Why would you ever propose gun control that will only restrict law abiding citizens. Criminals don’t check laws or care. I have a Virginia state concealed handgun license, but the proposed laws will directly affect me. I don’t understand why the people I voted for would think to restrict my right to defend myself and property. I believe that the police do the best that they can. However I have also worked as a first responder for 7 years and I can tell you that when seconds count, police are minuets away. I urge you not to pass any laws that will limit my ability to legally protect myself and my family.
Time and time again it is proven that stronger gun control laws save peoples lives. Please protect people in the shared spaces of the county by removing firearms from them.
I ask that this proposal be dropped completely.I have visited county parks for fishing and hiking while armed for decades.This proposal will immediately criminalize that activity. There is no basis to disarm someone with a long history of legal,peaceable use of a carry gun.Criminals will be put somewhat at ease,I suspect,as well as people who choose to fear someone like me because,well, guns are bad.Vote NO please if it comes to that.
Please oppose all gun control. I would like to let the board know that I am strongly opposed to any local gun-control.
I strongly oppose any effort to restrict the rights of citizens to keep and bear arms and to protect themselves and their families while in public.
No matter how well intended, laws cannot stop determined bad people from doing bad things, but they can and do prevent good people from defending themselves. Laws enabling good citizens to defend themselves and their families do make a difference. As I am sure you have heard, 1-3 million citizens use firearms annually to defend life and property, the vast majority of the time without ever firing a shot.
Any local gun control that the board considers will not stop the bad actors, but it will restrict the rights of good citizens and diminish their ability to defend themselves and their families.
Vote NO on this ordinance. There is no logical rational and no empirical evidence to support this. I challenge you to provide credible research that shows that this type of ordinance will make people safer. The data clearly shows that the public is LESS safe when you create “gun free zones”. Ninety four percent of mass shootings have occurred in “gun free zones”. Please reflect on that. Mass shootings occur in gun free zones. Additionally the data is clear that crime goes up when law abiding citizens are disarmed.
Law abiding citizens, especially concealed permit holders are not the problem, but in fact stop crime and come to the aid of victims hundreds of thousands of times per year. Criminals and those with bad intent do not obey laws and are emboldened by the idea that they can commit crime without fear of resistance.
An ordinance creating gun free zones may feel good but it creates a false sense of security. If your goal is to make people safer then vote NO to banning firearms.
as a long time resident of Albemarle County I strongly encourage you to vote no to this ordinance. My first objection is that as a law abiding citizen I have second amendment rights. My second objection has to do with the fact that there are countless ordinances in this county about behavior in county parks, such as cleaning up the horse manure off the trails when you ride. But nobody does that. Do you know how many dog owners walk their dogs off leash in the parks where we have an ordinance requiring them to be on leash? Who is out there enforcing manure pickup? Who is enforcing the leash law? You are adding another ordinance that you have no intention nor means nor resources to enforce. There is absolutely no reason to have this ordinance other than to jump on the fear bandwagon. please do not pass this ordinance. Thank you
Please vote YES on this ordinance. As a ninth generation Albemarle County resident, I urge you to help make our parks and our county building safer by passing this ordinance. I have personally been intimidated by those bearing arms in government-owned areas of Virginia and I look forward to the day when such actions are no longer permitted anywhere in our commonwealth. This ordinance is especially important as it will protect against such intimidation during voting. My brother was murdered with a gun in Albemarle County on August 12th, 2017, the day of the deadly Unite the Right rally. If you need any evidence as to why the prevalence and acceptance of guns in our area causes excessive harm, look no further than that day. Guns make the opportunity for deadly violence too easy. Please vote to make our community more safe.
The 44, unarmed, gunshot victims at Virginia Tech and the 14, unarmed, gunshot victims at Virginia Beach who lost their lives in designated “no-gun-zones” have their mortal lives stacked against your passage of Revised Ordinance No. 21-10! Would they have been allowed to conceal carry weapons (CCW) they might all be alive to protest your action(s)! Please do not ADD to the number of their fruitless genocide and LEARN FROM THEIR HISTORY! There is no need for your passage of any moderation of existing CCW laws in Albemarle County. Only persons devoid of common sense operating upon ‘fairy-tale-mindsets’ believe that Revised Ordinance No. 21-10 will protect them or any persons in Albemarle County--excepting the NAMED, PRIVILEGED-EXCEPTED-INDIVIDUALS cited within said Proposal! ‘We-the-people’ have just as much right to the natural law, self-protections afforded by the Second Amendment as do those individuals singled-out in your prejudicial Proposal.
As a County resident for more than 3 decades, an employee of the County, and former employee of the ECC, I strongly OPPOSE this firearms ordinance, and strongly urge you to vote NO. It serves only to disarm law abiding citizens, while making zones where criminals would have unrestrained access to performing acts of violence on the unarmed. While this proposal allows individuals to keep firearms properly locked in a private vehicle, it discriminates against those whose means of transport to facilities is by motorcycle or bicycle. Having been an ECC employee for the county, I know how long response times to rural areas of the county can be, and prohibiting citizens from lawfully carrying firearms to rural county buildings, parks and community centers would just add risk to the entire community. In the very least, an exception for those individuals with a Concealed Carry Permit (CHP exemption) should be added to this proposed legislation before it is voted upon.
I write to strongly support passage of the Firearms Ordinance. (21-416).
As a Jew who had to be in downtown Charlottesville for an appointment during the Unite the Right rally, I am acutely aware of the fact that the open carry of loaded firearms during any demonstration increases the likelihood that such an event will escalate into a dangerous or deadly situation. The General Assembly passed the local ordinance law in 2020 in response to the deadly Unite the Right attack on Charlottesville, when the city was powerless to disarm violent white supremacists. The organizers wanted to come back the next year to recreate the event, but their permits were denied for the city parks. I don't want our county parks to be used as staging grounds for the next white-supremacist/antisemitic rally.
I encourage our Board of Supervisors to join the other 12 Virginia localities, including Charlottesville, that have passed similar ordinances, protecting over 2.5 million Virginians so far.
I urge you to vote no to this proposed firearms ordinance. This is really a solution is search of a problem. What studies have shown a continual problem of gun violence in county owned areas? I frequently enjoy many of the parks and this limits my 2nd amendment rights when doing so. So I would expect great amounts of empirical evidence to show how this ordinance would save lives. Also How does this ordinance actually stop criminals from bringing firearms onto the banned places? It seems that this will only stop good citizens from protecting themselves against those that do not follow the law. Finally during the last meeting it was decided to draft an exception for CHP holders, where is that now? That makes it seem like it was all for show and the board will do whatever they please over the will of the citizens.
Dear Board Members,
I urge you to realize that the only way to prevent firearms from entering government buildings is to secure every entry with metal detectors. Signs and laws will only stop law abiding citizens. If you take these necessary measures to absolutely guarantee that ONLY law enforcement officials are armed, then I would not oppose firearm prohibition in government BUILDINGS.
However, it is clearly unconstitutional and quite illiberal to propose a prohibition of otherwise legal firearm possession outdoors on county property. There is absolutely no way for such an ordnance to be consistently enforced without instituting a similarly unconstitutional ordinance akin to the infamous NYPD "stop and frisk" policy. Firearm prohibition in county parks will not make anyone safer. Criminals are not stupid and will recognize the reduced probability of facing armed resistance from would-be victims as a boon to their risk/reward calculation.
Let's start with the bottom line up front. Here is how you get fired from your position on the board: pass this ordinance. Here is how to keep your job: do not pass this ordinance. Simple enough?
Now let's dissemble and argue for and against this ordinance.
Pros: It makes you feel like you're "doing something" to protect yourselves and others.
Con: While it feels good, it does not protect you in the least
Con: It is against the spirit of the law of the land, which states that the right to bear arms is your right, given to you by your Creator.
Con: It likely increases crime. Many studies show, over and over, and quite annoyingly to those who would like to restrict our natural rights, that with the increased prevalence of legally owned firearms comes a decrease in crimes overall, especially violent crimes like... uh... homicide to name one.
Con: increased crime rates disproportionately affect minorities. Hence, gun laws increase crime and are racist.
So in conclusion, don't pass this.
If you truly want "to enhance the well-being and quality of life for all community members" then you should vote against this. Criminals don't follow laws, hence the reason why they are criminals. Chicago is a prime example of having the strictest gun laws in the country, yet they have the highest rate of shootings. If gun control laws worked to prevent violent crime, I would give up my gun today because I believe human life is precious and that we should do all that we can to protect it. Ironically, It's for this same reason that I carry my gun because in reality these laws have the opposite effect. These laws only disarm responsible citizens who seek to protect themselves, their families, and bystanders if a violent crime erupts. If your family was at a park and someone began shooting, would you rather have a good guy with a gun also in the park, or would you rather pass this law and strip the good guy of his right to have his gun, leaving both your family and his family defenseless?
Vote no on this matter. This is a solution looking for a problem, that does not serve the public interest. Rather than restrict the civil rights of your constituents, why not focus on real challenges the county faces? Clearly, there are many that deserve the energy of the board, this is not one of them.
I strongly oppose this ordinance. What happened to exempting concealed handgun permit holders? There is no evidence to support the idea that banning carry by those with concealed handgun permits will decrease violence. I urge the board to revise the ordinance.
Please do not pass any restrictive firearms ordinances. Criminals and mass shooters will not follow your ordinances. We will not be any safer at all. If anything, just the opposite.
Vote no on this ordinance. It is overly broad and punitive, especially when considering it aims to infringe on a constitutionally protected right. Constitutional rights should only be regulated with the lightest of touch. Making people feel more comfortable on County property or preventing possible future shootings that have no precedent in the County are insufficient reasons to curtail the right to bear arms in such varied places and circumstances as this ordinance does. It should be obvious to people who respect science that the data shows that municipalities with strict carry restrictions are not safer places. Finally, it's baffling that the US government trusts me as a CHP holder to carry in national parks (signed into law by notorious 2nd Amendment absolutist Barack Obama), but the County that issued my CHP doesn't seem to trust me to carry in its parks.
I urge the Board of Supervisors to oppose this unneeded and overreaching ordinance. Only 6% of the state and NONE of the counties that surround Albemarle have passed any local gun-control. While criminals will be grateful to you for doing so, the good people of Albemarle and the rest of the state will not benefit from being disarmed. Also, the County Attorney was directed by the Board to draft an ordinance with exemptions for Concealed Handgun Permit holders. That didn't happen. Was that a real order to the County Attorney or just given with a wink and nod?
Why would you ever propose gun control that will only restrict law abiding citizens. Criminals don’t check laws or care. I have a Virginia state concealed handgun license, but the proposed laws will directly affect me. I don’t understand why the people I voted for would think to restrict my right to defend myself and property. I believe that the police do the best that they can. However I have also worked as a first responder for 7 years and I can tell you that when seconds count, police are minuets away. I urge you not to pass any laws that will limit my ability to legally protect myself and my family.
Please vote Yes on this ordinance.
Time and time again it is proven that stronger gun control laws save peoples lives. Please protect people in the shared spaces of the county by removing firearms from them.
I ask that this proposal be dropped completely.I have visited county parks for fishing and hiking while armed for decades.This proposal will immediately criminalize that activity. There is no basis to disarm someone with a long history of legal,peaceable use of a carry gun.Criminals will be put somewhat at ease,I suspect,as well as people who choose to fear someone like me because,well, guns are bad.Vote NO please if it comes to that.
2nd Amendment - SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.
What part of that is so hard to understand?? Vote NO on this issue!
Please oppose all gun control. I would like to let the board know that I am strongly opposed to any local gun-control.
I strongly oppose any effort to restrict the rights of citizens to keep and bear arms and to protect themselves and their families while in public.
No matter how well intended, laws cannot stop determined bad people from doing bad things, but they can and do prevent good people from defending themselves. Laws enabling good citizens to defend themselves and their families do make a difference. As I am sure you have heard, 1-3 million citizens use firearms annually to defend life and property, the vast majority of the time without ever firing a shot.
Any local gun control that the board considers will not stop the bad actors, but it will restrict the rights of good citizens and diminish their ability to defend themselves and their families.
Vote NO on this ordinance. There is no logical rational and no empirical evidence to support this. I challenge you to provide credible research that shows that this type of ordinance will make people safer. The data clearly shows that the public is LESS safe when you create “gun free zones”. Ninety four percent of mass shootings have occurred in “gun free zones”. Please reflect on that. Mass shootings occur in gun free zones. Additionally the data is clear that crime goes up when law abiding citizens are disarmed.
Law abiding citizens, especially concealed permit holders are not the problem, but in fact stop crime and come to the aid of victims hundreds of thousands of times per year. Criminals and those with bad intent do not obey laws and are emboldened by the idea that they can commit crime without fear of resistance.
An ordinance creating gun free zones may feel good but it creates a false sense of security. If your goal is to make people safer then vote NO to banning firearms.
as a long time resident of Albemarle County I strongly encourage you to vote no to this ordinance. My first objection is that as a law abiding citizen I have second amendment rights. My second objection has to do with the fact that there are countless ordinances in this county about behavior in county parks, such as cleaning up the horse manure off the trails when you ride. But nobody does that. Do you know how many dog owners walk their dogs off leash in the parks where we have an ordinance requiring them to be on leash? Who is out there enforcing manure pickup? Who is enforcing the leash law? You are adding another ordinance that you have no intention nor means nor resources to enforce. There is absolutely no reason to have this ordinance other than to jump on the fear bandwagon. please do not pass this ordinance. Thank you
Please vote YES on this ordinance. As a ninth generation Albemarle County resident, I urge you to help make our parks and our county building safer by passing this ordinance. I have personally been intimidated by those bearing arms in government-owned areas of Virginia and I look forward to the day when such actions are no longer permitted anywhere in our commonwealth. This ordinance is especially important as it will protect against such intimidation during voting. My brother was murdered with a gun in Albemarle County on August 12th, 2017, the day of the deadly Unite the Right rally. If you need any evidence as to why the prevalence and acceptance of guns in our area causes excessive harm, look no further than that day. Guns make the opportunity for deadly violence too easy. Please vote to make our community more safe.
The 44, unarmed, gunshot victims at Virginia Tech and the 14, unarmed, gunshot victims at Virginia Beach who lost their lives in designated “no-gun-zones” have their mortal lives stacked against your passage of Revised Ordinance No. 21-10! Would they have been allowed to conceal carry weapons (CCW) they might all be alive to protest your action(s)! Please do not ADD to the number of their fruitless genocide and LEARN FROM THEIR HISTORY! There is no need for your passage of any moderation of existing CCW laws in Albemarle County. Only persons devoid of common sense operating upon ‘fairy-tale-mindsets’ believe that Revised Ordinance No. 21-10 will protect them or any persons in Albemarle County--excepting the NAMED, PRIVILEGED-EXCEPTED-INDIVIDUALS cited within said Proposal! ‘We-the-people’ have just as much right to the natural law, self-protections afforded by the Second Amendment as do those individuals singled-out in your prejudicial Proposal.
As a County resident for more than 3 decades, an employee of the County, and former employee of the ECC, I strongly OPPOSE this firearms ordinance, and strongly urge you to vote NO. It serves only to disarm law abiding citizens, while making zones where criminals would have unrestrained access to performing acts of violence on the unarmed. While this proposal allows individuals to keep firearms properly locked in a private vehicle, it discriminates against those whose means of transport to facilities is by motorcycle or bicycle. Having been an ECC employee for the county, I know how long response times to rural areas of the county can be, and prohibiting citizens from lawfully carrying firearms to rural county buildings, parks and community centers would just add risk to the entire community. In the very least, an exception for those individuals with a Concealed Carry Permit (CHP exemption) should be added to this proposed legislation before it is voted upon.
I write to strongly support passage of the Firearms Ordinance. (21-416).
As a Jew who had to be in downtown Charlottesville for an appointment during the Unite the Right rally, I am acutely aware of the fact that the open carry of loaded firearms during any demonstration increases the likelihood that such an event will escalate into a dangerous or deadly situation. The General Assembly passed the local ordinance law in 2020 in response to the deadly Unite the Right attack on Charlottesville, when the city was powerless to disarm violent white supremacists. The organizers wanted to come back the next year to recreate the event, but their permits were denied for the city parks. I don't want our county parks to be used as staging grounds for the next white-supremacist/antisemitic rally.
I encourage our Board of Supervisors to join the other 12 Virginia localities, including Charlottesville, that have passed similar ordinances, protecting over 2.5 million Virginians so far.
I urge you to vote no to this proposed firearms ordinance. This is really a solution is search of a problem. What studies have shown a continual problem of gun violence in county owned areas? I frequently enjoy many of the parks and this limits my 2nd amendment rights when doing so. So I would expect great amounts of empirical evidence to show how this ordinance would save lives. Also How does this ordinance actually stop criminals from bringing firearms onto the banned places? It seems that this will only stop good citizens from protecting themselves against those that do not follow the law. Finally during the last meeting it was decided to draft an exception for CHP holders, where is that now? That makes it seem like it was all for show and the board will do whatever they please over the will of the citizens.
Dear Board Members,
I urge you to realize that the only way to prevent firearms from entering government buildings is to secure every entry with metal detectors. Signs and laws will only stop law abiding citizens. If you take these necessary measures to absolutely guarantee that ONLY law enforcement officials are armed, then I would not oppose firearm prohibition in government BUILDINGS.
However, it is clearly unconstitutional and quite illiberal to propose a prohibition of otherwise legal firearm possession outdoors on county property. There is absolutely no way for such an ordnance to be consistently enforced without instituting a similarly unconstitutional ordinance akin to the infamous NYPD "stop and frisk" policy. Firearm prohibition in county parks will not make anyone safer. Criminals are not stupid and will recognize the reduced probability of facing armed resistance from would-be victims as a boon to their risk/reward calculation.
Best regards.
Let's start with the bottom line up front. Here is how you get fired from your position on the board: pass this ordinance. Here is how to keep your job: do not pass this ordinance. Simple enough?
Now let's dissemble and argue for and against this ordinance.
Pros: It makes you feel like you're "doing something" to protect yourselves and others.
Con: While it feels good, it does not protect you in the least
Con: It is against the spirit of the law of the land, which states that the right to bear arms is your right, given to you by your Creator.
Con: It likely increases crime. Many studies show, over and over, and quite annoyingly to those who would like to restrict our natural rights, that with the increased prevalence of legally owned firearms comes a decrease in crimes overall, especially violent crimes like... uh... homicide to name one.
Con: increased crime rates disproportionately affect minorities. Hence, gun laws increase crime and are racist.
So in conclusion, don't pass this.
If you truly want "to enhance the well-being and quality of life for all community members" then you should vote against this. Criminals don't follow laws, hence the reason why they are criminals. Chicago is a prime example of having the strictest gun laws in the country, yet they have the highest rate of shootings. If gun control laws worked to prevent violent crime, I would give up my gun today because I believe human life is precious and that we should do all that we can to protect it. Ironically, It's for this same reason that I carry my gun because in reality these laws have the opposite effect. These laws only disarm responsible citizens who seek to protect themselves, their families, and bystanders if a violent crime erupts. If your family was at a park and someone began shooting, would you rather have a good guy with a gun also in the park, or would you rather pass this law and strip the good guy of his right to have his gun, leaving both your family and his family defenseless?
Vote no on this matter. This is a solution looking for a problem, that does not serve the public interest. Rather than restrict the civil rights of your constituents, why not focus on real challenges the county faces? Clearly, there are many that deserve the energy of the board, this is not one of them.
I strongly oppose this ordinance. What happened to exempting concealed handgun permit holders? There is no evidence to support the idea that banning carry by those with concealed handgun permits will decrease violence. I urge the board to revise the ordinance.
Please do not pass any restrictive firearms ordinances. Criminals and mass shooters will not follow your ordinances. We will not be any safer at all. If anything, just the opposite.
Vote no on this ordinance. It is overly broad and punitive, especially when considering it aims to infringe on a constitutionally protected right. Constitutional rights should only be regulated with the lightest of touch. Making people feel more comfortable on County property or preventing possible future shootings that have no precedent in the County are insufficient reasons to curtail the right to bear arms in such varied places and circumstances as this ordinance does. It should be obvious to people who respect science that the data shows that municipalities with strict carry restrictions are not safer places. Finally, it's baffling that the US government trusts me as a CHP holder to carry in national parks (signed into law by notorious 2nd Amendment absolutist Barack Obama), but the County that issued my CHP doesn't seem to trust me to carry in its parks.
I urge the Board of Supervisors to oppose this unneeded and overreaching ordinance. Only 6% of the state and NONE of the counties that surround Albemarle have passed any local gun-control. While criminals will be grateful to you for doing so, the good people of Albemarle and the rest of the state will not benefit from being disarmed. Also, the County Attorney was directed by the Board to draft an ordinance with exemptions for Concealed Handgun Permit holders. That didn't happen. Was that a real order to the County Attorney or just given with a wink and nod?