VSSA says Arlington attempts to circumvent prohibition against registration with “voluntary” form.
Virginia Shooting Sports Association urges Arlington, Virginia gun owners to "Just say no" to voluntary registration scheme.
Orange, VA (PRWEB) May 28, 2004 -– The Virginia Shooting Sports Association
(VSSA), the state affiliate of the NRA, said today that Arlington County is
creating a registry of gun owners by misleading them to believe the information
will be used as a tool to recover stolen firearms. The Virginia Legislature
recently passed a law (HB484) requiring localities to destroy gun purchase
permits by July 31st of this year. The bill repeals local purchase and
registration schemes, but that hasn’t stopped Arlington County from trying to
register guns and gun owners.
“It’s deceptive at best. They imply that an
effort will be made to recover a stolen firearm” said Steve Canale, President of
the Virginia Shooting Sports Association. “In fact, there are no special efforts
made anywhere to recover lost or stolen firearms,” Canale added.
The
Arlington Police Department web site contains a notice to its citizens, to
“voluntarily” register their guns. Though the website states that "The
Commonwealth of Virginia does not require gun registration. Arlington County
provides this service for its citizens in an effort to keep a record of the
serial numbers of firearms. In case of theft or loss, we will have the
information pertaining to individual firearms for reporting
purposes.”
“If your gun is stolen and you report it to the police with
the serial number it’s entered into the FBI’s National Crime Information Center
where it’s available to all police agencies nationwide. This registration scheme
is totally unnecessary, it’s a ruse” Canale stated.
The information the
Arlington County Police form gathers includes name, address, gender, race, home
phone, work phone, email address, make of gun, model, serial number, type of
gun, caliber and barrel length. Why all this information is needed wasn’t
stated.
Asked what he would do Canale concluded, “Just say no.”
#
# #
Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2004/5/prweb129696.htm