urllib.parse import (
-    urlparse,
-    urlunparse,
-    quote,
-    unquote,
-    parse_qsl,
-    urlencode,
-    urljoin,
-)
+from urllib.parse import urljoin
 
 from crawl4ai.models import Link as c4AILink
 from bs4 import BeautifulSoup
@@ -28,6 +20,7 @@
 from elm.web.document import PDFDocument, HTMLDocument
 from elm.web.file_loader import AsyncWebFileLoader
 from elm.web.website_crawl import ELMLinkScorer, _SCORE_KEY  # noqa: PLC2701
+from compass.web.url_utils import _sanitize_url
 
 
 logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
@@ -495,32 +488,6 @@ def _debug_info_on_links(links):
         logger.debug("    ...")
 
 
-def _sanitize_url(url):
-    """Fix common URL issues
-
-    - Encode spaces and unsafe characters in the path
-    - Encode query parameters safely
-    - Leave existing percent-encoding intact
-    """
-    parsed = urlparse(url)
-
-    safe_path = quote(unquote(parsed.path), safe="/")
-
-    query_params = parse_qsl(parsed.query, keep_blank_values=True)
-    safe_query = urlencode(query_params, doseq=True)  # cspell: disable-line
-
-    return urlunparse(
-        (
-            parsed.scheme,
-            parsed.netloc,
-            safe_path,
-            parsed.params,
-            safe_query,
-            parsed.fragment,
-        )
-    )
-
-
 def _extract_links_from_html(text, base_url):
     """Parse HTML and extract all links"""
     soup = BeautifulSoup(text, "html.parser")
diff --git a/tests/python/unit/web/test_web_crawl.py b/tests/python/unit/web/test_web_crawl.py
index 24ae0e61..30dd2a86 100644
--- a/tests/python/unit/web/test_web_crawl.py
+++ b/tests/python/unit/web/test_web_crawl.py
@@ -267,6 +267,7 @@ def test_extract_links_from_html_sets_text_from_anchor():
     <a href="/doc.pdf">Permit Standards</a>
     """
     links = _extract_links_from_html(html, base_url="https://example.com")
+    assert len(links) == 1
     link = next(iter(links))
     assert link.title == "Permit Standards"
     assert link.text == "Permit Standards"