EDGEWATER Home to just more than 5,000 people, this suburban Jefferson County town bordered by Denver to the east, Lakewood to the south and west, and Wheat Ridge to the north, is looking to limit Second Amendment rights like no city before in Colorado.
Although Denver has long banned open carry and recently announced its intent to look at banning concealed carry in public spaces including parks and city buildings, Edgewater has a laundry list of items targeting gun owners coming up for discussion that far exceeds anything seen to date.
On April 5th, the city council heard a presentation on gun violence prevention from Colorado Ceasefire, an anti-gun rights organization, and subsequently decided to move forward with a more detailed discussion on possible municipal ordinances. Such local gun rights restrictions would be allowed under Senate Bill 21- 256, passed during last years legislative session and signed into law by Governor Polis, which unwound decades of state preemption and allows local governments to manage their own gun laws, but only so long as they are more restrictive than those at the state level, a condition that has been referred to as a bastardization of the concept of local control.
According to an Edgewater City Council agenda for the April 19th meeting, the following will be considered for passage:
The presentation will include comments from Tom Mauser, father of a Columbine High School shooting victim and current board member of Colorado Ceasefire, which was started after the Columbine shooting and Ellen McCarron, Colorado Ceasefire Legislative Action board president.
Among justifications in the presentation are claims that the majority of Americans support reasonable gun restrictions and that there are no easy solutions, but that doing nothing will not solve the problem.
But according to David Kopel, research director at the Denver-based Independence Institute* and professor of advanced constitutional law at the University of Denver, concealed carry permit holderswho are heavily targeted in the potential Edgewater ordinancesare exceptionally law-abiding.
According to FBI data in the annually published Crime in the United States, about 5 percent of the Colorado adult population is arrested each year, says Kopel. In contrast, the figure for concealed handgun permit holders is only 1/10th of 1 percent. Permit holders are vastly more law-abiding than the general population.
Kopel continues that obtaining a concealed carry permit requires hundreds of dollars in fees and expenses for the required training, as well as long waits for appointments for a fingerprint-based background check. The only people who bother are those who are so concerned about legal compliance that they spend significant resources just to obtain a card from the government allowing them to legally do what they could done anyway for free, and with very low risk of being caught, continued Kopel. Its no wonder that Colorados concealed carry permitees are 50 times more law-abiding than the general population.
Weld County Sheriff Steve Reams, who is a vocal, statewide advocate for Second Amendment rights said the restrictions Edgewater is considering are neither reasonable nor will they solve any problem. Reams has continually spoke out against SB21-256 calling it a trampling on the Constitution.
Gun restrictions have not fixed the problem, Reams said. It was a huge overreach by the state. Restrictions on the Constitution are never taken lightly (by Democrats) until it comes to the Second Amendment. The Second Amendment is different than any other freedom for them.
According to Colorado Ceasefire, concealed carry permits are up the past three years in Colorado from 257,166 in 2019 to 297,003 in 2021.
Reams said from a law enforcement perspective, he doesnt see how such patchwork laws could be enforced, adding keeping up with state laws are complicated enough already without adding another layer.
I cant imagine how you would even go about it, Reams said, questioning whether current owners of banned guns would be grandfathered in. How do you prove you did not already own it? If Im driving through town going from point A to point B, and I get pulled over for a speeding ticket, am I going to lose my guns?
Reams said municipal laws are normally specific to property issues, not gun rights.
They are setting themselves up for a huge court battle, Reams said. I guess were finally about to see if the legislation is constitutional, but it will come at the expense of Edgewater residents.
The item will be discussed Tuesday during the city council regular business meeting. The meeting begins at 6:30 p.m. at 1800 Harlan St., Edgewater.
*Independence Institute is the publisher of Complete Colorado.
Our unofficial motto at Complete Colorado is Always free, never fake, but annoyingly enough, our reporters, columnists and staff all want to be paid in actual US dollars rather than our preferred currency of pats on the back and a muttered kind word. Fact is that theres an entire staff working every day to bring you the most timely and relevant political news (updated twice daily) from around the state on Completes main page aggregator, as well as top-notch original reporting and commentary on Page Two.
CLICK HERE TO LADLE A LITTLE GRAVY ON THE CREW AT COMPLETE COLORADO. Youll be giving to the Independence Institute, the not-for-profit publisher of Complete Colorado, which makes your donation tax deductible. But rest assured that your giving will go specifically to the Complete Colorado news operation. Thanks for being a Complete Colorado reader, keep coming back.
Visit link:
City of Edgewater to consider sweeping gun rights restrictions; concealed carry among targets - Complete Colorado