LETTER Focus on gun safety
Focus on gun safety
I have three grandchildren who attend North Allegheny School District. This is about gun safety, not gun control. In 1972, I joined the NRA as a lifetime member. After Sandy Hook, I decided to cut ties with the organization. Every time I take my grandson to kindergarten, I think of Sandy Hook and how it should have never happened. We need help from our local and federal representatives to consider what I am suggesting.
Everyone is talking about gun control when what we really should be talking about is gun safety. I am humbly asking our politicians and lawmakers to help us protect our children. I believe we have four options:
Do what we are doing now. Introduce technical solutions such as lock-down doors, bulletproof glass, metal detectors, etc.
Arm our teachers, bus drivers and other school employees.
Install an eight-foot chain-link fence around the campus with razor wire, like a prison.
Introduce proper gun safety measures:
A. When a person wants to buy a firearm or ammunition, he or she must obtain a permit. This would involve taking a written and practical gun safety test. The test would consist of proper gun maintenance, storage, laws pertaining to owning a firearm and other issues related to gun safety. It would also include a practical test on firing the weapon being purchased.
B. Passing a complete background check, including mental health, similar to the clearance that one would be subject to in the military. An example of this background check would consist in notifying local, county and state police. It would also notify any relevant schools, past or present. When these conditions have been satisfied, a permit would be issued. This permit would be renewed on a regular basis.
I consider option four as a starting point to what this state needs. With this policy proposal, we would lead the state and federal government in gun safety.
The Second Amendment states, “A well regulated Militia … shall not be infringed.” The key words of that amendment, in my opinion, are “well regulated.” This proposal is not designed in any way to lessen the strength or power of our Second Amendment. It is designed to uphold and strengthen it. In regulating the purchase of firearms and ammunition we are doing exactly what the founders of this great nation had intended. I suggest a committee be composed of the necessary stakeholders with regard to gun safety.
George M. Lucchino
McDonald