HB 3560, Employee Safe Commute Bill

[C. Richard Archie]

HB 3560 has been put on Notice for Wednesday, March 14 in the sub committee of Employee and Consumer Affairs.

[johnharris]

It is critical to put increased pressure on the legislators who will or may vote for our rights. It has been leaked that the House Leadership, in particular, are putting extreme pressure and even threats on the members who might vote for this legislation to vote against it.

[Sky King]

I have sent another round of emails concerning this bill. I also plan at this time to be in Nashville for this hearing. I have written to Rep. Bass telling him of my desire to speak in support of his bill. Unfortunately, I have recently heard that this bill may not be heard on the 14th. I do not know if it is being rolled by the sponsor or if it is being stonewalled by the House leadership due to the pressure that John comments on in the previous post.

[Sky King]

I was called today by The NRA and asked to do an interview over the phone. That interview will be aired tonight at 5 PM Eastern 4PM Central at www.nranews.com
if you are interested in hearing it.

[Sky King]

Ok folks it is time to crank up the calls and emails again. These bills were rolled from last week but are on the schedule again for this week. The General Assembly is wanting to wrap up business for this session early so we are rapidly approaching the last opportunity for these bills to be heard. Tell your representatives AND the committee members that we want these bill heard. Contact the sponsors, Eddie Bass in the House and Mike Faulk in the Senate and tell them you appreciate their work and that you want them to move their bills.

Don't be fooled by the number of co-sponsors. Just because we see a lot of co-sponsors does not mean these bills are a sure thing. Often representatives will sign on just to be able to say to us and their constituants that they have supported our Second Amendment rights, knowing and hoping all along that they will never have to have a recorded vote. We need these bills to come to the floors of the Senate and House for a recorded up or down vote. This is the only way we will ever know just who our "friends" really are.

It is recorded votes that we know that Beth Harwell IS NOT our friend. While she claims to be friendly to gun rights, her votes tell another story.

[Sky King]

I saw this on the TGO forum posted by "Waynesan"

"Posted Yesterday, 10:22 PM

http://missouri-news...lots-bill/15266

Latest on Harwell and Legislatures intentions on this bill."


Personally, I am getting a bit put off by the fact that we seem to have to get MORE news about what is happening in Nashville in regards to this legislation from Missouri than we do from our own state. And what we DO get from Tennesseess media is misleading, (remember the press release from Knoxville that incorrectly reported about the possible amendments to this bill).


With that aside, the whole idea that the TFA is not an interested party is bunk. The TFA has been at the forfront of pro-gun legislation in this state for over 15 years, being instrumental in the existance in us even having a handgun carry permit. Harwell, McCormick and Maggart just don't like having their true colors exposed. Harwell's voting record is just that, on record and the only things she has voted FOR are the TWO joint resolutions COMMENDING the TFA for their work promoting and protecting the rights of Tennessee citizens to keep and bear arms. She was the ONLY member of the Republican caucus in the House to vote AGAINST the override of the Governor's veto of the restaurant carry bills, and she did it BOTH times. Her voting record for other pro-gun initiatives is just as dismal.


Ever since the General Assembly passed legislation loosening the restrictions on corporate donations to political campaigns, the leadership has done everything short of handing the keys to the General Assembly to the corporate lobbies in order to gain favor and dollars.


Now to the issue of these proposed amendments. Right now I can live with restricting this to permit holders. We need to get this law on the books. As it stands right now, most of the laws expanding our gun rights are restricted to permit holders, restaurant carry, parks carry and so on. Untill we get a Constitutional or Vermont carry law which would open things to ALL law abiding gun owners, I think this is going to be the restriction we can expect on most any similiar law. I also feel adding verbage that states that this bill would not apply to single dwelling residential property (ie your home, after all your home is your castle) would not be a problem.


As for limitations that focus on the facilities itself, I have issues with that. We can do little to nothing in regards to facilities that are specifically restricted by state or federal law. However just because a facility has a fence and or a gate, is a nuclear facility or whatever, has NO impact on the circumstance encountered during my commute. The whole point of this bill is spelled out in the title of the legislation, SAFE COMMUTE. What does the fact that where I may work being a nuclear facility have to do with THAT? Am I suddenly mysteriously exempt from violent attack on my way home from work just because the place I just LEFT has a fence?


Getting the real information on what these "proposed amendments" may be is quite difficult. I have not seen or heard anything other than what has been leaked to the press such as this. I have no doubt that they are playing their cards close to their chest on purpose to prevent the barage of emails they know they would get. Well, we need to keep them going anyway.

[Sky King]

The Senate has bill passed the committees and is scheduled for the Senate floor but we still need phone calls and emails. Rumors still abound that there may be attempts to add bill killing amendments to it from the floor.

Now for the House bills. All the communication I hear is that Representative Jimmy Eldridge, Chairman of the Consumer and Employee Affairs Committee where the bills are assigned, supports these bills and has said the bills will get a full and fair hearing in his committee. The problem is in the SUB-committe. Mark White is the Chairman of the sub-committee and the bills are set to be heard there first. Representative Mark White is NOT being very forthcomming about where he stands on the bills.

We need a lot of calls and emails to Representative Mark White telling him that we want these bills heard.

Also it would be good to contact the bills sponsor, Representative Eddie Bass and thank him for his support for this and other Second Amendment issues. While a Democrat, it would be hard to find a stronger supporter for our rights. Representative Bass has announced that he is not going to run for re-election. He has always been in our corner in the past and his presence will be greatly missed. I have met and spoken with him and he is a very down-to-earth, common sence regular person. Something the General Assembly could use a lot more of.

[Sky King]

Email sent to Lt. Governor Ramsey:

Lt. Governor Ramsey,
When you ran for Governor against Bill Haslam, I voted for you in the primary and would have voted for you had you won the nomination.

In 2010, you asked the Tennessee Firearms Association to stand down for a year and we would get a parking lot bill in 2011. That did not happen. Now we have a bill ready for the Senate floor and it has been reported that Speaker Harwell has said that YOU told her that the Safe Commute bills will not be put on the schedule to be heard on the Senate floor essentially killing them even though they have passed the committees.

You have always held yourself out to be a big supporter of firearms issues but THIS contradicts all that.

I can promise you this, if these bills die as you have indicated at your hand, I WILL throw all the support I can muster behind ANYBODY who runs against you.

Unlike the promise you made to TFA, I will keep mine.

[Sky King]

From Tennessee Gun Owners Forum:

A post read:
"Yesterday I was the only person (excluding the NRA lobbyist) on the hall that was up there talking to the Senators and Representatives about the bills. There were over 100 people running up and down the halls to foster natural gas car engines, who do you think garnered more interest?"

My thought was:
This is what WE NEED to do. I know it is short notice and I really believe that the leadership does this on purpose. They know most of us have regular jobs and can not just drop stuff at the drop of a hat and travel to Nashville. BUT as many of us as can need to come to Nashville on Tuesday morning. We need buttons or something we can put on our clothes that simply says, "SAFE COMMUTE" and another that says, "NO FENCE". We need to be seen in strength outside Ramsey's office AND Harwell's office and IN the House committee meeting.

[Sky King]

Well we have all heard the old saying, "don't believe anything you hear and only half of what you read".

I was in Nashville yesterday with John Harris, Executive Director of the TFA and NRA lobbiest Darren LaSorte for the sub-committee hearing. All I can say is that this whole thing could not be more convoluted. I honestly believe that all of these mixed signals and messages are by design, to keep the constituants in cases like this confused.

There has never been any question that the House leadership has opposed this legislation. Even though reports came out from time-to-time that Beth Harwell was not opposed to gun rights, all her actions did not support that claim. Lt. Governor Ramsey has always been a good supporter AND we have the email where he responded to an inquiry stating that he would support legislation of this nature. However this year we saw Lt. Gov. Ramsey do some major back peddaling by wanting to narrow the scope of the bill and provide exemptions to lots that are secured by a fence. Later reports said that Ramsey had communicated to Harwell that the bill will not clear the Senate as he was not going to let it get to the floor for a vote. This took the pressure off Harwell hand her trio of Second Amendment henchmen to stop the legislation because it would be stopped in the Senate.

Repeated attempts by several people to contact Lt. Gov. Ramsey have failed as he has not returned phone calls or emails in resonse to inquiries about this. Most media outlets are saying that he is opposed to this bill as it is has been amended in the Senate. So I find it interesting that his office is now saying that is not true. Just because an amendment was put on the bill in committee does not mean it can't be removed on the floor and he knows that. The amendment offered by Stacy Campfield to also allow hunters is the major obsticle right now because it opens the door to too many people rather than limiting it to permit holders.

While personally I don't have a problem with allowing hunters, the big objection in Nashville is that hunters have not been vetted, (background checks, training etc) as permit holders have. So that amendment can easily be removed on the floor and Ramsey knows it.

The existance of the email has been made public and Ramsey certainly is well aware that it has surfaced and is being circulated publicly. I am sure he is not glad about that but, oh well. I can only speculate that may be why his office is saying what they are saying today.

But as they say, the proof is in the pudding and Beth Harwells actions again tell the real truth about where she stands. We all know it was planned to have the House bills in the C&E sub-committee then immediately in the full committee on the same day. But rather than allow the chair of that committee, Jimmy Eldridge suspend the rules, which is NOT uncommon in the later days of the sessions, so the bill COULD be heard in full committee on the same day, she denied that request. I ask ANY of you to watch the video of the House floor session for Monday. NUMEROUS motions were made and PASSED for suspension of rules for bills so that they could be heard, but not this one. Why? Well we all know why, Harwell wants to drag it out hoping the session will end before any real action to get the bills to the floor for a recorded vote can take place.

The REAL issue here is to get these bills to the Senate and House floors for recorded votes. I honestly think if that can happen, we have the votes to pass them AND I do not believe Haslam can refuse to sign it. No Republican or conservative wants to go into an election cycle with a bad report card from the TFA and NRA. History shows that to be detrimental to their campaign.

Yesterday, while good to see the swift action of the sub-committee, was again frustrating for two reasons. First and most obvious was the fact that there would be no more action that day because of Beth Harwell and her stubborness. Second was again to see the lack of turnout of supporters for this. There were only four of us. Two we all expect to see, John Harris and Darren LaSorte. The other two were myself and one other person to whom I will have to appologize to for not remembering his name, I have met him before though. But that was it. There was no way I could count the number of people there in lab coats and others supporting issues concerning veterinarians. Doctors, vet techs, THEY EVEN HAD DOGS there. Who do you think got all the attention, us or the vets.

I know it would have been a wasted trip for people because the bill was not heard, but we had no way of knowing that and the question is not whether or not the bill was actually heard, the REAL question is how many of you out there actually had any REAL intent to go.

Keep up the calls and emails to Ramsey and Harwell. They HAVE to know that the heat is on.

[Sky King]

Richard and I went to Nashville today and spoke in The Employee and Consumer Affairs Committee along with Darren LaSorte of the NRA in support of these bills. By now it is already old news that the bills did pass and are now set for the Calendar and Rules Committee for scheduling on the House Floor.

What I DO find interesting, and is apparently a development that took place as Richard and I drove back home is the apparent decision by Senator Mike Faulk, (the companion bills sponsor in the Senate AND the chairman of the Senate Calendar and Rules Committee) to put the bills back in motion in the Senate. This is as reported by a Nashville TV station:

http://www.wkrn.com/story/17510558/hous ... t-gun-bill

If this report is accurate, and the bills DO get put on the calendar for the House and Senate, we will need a full scale email, phone call and visit assault on the members of The General Assembly to support these bills.