Position Paper on Firearms bills before NYS Legislature April 27th, 2009A-801/S-1598A= Paulin/SchneidermanRequires the renewal of firearms' licenses after five years and; allows the commissioner of DCJS to set a date for expiration and provides for a schedule for recertification to be developed by the commissioner of criminal justice services. OPPOSE= No justification for a 5 year renewal of pistol license. Renewal of a license is not necessary because each issuing agent in the state already has the authority to simply send a letter once every five years to a license holder asking a few questions and requesting the return of a form so that all records are up to date. There is also no reason to allow DCJS to promulgate any rules or procedures because the law should clearly spell out what is necessary and not someone who is immune to the input of the people involved. A-1093/S-1715= Paulin/Schneiderman Requires the creation and imposition of restrictive commercial practices and stringent recordkeeping and reporting to prevent gun sales to criminals; provides that such measures shall be promulgated by the superintendent of state police; requires liability insurance of at least one million dollars; restricts premises of sales; requires employee training; prohibits straw purchases; imposes additional license conditions. OPPOSE- would unnecessarily impose severe restrictions on lawful gun sellers that would drive most of them out of the business (maybe that is the real goal). The stringent recordkeeping and reporting requirements by the federal government currently in effect is more than enough and additional requirements are only meant to harass legitimate firearms sellers. Additionally, measures that are arbitrarily promulgated by the superintendent of state police no matter how unreasonable are not in the best interest of open government. Requiring liability insurance of at least one million dollars of gun dealers is arbitrary and imposes unreasonable restrictions on only the LAWFUL trade not the illegal one. Other businesses with much higher risks are not expected to carry such insurance Baseball and Football have much higher fatality and injury rates overall, and businesses such as auto repair, are more dangerous, so why are firearms businesses being targeted for special insurance? Attempts to make lawful businesses, Dealers of firearms, Shooting Ranges, etc. responsible for the criminal misuse of a lawful product is just plain wrong. This is just another demonstration of bias against firearms. All these proposals are unneeded because criminals do not buy through lawful channels. A-1326= Englebright Proscribes persons, firms or corporations engaged in the retail business of selling firearms from selling, delivering or transferring child operated firearms; defines "child operated firearm" to mean a pistol or revolver manufactured 1 year after the effective date of these provisions which does not contain a childproofing device or mechanism incorporated into the design of such pistol or revolver to effectively preclude an average 5 year old from firing same; makes violations a class A misdemeanor. OPPOSE= the assumption that gun makers are purposely selling guns that can be operated by a child is plain arrogance and insulting. The mandate of design criteria to keep that average 5 year old child from operating a firearm is misleading because what is needed is education. The NRA Eddie Eagle program has trained successfully more than 25,000,000 million children in firearms safety education. To ban the sale of guns to New Yorkers by requiring technology that doesn't exist to solve a problem that doesn't exist except in the minds of the anti-gun community is not in the best interest of the people of this state. Federally required air bags in cars have killed more five-year-olds than gun accidents. A-2881/S-2375= Koon/Padavan Includes possession of armor piercing, frangible or devastator ammunition as criminal possession of a weapon in the 4th degree and where possession is knowingly with intent to use against another, it shall constitute criminal possession of a weapon in the 3rd degree. OPPOSE= defines types of ammo as either good or bad ammo and provides criminal penalties for illegal use of this ammo. This bill is misleading and makes unsubstantiated claims that certain types of ammo are "armor" piercing, which is not always bad and does not define "armor". This is nothing but a prelude to a complete bans of various ammo types. Bans hard ammunition by calling it armor piercing and bans soft ammunition by calling it frangible. It's a simple matter to thus ban all ammunition by overlapping the definitions. Hard ammunition can do less damage by leaving a smaller hole, and should not be banned. Soft ammunition prevents the bullet from passing through its target and killing unintended persons beyond the target. It is the safest ammunition for use in cities for self defense or defense of others. It is used by air marshals. All ammo has legitimate uses and should not be banned. A bullet without a gun in your possession that is capable of firing it causes no harm and is not dangerous. Even if you have both in your possession, a gun and a bullet, if you are not involved in a crime than what is the wrong? Nothing… but the anti-gun fanatics don't want to impact crime or criminal behavior just to harass lawful gun owners. A-2882/S-627= Koon/Robach Provides for the submission by state and local law enforcement authorities of expended projectiles and shell casings and guns, found or otherwise coming into their possession, to the state police pistol and revolver ballistic identification electronic databank; requires the law enforcement agencies to make a record thereof and submit within 30 days. OPPOSE= An expansion of the failed CoBIS system is still a failure. CoBIS has, as predicted, failed to produce any crime fighting results in its near 9 year life span. The bill would expand a very expensive program that in many years of existence has yet to solve or prevent a single crime. This bill requires the submission of expended projectiles and shell casings and guns to the state police. Perhaps the real purpose is to make guns more expensive, so poor people in this state can't defend themselves. A-3076/S-3597= Kavanagh/Krueger Establishes a three-hour safety course, developed by the municipal police training council, which shall be completed by an applicant prior to the issuance of a license to possess a pistol, revolver, rifle or shotgun; provides that a license for a firearm shall not be issued until a certificate of participation in such course is submitted to the licensing agency or officer. OPPOSE= There is no reported problem with "untrained" licensees, for this bill to solve. Please go the www.nysafe.org web-site and look at the "12 Talking Points of Mandatory Training" which is attached at the bottom of this report. It clearly outlines the necessary safeguards that must be included against bureaucratic abuse which is and has been documented many times. This bill completely fails to recognize the National Rifle Association, the premiere firearms training organization and its firearms courses. A-3211A= Eddington Bans the sale, use or possession of 50-caliber or larger weapons and directs the division of state police to embark on a program whereby persons currently in lawful possession of such weapons may be reimbursed for the fair market value thereof upon turning such weapons in to a designated officer. OPPOSE- this bill has absolutely NO JUSTIFICATION what so ever. While it has been amended to exempt rifled barrel shotguns it still totally bans many other commonly used firearms. This bill is nothing more than a current push to disarm all New Yorkers, one gun-type at a time. There is no documented abuse or use of this firearm in any crime anywhere in New York State. And even if there were it is already against the law to commit a crime and lawful firearms owners should not be made the scapegoats for criminal misuse. Punish the bad guys not the good guys. A-5078/S-725= Lentol/Johnson C Amends the definition of a "disguised gun" to include a weapon or device capable of being concealed on a person and from which a shot can be discharged through the energy of an explosive which is designed and intended to appear to be a toy gun. This bill also includes any rifle and or shotgun form being any color the customer wants it to be. OPPOSE= another bill that assumes that gun manufacturers are routinely making firearms that appear to be toys only to be used wrongfully. This overly broad bill would make it a felony to apply after market some of the most effective anti corrosive finishes, such as: chrome plating, bluing, browning, black anodizing, or any paint. Many firearms are available in different colors and finishes, particularly now that women make up a greater segment of firearms enthusiasts than they have before. There are pink, blue, green, and many other colors available from the factory, or through local or other shops. Many enthusiasts customize their firearms in different ways, the same way you might paint your home a different color, or paint your car, or customize it in other ways. Most folks customize their firearms to show their individuality, some do it because the new finish is more protective from the elements. Since when is the color of a firearm indicative of a criminal act? What happened to committing a crime other than bad taste for the color chosen? A-5696/S-4456= Kavanagh/Schneiderman Requires employees of dealers in firearms to submit to state and national criminal background checks. OPPOSE= Requires something all firearms dealers are already doing. Almost every gun store I have ever been in requires its employees to carry a firearm which requires a handgun license and one of the most intrusive and through background investigations ever conducted. This is just another attempt to harass lawful gun owners in this state. A-5844/S-3098= Weisenberg/Schneiderman Enacts the "children's weapon accident prevention act"; creates crimes of failure to store a weapon safely in the first and second degrees, aggravated failure to store a weapon, and criminally negligent storage of a weapon in the first and second degrees; provides affirmative defenses; directs the commissioner of education to develop a weapons safety program. OPPOSE= Mandatory firearm storage requirements. State negligence laws already exist and can be used against anyone acting irresponsibly. This bill has nothing to do with children or safety. If it did it would pass into law as a requirement in every grade school in New York State the Eddie Eagle Gun Safety Program. This program has been used to teach firearm safety with over 25,000,000 million children nationwide and has been adopted by many states and localities as an official program. A-6157= Titone Amends the definition of assault weapon to include additional weapons; defines the terms "detachable magazine", "muzzle break" and "muzzle compensator"; authorizes the division of state police to promulgate rules and regulations for the addition of information identifying assault weapons lawfully possessed prior to January 1, 2010 to the pistol and revolver ballistic identification databank. OPPOSE= Dramatically expands the definition of an assault weapon to include many more commonly owned rifles, pistols and shotguns. Requires registration if you want to keep your firearms. Gives State Police vast authority to designate any semi automatic firearm as an assault weapon. What New York State calls "Assault Weapons" are really no different in function than most other rifles and shotguns, and differ in appearance only, their so called "scary factor". The features alluded to don't really make much difference in their efficiency or lethality. The Federal "Assault Weapons Ban" has expired, and no upswing of violence has occurred. The notion that these types of rifles, pistols and shotguns somehow cause mayhem all by themselves, or are more dangerous than anything else is preposterous. This is one of the most outrageous attempts to undermine the recent US Supreme Court decision that the government may not ban firearms as they are constitutional protected under the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights. Even the US 9th Circuit Court of Appeals just recently stated that the Heller Decision is incorporated and thus applicable to the States. That basically means the individual states are bound by the US Supreme Court Decision. Even if it was, it is bad law that does nothing but disarm lawful people while not affecting the criminal at all. A-6468/S-4397= Schimel/Schneiderman Requires semiautomatic pistols manufactured or delivered to any licensed dealer in this state to be capable of micro-stamping ammunition; establishes fines for violations of this requirement. OPPOSE= this bill is nothing more than a back door method of banning semi auto handguns by mandating untested sole source technology. This bill creates a MONOPOLY (which I thought was illegal) because only one company CLAIMS to have the technology to be able to do this. There is no useful purpose for this proposal except to harass and coerce legitimate and lawful gun owners. Why, because this proposal can only trace a firearm back to its last LAWFUL owner and not the criminal who actually used it. This is just another program that does not and will not work which then begs the question, what will be next to be heaped on the law abiding citizen in an attempt to get at criminals. Obviously this approach has more problems than that which they claim to be trying fix, but I think they already know that. A-7574= Hoyt Provides that collateral loan brokers shall store firearms in the same manner as gunsmiths and dealers in firearms are required to store them. OPPOSE= Unnecessary burden on pawn shops engaged in the lawful business of buying and selling firearms and who must be licensed the same as any other gun dealer and follow all of the same rules and regulations governing gun stores. This bill purports to stem the flow of firearms but if they are all legal firearms why do they want to stem the flow? Can you say harassment? A-7575= Lancman This bill would improve public safety and prevent domestic violence incidents from escalating into even greater violence by keeping guns out of the hands of domestic violence perpetrators. OPPOSE= broadly expands offenses that would be included in "serious offenses" which would permanently ban one from possessing firearms. It also ties these offenses to "family members" but doesn't define what a family member is, which gives courts dangerously broad authority to act and to determine who is included in the definition of a family member. Courts should not be allowed to write law as this bill would allow. This bill claims to improve public safety and prevent domestic violence incidents from escalating into even greater violence by keeping guns out of the hands of domestic violence perpetrators. This is an outright LIE!!! No law ever made has been able to prevent criminals from doing what they want and when they want. What might really work is providing the intended domestic violence victim, who will be there when the crime is being committed, the right to have a firearm and to use it for self protection. A-1030/S-391= McEneny/Breslin Establishes a task force to assess data and information compiled by law enforcement personnel and health providers related to incidents of firearm violence and injury; provides that the task force would designate a state agency to coordinate a statewide system for reporting the nature, incidence and specific causes of firearm violence. OPPOSE= this is truly feel good legislation that serves no real purpose but to support a designated outcome and does a great job of misdirecting the publics attention on a non-issue. It does this by claiming there is such a thing as firearm violence instead of criminals who exhibit violence and use a firearm unlawfully. It suggests that guns are the cause of crime and that guns need to be punished by keeping them out of the hands of good people. This only creates more victims of crime by making the very public the legislature is supposed to protect by making them helpless victims.
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