Loudoun’s laws have been brought in line with the State’s:
Adjusting to meet state rules on firearms, Loudoun’s supervisors voted 7-2 to allow guns in county parks.
County regulations had limited the carrying of firearms in local parks, while state rules allow them. Firing a gun in local parks is still prohibited.
“We’re doing a technical change to two county ordinances to bring us in line with state code,” said John Sandy, a county administrator. The county began looking at changes to its gun laws this spring. At that time, state lawmakers approved new laws that make it easier to file a lawsuit against a locality for violating state firearm rules.
As I’ve mentioned here before, Virginia is what’s known as a “Dillon-rule state.” What that means is that localities only have the power to enact those laws they are explicitly permitted to by state law. If the state law does not specifically say they can create a regulation, then they cannot do so nor can they enforce such a law if it’s explicitly overruled by a state law. That’s the situation Loudoun was in, here. The state passed laws that went into effect July 1st permitting otherwise lawfully permitted gun owners to carry guns into state parks. With that law passed, Loudoun’s ordinance saying they couldn’t was in violation of the Dillon rule. Since one of the other laws passed places the onus for paying court costs onto the local government should they be sued for creating or enforcing a law in violation of state laws, making the proposed change to the ordinances is a defensive maneuver for Loudoun.
Chairman York and Supervisor Delgaudio were the 2 who voted against the changes. Both should be ashamed of themselves and this action calls into question – again – whether they’ve really got Loudoun’s interests in mind. The changes to the laws were to bring Loudoun into compliance with state law and avoid lawsuits that would be won easily by the first people to file. When those suits would be lost, Loudoun would pay for the case. Not smart. York should consider his own commentary on the matter and give it some deeper thought:
“I’d like to understand just what kind of protection we’re offering our citizens,” Chairman Scott York (I-at large) said during an April discussion. “I pick this up, and I think, ‘Well that’s great, fine and dandy, but what happens when somebody pulls out a gun at Franklin Park because we have just done this? What protection have we left residents?’”
The person who pulls a gun in Franklin Park or any other park in Loudoun, unless he’s doing so in self-defense, is by definition engaging in an illegal act. The kind of person who’s likely to do that didn’t care that Loudoun’s ordinance said he couldn’t carry the gun before, which causes me to ask York the question of what kind of protection he was offering our citizens before this change was enacted. Quick answer: none. The only thing being done by restricting law-abiding citizens from carrying their firearms for self-defense was assuring the crooks who were carrying theirs in violation of that restriction an unarmed target populace. Unless York was proposing placing armed police in every park in sufficient numbers as to blanket the area, he was providing no protection to the citizens at all before this. Making this change allows citizens to provide for their own defense.
One more quick item: Delgaudio offered an amendment that would offer an exception to the ordinance prohibiting firing a gun in a local park for shooting in self-defense. For some reason, the amendment was voted down. What message does that send to Loudoun’s citizens? That the Commonwealth’s Attorney in Loudoun might cite you for unlawful discharge of a firearm should you have to shoot in defense of yourself and your family? If the BoS meant to permit such defensive shots, why deny the amendment? Curious.
July 21st, 2009
Posted by
ricjames |
2nd Amendment, Law, Politics |
no comments
The Kincora development I wrote about yesterday came before the Loudoun Board of Supervisors at today’s meeting and the BoS voted to approve the zoning changes needed to allow the development to proceed.
Loudoun County supervisors on Tuesday approved zoning changes that would allow a 5,500-seat minor league baseball stadium and a mixed-use office and retail complex to be built at Routes 28 and 7.
The board’s endorsement of the project, part of the planned Kincora Village, came with at least 50 conditions of approval that addressed environmental impacts, open space requirements and road improvements.
The vote was 6-2 in favor of approval with Stevens Miller (D-Dulles) abstaining and Andrea McGimsey (D-Potomac) and Jim Burton (I-Blue Ridge) voting against. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, Supervisor McGimsey’s vote was hardly unexpected. With the decision made I would like to see all of the Supervisors taking whatever actions are necessary to ensure the development is done as it was specified by the builder and that all the promises made by the builder regarding building schedules be kept.
(More on this story at Loudoun Independent.)
July 21st, 2009
Posted by
ricjames |
Economy, Human Interest, Politics, Virginia Politics |
no comments
I got this in e-mail this afternoon and thought you might enjoy the chuckle:
For the Annual Company Picnic, management had decided that because of liability issues, we could have alcohol, but only one drink per person…
I was fired for ordering the cups.
July 21st, 2009
Posted by
ricjames |
Human Interest |
no comments
Too Conservative is back on the air, and with a new look besides! We’re damned glad to see them and looking forward to even better stuff over there.
July 21st, 2009
Posted by
ricjames |
Blogging, Politics, Virginia Politics |
no comments
The latest demonstration that Obamacare is a bad idea comes from Obama himself speaking to what should have been among his friendliest crowds. On a conference call the President hosted for leftist bloggers for the purpose of getting their support in pressuring Congress to pass Obamacare the President made a startling admission:
During the call, a blogger from Maine said he kept running into an Investors Business Daily article that claimed Section 102 of the House health legislation would outlaw private insurance. He asked: “Is this true? Will people be able to keep their insurance and will insurers be able to write new policies even though H.R. 3200 is passed?” President Obama replied: “You know, I have to say that I am not familiar with the provision you are talking about.” (quote begins at 17:10)
There is no question Section 102 exists. It’s been published on the Thomas Locator and it’s available to anyone who cares to look it up. For the President to be continuously saying – as he did yet again later on that very call – that people will be allowed to keep their current insurance and doctors if they like (“Period,” says the President) while not being familiar with the law he’s touting is worse than just politics as usual. It’s willful dereliction bordering on a fraudulent assertion.
The Heritage Foundation has looked at Section 102 and, like me, has found that it does not explicitly outlaw private insurance. However, its effects will have the same result:
We are familiar with the passage IBD sites, and as we wrote last week, the House bill does not outright outlaw private individual health insurance, but it does effectively regulate it out of existence. The House bill does allow private insurance to be sold, but only “Exchange-participating health benefits plans.” In order to qualify as an “Exchange-participating health benefits plan,” all health insurance plans must conform to a slew of new regulations, including community rating and guaranteed issue. These will all send the cost of private individual health insurance skyrocketing. Furthermore, all these new regulations would not apply just to individual insurance plans, but to all insurance plans. So the House bill will also drive up the cost of your existing employer coverage as well. Until, of course, it becomes so expensive that your company makes the perfectly economical decision to dump you into the government plan.
As they say in my industry, that’s not a bug, it’s a feature. The intent of the legislation is to kill off private insurance and have everyone on the government plan. (Everyone but Congress, of course.) The issue here, however, is the fact that the President is demanding Congress pass this bill and is trying to marshal his activist forces to pressure Congress to get that task done while making assertions about the law that he then admits he doesn’t know enough to be making.
Which begs the question of what else he’s telling us about the bill that he’s “not familiar with.” Let alone what he’s not telling us because he knows we’d never agree.
This law stinks badly and the fact that the President and the Dem leadership of Congress are trying to give it the bum’s rush past us stinks worse. We should listen to the instinct that tells us when someone wants us to jump before we look over the side that it’s a bad idea to take the leap.
July 21st, 2009
Posted by
ricjames |
Medicine, Politics |
no comments
An expected budget update issued by every modern administration is now, officially, late. The midsummer update was to have been released at mid-July (that was just shy of a week ago, now) but it’s being “delayed” until mid-August by the White House. Coincidentally, it will be released after Congress recesses for August. Anyone who wonders why isn’t paying attention. From theblogprof:
There was supposed to be a midsummer budget report released a few days ago, the middle of July. But Obama has conveniently hidden it away for an extra month. Why? Health care legislation. Global warming cap-and-trade legislation. He is hiding the fact that these initiatives, futile as they are anyway, simply cannot be paid for under any scenario whatsoever. Not the best-case rosy scenario that Obama and his minions painted back in February, and certainly not under the worst-case, which is far closer to where we are. The White House has been forced to paint an economic picture that is at best smoke and mirrors, and at worst an outright fraud. Recall just the other day I wrote a post regarding Larry Summers gauging economic improvement by pointing out that fewer people are Googling “economic depression.” (Moving the goal posts: Obama measure of stimulus success: fewer people Googling “economic depression” ) Summers is supposed to be a smart guy, but the claim is beyond absurd. But with the economy as it now stands, he simply has no good news to bring forth, and thus has to make stupid claims like that one to try and paint a better picture.
Obama knows that the report will show his administration’s assertions about the budget, about unemployment, about the economy in general have been wildly off-base, as predicted by… well, anyone who’s not on-board with Obama’s agenda in the first place. He knows that if the public gets a look at that report his chances of ramming a socialized health care system down our throats will be just about nil. Ditto his cap-and-trade fiasco. He’s also looking to protect his fellow Dems in Congress to whatever extent possible or, at least, keep them from getting pressured while they’re still in session and votes are still being taken.
Which is also why he’s so adamant that a vote must come before Congress recesses for August. See how that hiding the report thing is working?
July 21st, 2009
Posted by
ricjames |
Economy, Human Interest, Medicine, Politics |
no comments
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