Posted on 11/29/2012 9:29:50 PM PST by smokingfrog
WHIDBEY ISLAND, Wash. - For Michael McInerney, home is on the range, shooting a gun, a way of life.
“I've been a target shooter since I was able to pick up a rifle,” he says, squeezing off a few rounds at a fresh target.
Outside city limits in Island County you can shoot just about anywhere, anytime. The same goes for hunting. It’s a way of life not everyone in this increasingly populated county is comfortable with.
“You do think about once in a while,” said Ken Webb, a relative newcomer to Whidbey Island after five years.
Like many here, Webb prefers gardening to guns. The shots he hears all the time are a little unnerving for his family.
“They're out here playing frisbee on my lawn. A stray bullet, that definitely concerns me,” he said.
Sweeping changes to gun laws are now being considered by county commissioners. The issue started with a single gun owner who was shooting in his backyard. The property was deemed to be safe for shooting by sheriff’s deputies. Nevertheless, neighbors complained.
(Excerpt) Read more at king5.com ...
“You do think about once in a while,” said Ken Webb, a relative newcomer to Whidbey Island after five years.
I knew Ken when he left Seattle. All he talked about was having his own place out in the woods with some acreage and not so crowded. Where he could do what he wants and nobody would bother him.
(No - I don’t really know Ken. But I do know his type.)
Another case of newcomers moving into an area because they claim to love it, then wanting to immediately start changing it.
Yes, and the other first thing they want to do is put up a hundred or so STREET lights, there goes the beautiful night sky.
The first day of deer season sounds like a war zone if you are not used to it.
Move to some liberal haven then idiot! The idea of people living free obviously frightens you.........
If you are so stupidly ignorant of shooting ranges and where missed rounds may go, then go get educated. I forgot, the liberal mantra is: "ban that which we do not approve of or understand"
Definitively ban that which frightens us, which is most anything those horrid conservatives like........
libtard creep.
If they were really “clashing”, who would be stupid enough to side against the gun owners?
Yeah, I’ll stand with you guys who plan to rumble with fists and baseball bats against the guys with Mossbergs and Mini-14s, sure :P
I grew up there in the 70’s. Now it is almost San Fancisco/Seattle combined. Left wing lawyers & gays everywhere and a culture so far removed from our fishing and hunting life as young lads that it breaks my heart to even get on the ferry when I visit every 2 years.
Just in case Ken moves next door. Or if the county tries something stupid there a good chance they well grandfather and the ranges that have been there.
On the land where I grew up in rural Indiana and pretty much everywhere in the county around it, you could walk into your back yard, throw down a can and start blasting. You could even break out the HP rifles without worry for the most part.
Now, as the land has been sub-divided over the years and housing developments have cropped up everywhere and all around, it is simply no longer safe to go out back, tack up a target and go at it.
To date, there are no new laws that ban shooting since there is no city, but self-governing and common sense pretty much restrict what you can do. He has a 20 acre plot where we dozed up a huge backstop of fill dirt, and shooting is pretty much restricted to that one spot.
Now mind you, I've always been a staunch supporter of gun rights and it breaks my heart when I see what the area where I grew up in is turning into, but in some cases time really is the enemy for the sport shooter. Of course we can say "they knew the laws when they moved in here", but that doesn't change the fact that some kid could get killed by accident and no amount of self-justification would allow me to rid myself of the guilt if it happened. I hate them for populating the area and creating this issue, but that doesn't change the fact that they are there.
Another reason silencers should be unregulated.
The next door neighbor’s kids at my parent’s place were shooting a shotgun from the back porch the day after thanksgiving.
The multiple echos bouncing around the mountains across the valley was a pleasing sound.
You are correct. I used to sit in the back yard at the start of deer season and it sounded like a FB in Vietnam getting overrun. :~)
If the sound of gunshots is unpleasant to the noobies, then rather than ban shooting, they should require silencers.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.