Because Of New State Law, Cities And Counties Are Scrambling To Get Their Gun Laws Off The Books

The state of Florida is going after a gang of gun outlaws by threatening them with $5,000 fines, firings and lawsuits.

St. Petersburg, Brooksville, Tampa, Hillsborough County —and other scattered scofflaws.

As a result, city councils and county commissions are now scrambling to rewrite local laws, because they're staring down the barrel at those fines, firings and lawsuits.

St. Petersburg is getting ready to repeal its ordinance against discharging firearms in the city limits. Tarpon Springs made a similar decision in August. Brooksville killed a ban on guns in parks and also deleted a law that could have suspended the sale of ammunition and firearms during emergencies. There are many more.

All those ordinances have been illegal for years because state law prevents cities and counties from regulating guns. But a new law, set to take effect Oct. 1, takes it a step further. It allows judgments of up to $100,000 against local governments that enforce such laws. And, in an unusual move, the law also says local officials could be fired and fined $5,000, with no representation from the city or county attorney.

"It is from Pensacola to Key West and all points in between," said Kraig Conn, legislative counsel for the Florida League of Cities.

Conn said city officials at first reacted with "a level of disbelief" as they realized their governments could be penalized and "you're going to be held personally liable as well."

St. Petersburg police Chief Chuck Harmon said, "I think they went overboard. I understand if they want to regulate state gun laws as the Legislature has the authority to do. But what happens to an officer who may misapply an ordinance? That seems like an awful lot of penalties for something that may be unintentional."

State Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fort Walton Beach, who sponsored the law, said "There's been plenty of hand-wringing and bed-wetting from local government."

But he said something needed to be done to prevent them from "willfully" violating state law. He pointed to the city of South Miami, which passed an ordinance requiring trigger locks.

The National Rifle Association fought the law, which was overturned because of the state law preventing it. Even so, Gaetz said, "There was no way for the NRA to ever be made whole through the recovery of attorneys fees and everything else."

The story begins in 1987, when the Florida Legislature passed a law saying it controls "the whole field of regulation of firearms and ammunition."

Just in case that wasn't clear, the law spelled out that this power was "to the exclusion of all existing and future county, city, town, or municipal ordinances." It made exceptions for the Florida Constitution and "general law."

But apparently, it wasn't clear. Cities and counties continued regulating some aspects of guns and ammo, at the very least by keeping gun laws on the books.

Such as St. Petersburg, which has an ordinance preventing people from firing guns in the city limits. Or Brooksville, which banned guns in parks.

Occasionally, a city or county would bring some of its laws into line, as Pasco County did in 2003, by repealing most firearms regulations. The matter came to the county's attention because a local resident with a concealed gun permit liked riding his bike several times a week at the Jay B. Starkey Wilderness Park and thought he should bring his gun with him for his own protection.

"In wooded areas like that, you're all by yourself," the man said at the time. "You're three, four miles out on the bike path, and anything could happen."

Pasco, for example, still has an ordinance that allows the county administrator to suspend the sale of alcohol, explosives or guns during a state of emergency. County Attorney Jeff Steinsnyder said the county would no longer enforce that ordinance, or any other gun control ordinances, once the state law takes effect. He said the ordinance likely would be stricken during a cleanup of the county's land development code.

The law does not mean that it's suddenly acceptable to fire guns at will. There is a state law against discharging a firearm in public.

Asked if it wouldn't be helpful to let officials keep guns out of city parks, Gaetz, the legislator, said it's never the law-abiding people with proper concealed weapons permits who cause trouble. It's always the people who are holding guns illegally.

Even with the new law, he doesn't expect a lot of fines and firings. He expects that cities and counties will continue taking their old gun laws off the books.

Conn said city officials at first reacted with "a level of disbelief" as they realized their governments could be penalized and "you're going to be held personally liable as well."

That should apply to all areas. I can imagine the panic once these bozos realized that THEY might actually be held responsible for their deeds. The Horror!

“St. Petersburg police Chief Chuck Harmon said, “I think they went overboard. I understand if they want to regulate state gun laws as the Legislature has the authority to do. But what happens to an officer who may misapply an ordinance? That seems like an awful lot of penalties for something that may be unintentional.””

Cry me a river. If law enforcement doesn’t know how to properly apply the laws on the books, they have no business being in law enforcement. We’re not talking about a small mistake here, we are talking about wanton and systematic deprivation of Constitutional rights. They’re lucky I wasn’t put in charge of drafting the law, or they would be spending a long time in prison instead of paying a fine.

I wonder if he applies the same legal philosophy when it's one of the more important people (private citizens) charged with violating a law.

Cry me a river, Chief. When this happens to a "civillian" your guys arest, you spout, "Ignorance of the law is no excuse." Same same here.

Well, MORESO for them than for the public, for two reasons. First, they're immersed of the legal system and have less excuse for not knowing plus other people's rights are contingent on their knowledge. Second, by being part of the system that has "Ignorance is no excuse" as a policy, they implicitly validate that policy for use against themselves. We, employed at real companies making real things, aren't in the same position logically.

Actually, I believe cities and counties SHOULD have the last word in firearms legislation. They should have the authority to prescribe where and when a weapon may be discharged in a non-emergency situation. And that should be ALL the weapons legislation permitted, ever.

Same with drug usage (recreational)... cities and counties should be able to prescribe penalties for ANY form of PUBLIC intoxication. That’s it and that’s all.

The law demands certain behavior with respect to guns from our cities and towns, but some of them simply ignore the law because there is no statutory penalty, only a civil cause of action on the part of the victim who has to pay their own way in order to enforce the law.

Adequate statutes exist; all that's necessary is for a state prosecutor's office to start enforcing them.

If state law says that certain municipal ordinances are void, then nobody who can't demonstrate why the state law isn't valid can have any valid reason for believing the municipal ordinances to be valid. Someone who detains another without reasonably believing he is authorized to do so is a robber or a kidnapper (depending upon the length and nature of the detention).

While I recognize that a prosecutor's office is subject to political pressures, is there any legal reason a state prosecutor couldn't invite persons who have been unlawfully detained by cops to file complaints with him. If Citizen Fred complains that Joe Cop detained him, and Joe Cop can't convince a jury that he had a legitimate reason for believing that Fred did something that was actually illegal, then Joe Cop is guilty of robbery or kidnapping (the particulars of the case would determine which).

What's important is to recognize that void statutes are illegitimate, and any attempted enforcement actions would be likewise illegitimate. Further, by definition, illegitimate actions form no part of any government agent's legitimate duties; while government agents carrying out their legitimate duties may legitimately have certain legal protections, such protections cannot be legitimately applied to government agents acting in ways they cannot reasonably believe to be legitimate.

The law says they must issue or deny within 14 days, for instance, but there’s no penalty if they don’t, only the ability for the applicant to sue them in district court.

Are you saying municipalities are responsible for issuing licenses? If state has exclusive legal authority over weapons matters, such a policy would seem odd. Nonetheless, if the issue is that municipalities have the manpower to do the background checks and the state doesn't, a remedy would be to provide that applications get sent to the state which logs them and forwards them to the municipalities, which are required to notify the state of the result. Someone who is neither accepted nor denied within 14 days could inquire with the state the status of their application. Someone whose license hasn't been denied within 14 days would be deemed to have been granted one, at least until such time as the person is served notice of denial.

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