Anderson County to vote to post parks 15 June

[meadsteve]

Was sent this article by a Oak Ridge friend. Here is the article and my response. This is going to be a battle across the state. These anti-gun politicians don't understand how many permit holders there are and how it will effect their loosing re-election.

Steve Mead
Oak Ridge, TN

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Check out my comment in the Sentinel- about 1030 pm, 08 June, and printed below. We need to start contacting the commissioners and help them understand that there are several thousand permit holders in Anderson County. 1223 in Clinton (zip 37716) , 952 in Oak Ridge (zip 37830), 220 in Lake City (zip 37769), 220 in Heiskell (zip 37754).
The names, addresses, year of birth and effective date of their permit of all of these folks is available at http://www.commercialappeal.com/data/gunpermits/
To get details you go to the site and click on details with their name.
http://www.commercialappeal.com/data/gu ... 1321360447 - here is an example

Here is link for Oak Ridge - http://www.commercialappeal.com/data/gu ... 1318416288

These lists make great calling lists .


Steve Mead
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Comment on Knox News Sentinel article (see web link below)

The problem with this new state law is that most of what you read is intentionally misleading. First of all the law only applies to state licensed handgun carry permit holders that are already authorized to carry their handguns in Walmart, Home Depot, grocery stores,liquor stores, on the street, in restaurants, and shopping malls... places people go every day. Most folks don't even know because there are simply no problems. The folks that just don't like guns lead you to believe for political reasons that this new law will allow everyone to carry guns in parks - simply a lie. The percentage of permit holders in Tennessee that committed a crime requiring their permits to be revoked during 2008 was 12/10,000 of 1%. A recent multi-year study by the U.S. Department of the Interior subject to nation-wide commenting came to the determination that allowing permit holders to carry their handguns in the nations parks and wildlife refuges would reduce crime and improve overall safety. The U.S Congress and President Obama just passed a law allowing permit holders to carry their handguns in all national parks and wildlife refuges as long as the state allowed it - most states do. Those that want to post the parks with "No Weapons" would lead you to believe if you just put up signs then their will no criminals with guns in the parks. In fact, criminals are attracted to places where guns in the hands of law abiding citizens are banned - and keep in mind the signs in parks say no can have weapons, in reality they only apply to permit holders... folks very unlikely to cause a problem and more likely to come to the aid of you or your children until law enforcement can arrive if their was a crime problem. Additionally, as was done when the courthouse was posted, Commisioner Gillenwaters seems to be ignoring state law. The current posting in the courthouse is unenforcable because it does not comply with state law. The law allowing the county to vote on this has not yet been signed into law, and might not be so on 14 June.
The thousands of Anderson County permit holders are generally politically active and will be involved in the next county elections. Everyone wants our parks to be as safe as possible. Most want state and federal constitutional rights to only be infringed when there is a compelling public interest. The studies have been completed - there simply is no evidence to substantiate that permit holders are a crime or safety problem. In fact the opposite is true. A vote to prohibit the permit holders in parks is a vote to increase crime and reduce overall safety.
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http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/jun/0 ... uns-parks/

Anderson County official favors banning guns in parks
By News Sentinel staff
Monday, June 8, 2009

CLINTON - A resolution banning handguns from all Anderson County parks is expected to go before the Anderson County Commission on June 15.
Commissioner Scott Gillenwaters, who spearheaded successful efforts to prohibit guns in the courthouse, introduced the resolution.
The state Legislature has passed a bill permitting guns in all state and local parks. But local governments can opt out of it and continue to prohibit guns in parks under their jurisdiction.
One portion of Gillenwaters' resolution declares the possession of firearms in county parks to be "a public nuisance and a threat to the public health, safety and welfare of all visitors to our parks."

[meadsteve]

The vote in Anderson County regarding posting of the parks has been delayed to late July. Appears the thousands of permit holders are being heard - and perhaps feared. Recommend using the Communist Appeal data base to find names and addresses of all permit holders and get in touch with as many as possible. If you have someone with the skills have them bounce the list against a voter registration data base and target the permit holders who vote.