[Jeff Johnson]

Here is an email I got from the Utah Shooting Sports Council with a wrap-up of this year's legislative action.

*********************
LEGISLATIVE SESSION FINAL UPDATE
There is some good news for gun rights out of the 2008 session.

(a) LOSS- SB 67- "Protection of Constitutionally Guaranteed Activities in Certain Private Venues" proposed by strongly pro-gun Senator Mark Madsen, for the THIRD year in a row! This was a "parking lot bill" that restricts employers from infringing on the self defense rights of law abiding employees. The Senate passed by an overwhelming bi-partisan majority (23-4)(with similar strong margins in the previous two attempts). This is the common sense reform to allow law abiding citizens to keep legally possessed weapons in their private vehicles. However the house leadership (specifically Speaker Greg Curtis (R-Sandy) and Rules Committee Chairman Steve Urquhart (R- St. George)) controlled the system to make sure this bill got shot down by an unfriendly committee. They did so after PROMISING it would go to a different, friendly committee. These two gents confirm some of the worst stereotypes about politicians. If you live in their districts, they are not your friend and !
they should be replaced. (Curtis and Urquhart- remember the names!)

(b) WIN- SB 157- (1st Substitute) "Rights of Citizens to Carry Firearms in Declared Emergency" - also by Sen. Mark Madsen. This is a "Katrina bill" to prohibit seizure of guns from law abiding citizens in a disaster situation. The Senate passed by an overwhelming bi-partisan majority (26-2). After sitting untouched in the House for 9 days due to delaying tactics by Curtis and Urquhart, it was finally overwhelmingly passed (72-2) only hours before the session ended. GUN RIGHTS ARE INCREASED BY THIS BILL! THANK YOU to Sen. Mark Madsen for running this bill in the Senate, and to Rep. Carl Wimmer (R-Herriman) in the House. The bill goes to the Governor for his approval.

(c) WIN & LOSS- HB 473- "Firearms Amendments" by Rep. Curt Oda made minor, but important, technical changes to clarify possible confusion about CWP Permit holders being allowed to or forbidden from having their self defense weapon visible. This excellent bill got twisted into a BAD bill, by Rep. Steve Urquhart with his amendment to BAN permit holders from carrying openly in colleges or universities. The University of Utah and their allies were extremely busy quietly lining up support for this amendment and they managed to get it pushed through by a vote of 49-21. Rep. Stephen Sandstrom (R-Orem) and Curt Oda (R-Clearfield) were especially strong defenders of gun rights in the House.
The GOOD GUYS in the House were Representatives: Daw, Donnelson, Dougall, Duckworth, Julie Fisher, Fowlke, Frank, Garn, Gibson, Greenwood, Grover, Hansen, Harper, Hendrickson, Herrod, Hughes, Kiser, Mathis, Morley, Newbold, Noel, Oda, Painter, Ray, Sandstrom, Sumsion, Tilton, Walker, and Wimmer. Remember to help these people get reelected, as they stand up for your gun rights.
Note that Curtis and Urquhart were the main culprits in sabotaging a good gun bill. Fortunately, our friends in the Senate, led by gun rights champion Sen. Mike Waddoups (R- West Jordan) blocked consideration of this twisted bill, so it was defeated.
The real problem is that if this bill passed with even minor restrictions, the anti-gun crowd would try to expand these restrictions next year. NO MORE INCREMENTAL GUN CONTROL! Gun control is a failed concept that just does nothing to stop criminals!

(d) WIN- HB 14- was a "drive by shooter" bill but adds an exemption for firing from vehicles at a range for training (which is technically illegal now). Passed by both houses and awaiting approval by the governor. Gun owners gained a tiny bit with this one.

(e) WIN- HB 110- "Discharging a Firearm Within a Municipality" was aimed at shootings not falling under assault type charges. This one had some problems and appeared to be unnecessary and overly restrictive on lawful activities. It also chipped away at the "preemption" which keeps every little municipality from making their own set of gun laws. THIS BILL WAS KILLED, which was good for gun rights.

(f) NEUTRAL- HB 195- "Concealed Firearm Permit Amendments" by Rep. Merlynn Newbold fixed the problem of non-U.S. citizen eligibility for and processing of Concealed Weapon Permits, primarily Canadian citizens. The House passed this 62-0, but the Senate refused to vote on it, so it died. We suspect the Senators were a bit peeved about their excellent gun bills getting stuck in the House and were sending a message to quit playing games.

***************
THANK YOU USSC MEMBERS AND SUPPORTERS!
When we asked, you responded with a flood of emails, calls and faxes to elected officials. That was a major part of our victory defeating the one bad gun bill again this year, and advancing good bills. Although we were not successful getting the absurd parking lot problem fixed, or clarifying the open/concealed controversy, we will be back again next year.

Our goal is to incrementally restore gun rights that had been steadily chipped away for decades. The "powerful gun lobby" is actually the thousands of people who are willing to step up and make your voices heard to help defend our gun rights.

USSC avoids asking you to contact lawmakers unless it is really important, but we will certainly need you to be heavily involved again next year.

We got some good things, but didn't get others. We've got a couple of very anti-gun RINOs in the House that have sabotaged us. Fortunately, the bad bills (including a good bill turned bad) were defeated.

 

[Sheepdog]

Thanks for the informative wrap up!

 

[the wall]

Thanks for the wrap-up. I didn't realize we had so many bills in this session dealing with gun rights. I will definitely be writing my representatives next year and making sure the right bills go through and the wrong ones don't.

 

[doconix]

Excellent summary. I for one was extremely disappointed that the Senate bill for right to carry in your car at work was tabled and essentially killed. For those of us who work at gun-unfriendly places, leaving the gun at home severely limits the ability carry each day.

 

[GeneticsDave]

Great! Thanks!

 

[Shaolin]

Thanks for the update.

 

[Sleepless]

Thanks for the info, looks like you guys have better checkup on gun legislation and activism on the boards then what I have noticed on the Canadian ones, but I have one request and that is if HB 195 gets resurrected at the next sitting, if you guys wouldn't mind emailing your Congressmen and Senators and ask them to support the bill because there is a lot of Canucks who are longing to get a Utah Concealed Weapons Permit because we are in the US quite a lot and it seems that Scott Duncan who is Commissioner with the Department of Public Safety is trying to sabotage the bill if he can which is sad to see.

Thanks in Advance and thanks for a great forum.

 

[pricedo]

Thanks for the info, looks like you guys have better checkup on gun legislation and activism on the boards then what I have noticed on the Canadian ones, but I have one request and that is if HB 195 gets resurrected at the next sitting, if you guys wouldn't mind emailing your Congressmen and Senators and ask them to support the bill because there is a lot of Canucks who are longing to get a Utah Concealed Weapons Permit because we are in the US quite a lot and it seems that Scott Duncan who is Commissioner with the Department of Public Safety is trying to sabotage the bill if he can which is sad to see.

Thanks in Advance and thanks for a great forum.

it seems that Scott Duncan who is Commissioner with the Department of Public Safety is trying to sabotage the bill if he can which is sad to see.

Looks like he did a good job of sabotaging the bill because you now have to be a US citizen or a permanent resident (Green Card holder)to be eligible for a Utah CFP.......no more non immigrant alien applications.

 

[ranger45]

Boy, it sure looks like we need to do what we can to make sure that Speaker Greg Curtis (R-Sandy) and Rules Committee Chairman Steve Urquhart (R- St. George) don't get reelected. They are definitly not our friends.

 

[divegeek]

Looks like he did a good job of sabotaging the bill because you now have to be a US citizen or a permanent resident (Green Card holder)to be eligible for a Utah CFP.......no more non immigrant alien applications.

Where does it say that? I just spent some time looking through the law, and I can't find it. It doesn't appear to be anywhere in the administrative code, either. R722-300 used to say that non-citizens and non-residents followed the same process as citizens and residents, but it has gone away (along with the requirement to notify a peace officer that you're carrying concealed).

The law does say that the Commissioner has the right to make administrative rules governing the CFP application process but does he really have the right to do that WITHOUT publishing the rules? According to 63G-3-301, he does not. All proposed rules have to be published first in the Utah Bulletin, then undergo a 30-day public comment period before it can go into effect. I've looked through all of the Utah Bulletin issues for this year, and no rule regarding CFP eligibility has been proposed.

If the BCI is denying permits to non-residents, it looks to me like they're doing it illegally. I can't find anything in the law or the administrative code that can be used to justify it, and I don't think the Commissioner has the authority to make such policy changes without following the legal rulemaking process.

 

[jimtheguern]

When I got my permit last year they was talk from BCI about not issuing permits to anyone except citizens. I gave them a call and asked them if that included green carders. The response was that they were considering stopping both non-citizen and green carders because of "the extra work load for the feds to do a background check". I mentioned that it was probably easier for the FBI to do a background check on me than on my wife given all the seemingly countless background checks I have had to get and stay here. At that time they were still thinking about it.

he didn't really seem to bothered in giving any further information. In fact he pretty much told me that if I sent in my application I would be wasting my money. I sent it in with Mrs theguern's application and it went through without a problem (albeit it took two weeks longer than my wives did). I never found out if they made that change or not (maybe another greeny on here can update us). My be interesting to see what happens come renewal time (depending on if I have got my citizen ship by that stage or not).

 

[Jeff Johnson]

Looks like he did a good job of sabotaging the bill because you now have to be a US citizen or a permanent resident (Green Card holder)to be eligible for a Utah CFP.......no more non immigrant alien applications.

Where does it say that? I just spent some time looking through the law, and I can't find it. It doesn't appear to be anywhere in the administrative code, either. R722-300 used to say that non-citizens and non-residents followed the same process as citizens and residents, but it has gone away (along with the requirement to notify a peace officer that you're carrying concealed).

The law does say that the Commissioner has the right to make administrative rules governing the CFP application process but does he really have the right to do that WITHOUT publishing the rules? According to 63G-3-301, he does not. All proposed rules have to be published first in the Utah Bulletin, then undergo a 30-day public comment period before it can go into effect. I've looked through all of the Utah Bulletin issues for this year, and no rule regarding CFP eligibility has been proposed.

If the BCI is denying permits to non-residents, it looks to me like they're doing it illegally. I can't find anything in the law or the administrative code that can be used to justify it, and I don't think the Commissioner has the authority to make such policy changes without following the legal rulemaking process.

Check out this thread from just over a year ago: No more Utah CFPs for foreigners

I'm not quite sure what to think of this. I guess it makes sense to not issue the permits until they can gain access to foreign criminal records, something that unfortunately is not likely to happen soon.

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1,51 ... 96,00.html

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=1870766

I don't know if they made a rule change to effect this, or if they just decided to do this by executive fiat.
I hope that we can get this fixed in the legislature.

 

[divegeek]

I don't know if they made a rule change to effect this, or if they just decided to do this by executive fiat.
I hope that we can get this fixed in the legislature.

Well, they didn't make a rule change.

And if access to foreign criminal records is the issue, they also shouldn't issue to resident aliens, or naturalized citizens. I think this is xenophobia, not pragmatism.