2011 Legislative Session Ends with NO Gun-Related Legislation Passing

The 2011 regular session of the West Virginia Legislature ended at midnight with good news and bad news for West Virginia gun owners.

  

The good news: Once again, as we have done every year since 2007, WVCDL helped stop every anti-gun bill that surfaced.

  

The most serious threat we faced this year was HB 2346, which would have significantly expanded disqualifications from firearm possession for domestic violence protective orders issued in ex parte "emergency" hearings where the respondent does not have the right to be heard and vastly expand the categories of "protected persons" with regard to whom a protective order would bar firearm possession.

  

The bad news: This year, the Legislature did not pass a single bill that could be described has being even mildly "pro-gun."  We were not surprised that neither HB 3125 nor SB 543 were acted upon given their length and the delays in the bill drafting office. However, there were many other smaller, "bite size" bills the Legislature could have taken up to give at least a token gesture to gun owners, but they did not do so.  Even the most innocuous bills, such as HB 3087 and SB 387 (relating to retired law-enforcement officers) each passed their respective houses of irigin but went nowhere in the other house.

  

One small consolation: given the political turmoil surrounding the state Senate's controversial rule changes to strip Senate President Earl Ray Tomblin of his senatorial powers and duties while he acts as Governor pursuant to Article VII, � 16 of the state constitution until a special election later this year and the potential litigation surrounding the constitutionality of this arrangement, at least we have nothing to lose if the state Supreme Court declares everything done by the Legislature over the last 60 days null and void.

  

Below, I offer more specific discussion of what we learned this year and how we will adapt going forward.

HB 2346 Helped Expose Anti-Gun Delegates

Message to All West Virginia Gun Owners from the 2011 Legislative Session:

Join, or Die.

It's that simple--and I don't mean necessarily join WVCDL (although that would help).  I mean that all gun owners in West Virginia are going to have to unite behind future legislative initiatives if we are going to break the growing legislative logjam that shows no signs of breaking on its own.

  

This year, WVCDL revamped its legislative strategy by condensing our entire legislative agenda into one bill.  For several years, we wrote and got many different bills introduced, mostly going nowhere.  We had been urged by various legislators and staffers to focus our efforts on one or two bills each year. So, we took that advice and placed our primary focus behind one bill this year.

  

Despite our new strategy, various legislators and individuals not affiliated with WVCDL chose to once again attempt to pursue separate legislation. none of them got anywhere--not even retired law enforcement officers who only wanted adequate legislation in place to ensure access to qualification programs for nationwide concealed carry for "qualified retired law enforcement officers' under federal law.

  

Between now and the 2012 legislative session, WVCDL is going to urge all pro-gun legislators to simply not introduce any gun-related legislation other than the West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act.

  

Why?

  

See the picture above.  For the last few years, gun owners pursuing various legislative initiatives have simply not hung together. However, we have done magnificent jobs of hanging separately.

  

Next year, we want the West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act to be the only game in town for the House & Senate Judiciary Committees to consider if they feel enough heat to get serious about addressing gun rights issues.

  

Lest there be any misunderstandings, the West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act is not being offered on a "take it or leave it," "all or nothing" basis"--far from it. However, at the rate our Legislature is acting, there is not a single person on this earth today who will live to see 1/4 of the issues we have identified as needing legislative attention debated--much less enacted into law.  There is a legislative logjam that we must clear--and it is not going away until we do the hard work of clearing it.

  

There's a lot we can debate, discuss, amend, etc. However, right now, the legislative process simply is not working at all.  Anyone who is serious about debating and attempting to influence public policy knows that a bill 1/10 the size of HB 3125 and SB 543 is not going to emerge from the legislative process and become law precisely in the same form as it was introduced.  However, with that said, we're simply not going to concede half our agenda before we've even introduced a bill.  The West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act is the product of a sophisticated, strategic legislative strategy through which we want to get the most we can possibly get at a particular point in time, even if we must temporarily set some issues aside for the future to get many other things that can be obtained now.

  

In short, in order for West Virginia gun owners to make any truly significant legislative progress in the future, we must make the West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act the basis of legislative negotiations, rather than present law. We must make those who are either oppose or indifferent to us propose modest changes to a bill we have written, rather than let them make us play small ball and make only modest changes to a body of law they have written over many decades.  Even if we have to accept several amendments that temporarily set us back, we need to at least pass a bill that will put in place the legal architecture for us to return in the future and seek what we had to temporarily set aside before with short, concise bills that I can assure you are simply not possible due to broader issues with the law that would be corrected if we can get just half of the West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act enacted into law.

  

This means that retired law enforcement officers are going to have to stop having bills like HB 3087 and SB 387 introduced separately (similar--in fact, better, provisions are already included in the West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act).

  

This means that the prosecuting attorneys are going to have to stop having bills like HB 3087 and SB 306 separately introduced.

  

In the interests of full disclosure, HB 3087 was a WVCDL bill from 2008, which we stopped advancing as a standalone measure and rewrote before incorporating it into the West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act, and SB 306 is part of that bill.

  

This means that our veterans and active servicemembers who are right to want to be able to use their honorable discharge or proof of current military service in lieu of a (largely redundant) separate concealed handgun training class have to stop having bills like HB 3237 separately introduced. The West Virginia Gun Owner Protection Act already includes this language.

  

This means that my good friends, Senator Dave Sypolt and Delegate Gary Howell--despite how adversely they are affected by the current law--must drop their standalone legislation to repeal or relax the State Capitol Carry ban: SB 340 (full capitol carry ban repeal), HB 2457 (parking lot storage for CHL holders only), and HB 3093 (Capitol carry ban repeal, but only for constitutional officers and state employees who have a CHL).

  

Finally, this means that anyone else who thinks they can have a standalone bill dealing with a comparatively tiny and simple gun-related issue should think long and hard about the effect a standalone bill will have on the broader gun rights agenda.

  

As I said above, we gun owners are doing a magnificent job of hanging separately.  Now, I suggest we try hanging together.

WVCDL to Form Local Chapters, Target Key Legislative Leaders

In the coming weeks and months, WVCDL is going to begin organizing into various local chapters throughout the state that will regularly meet and organize on the local level.

  

Initially, we will be focusing on the 4 counties from which the presiding officers and Judiciary Committee chairmen of each house of the Legislature reside: Wayne, Harrison, Marshall, and Kanawha counties.

  

While we will organize into local chapters in other counties, over the next year, it is going to be critical that we get as many residents of these 4 counties as possible involved in WVCDL as their local delegates or senators hold the fate of most gun-related bills in the Legislature.

  

In the Senate, Judiciary Committee Chairman Corey Palumbo is a committed anti who simply will not advance serious pro-gun legislation without pressure from leadership. However, Kanawha County residents must still let him know you're watching him very carefully. Most importantly, those of you in Kanawha County are closest to the capitol and can play a key role in hearings held with short notice.

  

Right now, we do not know who is going to be the presiding officer of the Senate next year. There is an open question as to whether Senator Tomblin will return to the Senate presidency full-time if he loses the special election for Governor this year. Depending on this outcome, Senator Kessler will likely either become the Senate President or would be returned to his former position as Judiciary Committee Chairman if Senator Tomblin returns to the Senate.  Therefore, those of you in Marshall County have an important tole to play.

  

In the House of Delegates, Speaker Rick Thompson claimed to be a CHL holder when he called me last year to try to avoid explaining why he ultimately did not take the WVCDL Legislative Candidate Survey. However, he made the call on putting HB 2346 on the inactive calendar after it got out of committee. In terms of his leadership style, Speaker Thompson claims to take a hands-off approach to managing his committee chairmen, except when he occasionally cracks the whip.  Those of you in Wayne County have an important role to play here.

  

Those of you in Marshall and Wayne counties should take note of the fact that, legally, West Virginia's concealed handgun license reciprocity agreement with Ohio is and has always been hanging by a thread doe to the very poor manner in which our licensing law is written and the requirements that Ohio law imposes for establishing reciprocity. I do not discuss this issue much publicly for obvious reasons. When Ohio first passed their concealed carry law in 2004, then-Attorney General Jim Petro (R) determined that West Virginia's licensing law did not meet Ohio's standards. three years later, when West Virginia revised its reciprocity law and jump-started its expansion of reciprocity with other states, then-Attorney General Marc Dann (D) took the most flexible interpretation he could of Ohio's law and sign the reciprocity agreement that remains in place.

  

Two elections--and two Attorneys General--later, the Ohio AG's office is now occupied by Mike DeWhine, er, DeWine, (R)--who has, at best, an extremely strained relationship with the Ohio pro-gun community. In 2006, when he was running for reelection to the U.S. Senate, DeWine was the only Republican running for the U.S. Senate in the entire country to get the endorsement of the Brady Bunch--and Sherrod Brown, who won, was certainly not a pro-gun guy, either. In his 2010 AG campaign, DeWine attempted to reinvent himself to try to appeal to gun owners. . Regardless, so far, we have been extremely fortunate that Ohio has not placed our reciprocity agreement under serious review.  Until Ohio adopts a more permissive reciprocity law, the reciprocity agreement that permits the 1/4 of West Virginia residents who live in counties bordering Ohio to cross the river with little legal difficulty, is skating on very thin ice.

  

Finally, we return to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Tim Miley. Those of you in Harrison County must let Delegate Miley know that his past conduct is unacceptable and that he has one more regular legislative session left to prove himself worthy of your support. It's shape up or ship out time for Delegate Miley--and YOU in Harrison County have to be the ones to deliver that message to him.

  

WVCDL is looking for members or volunteer to be county or regional (depending on the concentration of WVCDL members and other factors) local chapter leaders. Responsibilities of WVCDL local chapter leaders include organizing and holding local membership meetings on a regular basis, meeting with local legislators, and occasionally contacting your local media. If you are interested in being a WVCDL local chapter leader in your county or region, please click here and send us a short e-mail.