In this alert:

• Volunteers Needed Saturday Morning
• Dealing With Illegal Gun Bans

Pro-Gun Legislator Needs Volunteers Saturday Morning

GOUtah! does not endorse political parties or candidates, but we like to try to reward politicians of any political party who have, by their actions while in office, demonstrated a strong commitment to protect our Second-Amendment rights. We like to reward them by helping them with their campaigns when possible. We also like to create political pain for politicians who have an anti-gun track record.

This Saturday morning, those of you living in the southwest quadrant of Salt Lake County can do both of these things. Rep. Carl Wimmer, who represents House District 52, has only been in office for one term, but during that time he has already developed a good track record for protecting our rights, both in terms of voting on bills and in terms of sponsoring actual pro-gun legislation. Among other things, Rep. Wimmer sponsored a successful bill this year that makes it legal for you to fire a gun from inside a motor vehicle at a shooting range with the permission of the range owner (something which had previously been illegal).

Rep. Wimmer’s opponent is David Hogue, who served as the representative from District 52 from 1997 until 2006, when Rep. Wimmer replaced him. Mr. Hogue wants to get his old job back. Mr. Hogue voted to protect gun rights on one occasion that we can think of a number of years ago, but only after gun owners expended a lot of energy to persuade him to do so. Protecting your Second-Amendment rights does not seem to be part of his natural inclination, in our opinion.

Rep. Wimmer informs us that Mr. Hogue is pulling out all the stops to regain his old seat in the House of Representatives.

Rep. Wimmer is having a walkabout event this Saturday, where volunteers will walk District 52 and visit the homes of people who have recently moved into the area to register them to vote in the district and give them literature about Rep. Wimmer.

If you live in that neck of the woods, even if you’re not in district 52, please consider helping out. You can meet at Rep. Wimmer’s residence at 10:00 a.m. Saturday, September 13th. The address is:
14028 South Rosaleen Lane (5700 West), Herriman

We encourage you to help out. If you do, please thank Rep. Wimmer for his defense of the right to keep and bear arms. First, because he deserves our thanks, and second because it will let him know that you are a Second-Amendment activist, and that we Second-Amendment activists are willing to go the extra mile to help those who help protect our right to keep and bear arms.

How To Deal With Illegal Gun Bans

While we were taking a stroll at a Salt Lake County park last spring, we noticed an official sign indicating that firearms are prohibited in the park. As you probably know by now, Utah law prohibits any state or local government entity from enacting its own gun regulations without express authorization from the state legislature. And the state legislature has never authorized Salt Lake County to ban guns in its parks. So the Salt Lake County Parks and Recreation Department is, in our opinion, in violation of state law with this ban.

We also noticed that the Utah Transit Authority posts the following policy on its website (Rider Rule #26), which we believe to be an illegal policy:
"Dangerous weapons are prohibited on UTA buses unless under the direct control of a law enforcement officer or private security personnel licensed by the State."

Note: We’ve been informed that the Utah Shooting Sports Council (USSC) is already working to get the UTA gun policy revised. We’ll fill you in about this in a coming alert.

And, of course, Salt Lake International Airport has signs indicating that firearms are banned in the non-secure areas of the passenger terminals. Again, we maintain that this ban is illegal.

We’ve seen several other gun bans enacted by various state and local government agencies that have no authority to ban guns.

So what are we to do about this?

GOUtah! has decided to initiate a statewide operation to get these various petty bureaucrats to obey state law by rescinding all illegal gun bans and eliminating all signs that post illegal gun bans. But we need you to be our eyes and ears for this.

The first phase of this operation will be to collect data.

If you notice a sign at any facility that’s owned or operated by a state or local government agency (a public school, a public park, a public bus, a community center, etc.), please send specific information about it to: goutah@hughes.net. Please include the following:

1. The location of the sign (schoolyard, city park, community center, etc.)
2. The exact text of the gun restriction ("No weapons allowed", or whatever.)
3. When was the most recent time you saw the sign?
4. If you have a recent digital photo of the sign, please attach it to your e-mail message.
5. If you’ve already contacted a government employee or supervisor about the policy, please tell us that person’s name and title, if you can recall it, and please tell us what he or she said.

We appreciate your help with this project.

That concludes the GOUtah! Political and Legislative Alert #303 for 10 September 2008. We hope this information will be of assistance to you in defending your firearms rights.

Remember that getting this information is meaningless unless You Act On It Today. If you just read it and dump it in the trash, your gun rights, and the gun rights of future generations go in the trash with it. Get involved, get active and get vocal!

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