Tennessee Firearms Assoc. Inc.

Has anybody heard from any of the Legislators regarding the Parking Lot Bills?

Richard,
I have heard nothing. The last discussionn I had with anybody was when I spoke with you following the meeting in Jackson. Prior to that, I had spoken with Senator Campfield's office. His secretary indicated that he would call me the next Monday as he would be interested in hearing what I had to say. I never got a call.

I never followed up on that based on what you and I discussed. Are there new developments that make it necessary to contact the sponsors of these bills? There have been new developements on my end that could impact my ability to travel to Nashville. While my work schedule allows me to be available on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, I received a Federal summons for jury duty beginnning May 2 of this year. Depending on how this goes, I may not be able to travel to Nashville if I am called for jury duty.

Call me or email me.

Sam

I am concerned that the folks are not connecting with the Legislators. It seems that the steam has leaked out of our efforts on this issue.

I don't know if it is a lack of steam or a lack of direction. The last several years, we knew we had a fight. Now maybe with a Republican majority in both houses and in the Governors mansion, maybe there is a feeling that we have it made. Nothing could be further from the truth.

We were all told that Speaker Harwell was not going to entertain any pro-gun legislation. However there has in fact been quite a few pro-gun bills introduced. First and most prominent is the huge NRA drafted bill. There is also more than one parking lot bill.

I think a big problem is that nobody is giving any of these bills any hope of passing given Speaker Harwell's proclomation. I have yet to see anything from John concerning the NRA bill since it first came out where he indicated sceptisism pointing to the Castle Doctrine we have that too was a NRA drafted bill.

Most of what I have seen on this forum from the TFA has been more about a Vermont/Arizona type carry law and little much of anything else. Personally, while I would support such a bill, I wouldn't give it a snow balls chance in a furnace of passing. I do think we have a good chance of getting at least a parking lot bill this session if we could get some real momentum behind it. But again, unlike the efforts in the last few years to get a restaurant bill and parks bill passed, I havn't seen much enthusiasm for much of anything.

Everybody on this board and those who know me, know one of my biggest issues has been a parking lot bill. Even when it wasn't the issue in the forefront. I got behind the restaurant and parks bills. I wrote the letters, I made the phone calls, I wrote letters to editors in support of these bills. Now that we have those, I think it is time to get behind another issue that impacts a great number of us, and that is the one that tells us that we can not provide for our own protection during our commute to and from work. A Vermont/Arizona carry bill that would allow any law abiding citizen to carry without a permit is STILL NOT going to tell an employer that he can not prohibit an employee storing a legal firearm in their private vehicle while at work.

So let's decide which ones we are going to work on and get at it. Let's stop sending the mixed signals about whether or not any of our bills have a chance or not and work at it.

I sent several e-mails in the last few days to various Legislators, have not received any responses yet.

Guess it is time to saddle up and head back to Legislative Plaza.

What are the bill numbers?

OK, HB 2021 by Josh Evans, (companion bill SB2061 by Campfield and Gresham) is on the schedule to be heard in the House Judiciary General Sub-committee on Wednesday, April 6 at 3:30 PM.