"It does not take a majority to prevail. What it takes is an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men."
-- Samuel Adams
We recently received the following alert via e-mail from the National Rifle Association, which we think is worth passing on to our readers:
As we reported in July, the Nevada Department of Public Safety (NDPS) dropped Utah from the list of states whose Right-to-Carry permits are recognized by Nevada because Utah state law does not mandate live-fire range training as a part of its course requirement for the issuance of a permit. The Nevada Sheriffs’ and Police Chiefs’ Association (NSPCA) will be hosting its third annual Concealed Carry Weapons (CCW) forum in Carson City on Tuesday, September 15 from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. in Room #1214 of the Nevada Legislative Building. The forum will be available to participants in the Las Vegas area via teleconference at the Grant Sawyer Building located at 555 E. Washington Avenue in Room 4401.
The purpose of the forum is to allow members of the pro-gun community to provide public input regarding the administration of the CCW permitting process, which is the responsibility of the county Sheriffs. The moderating panel will include Douglas County Undersheriff Paul Howell, Nevada Department of Public Safety Captain P.K. O’Neill, and Executive Director of the Sheriffs’ and Chiefs’ Association, Frank Adams.
Any Utah CWP holder who is disappointed about the recent decision by Nevada to no longer recognize Utah permits should consider attending and voicing their concerns. Please take the time to attend in Carson City or Las Vegas. If you can’t attend, but would like to submit a question or comment, please email fadams@nvsca.com or mail to P.O. Box 3247, Mesquite, NV 89024.
We encourage you to submit your comments to Mr. Adams at the e-mail address given above on Monday. Perhaps we can get the Nevada authorities to reconsider their decision. The Nevada Sheriffs’ and Police Chiefs’ Association apparently has a lot of power to make decisions regarding CCW in Nevada. Mr. Adams is the Executive Director of that organization.
One point to make, if you’re a Utah resident, is that Utah doesn’t seem to have had any problems stemming from its lack of a live-fire training requirement, despite having issued close to 100,000 CCW permits since 1995. Another point to make is that many Utahns with CCW permits travel to Nevada as a destination for vacation and recreation, since it’s an adjacent state. The lack of recognition of the Utah permit may discourage some of these people from vacationing in Nevada. In the current economy, places like West Wendover, Mesquite, and Las Vegas can use all the tourism they can get.
Here’s a link to NRA’s original report.
Thanks in large measure to your efforts at contacting your Utah State Senator and Utah State Representative, we actually had a good legislative session this year.
Two major gun-rights bills passed during the general legislative session this past winter and were signed into law by the Governor:
HB 357 S2 (sponsored by Rep. Stephen Sandstrom). GOUtah! supported this bill, and it passed both the House and the Senate and was signed into law by the Governor. This new law, as we interpret it, makes it legal to do the following actions without a concealed-weapon permit:
Carry a concealed and/or loaded firearm at your place of residence, or on any real property that you own, or in a business that you own or control.
Carry a concealed and/or loaded handgun in a motor vehicle that you own, or in any other motor vehicle where you have permission from the owner of the vehicle to carry a handgun. Note that rifles and shotguns remain regulated by the old law, and must be unloaded while in the vehicle.
Disclaimer: We’re not lawyers. We’re just regular guys. So we can’t guarantee that our interpretation of the Utah Code is totally accurate. Please read the relevant laws or talk to an attorney or concealed-weapons instructor who is familiar with the law.
SB 58 S2 (sponsored by Sen. Mark Madsen). GOUtah! supported this bill. It passed the Senate and the House and was signed into law by the Governor. SB 58 S2 revises the state’s liability laws to strongly discourage parking-lot gun bans, i.e., policies that prohibit people from keeping firearms locked in their cars in a parking lot. This will apply to most types of parking lots, but it is primarily aimed at companies that prohibit employees from keeping guns in their cars in the company parking lot.
SB 58 S2 contains a number of exemptions. Private residential driveways and parking areas are exempt. Parking lots used by religious organizations are exempt, as are parking lots of entities that are subject to federal firearms restrictions. The new law also allows companies that have secured parking areas with manned checkpoints at the entrances (such as oil refineries and other high-security facilities) to ban guns in the parking lot, provided that a gun-storage facility or an alternative parking area is provided outside the security perimeter. A last minute amendment was added that allows a company to ban guns in a non-secured parking lot if the company provides an alternative parking area where guns are allowed. GOUtah! opposed this last amendment, since it could potentially lead to some problems. However, even with this late-stage amendment, SB 58 S2 represents a net gain for gun owners. We got some new legal protections that we didn’t have before, without having to give up any legal protections that we already had.
As far as we know, no significant anti-gun bills passed.
That concludes the GOUtah! Political and Legislative Alert #321 for 12 September, 2009. 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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