The Akron Legal News

Ohio gun bill opposed by California group

TIFFANY L. PARKS
Special to the Legal News
Published: July 30, 2014

A California-based agency has taken issue with an Ohio bill that originally sought to decriminalize the knowing violation of a posted firearms prohibition by a landowner in a parking area on his or her own private property.

As introduced, Senate Bill 338 would have repealed a current law provision that allows a lessor of government land or premises to ban firearms or concealed firearms from the land or premises. That provision has been reinserted but is still under review.

The Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence voiced its opposition to SB 338, sponsored by Sen. Joe Uecker, R-Loveland, which has had four hearings in the Senate Civil Justice Committee.

“A landowner wishing to enforce a parking area firearms prohibition would be forced to pursue civil remedies at his or her own expense,” said Laura Cutilletta, a senior staff attorney with the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, adding that a private landowner enjoys several rights arising out of his or her ownership interest in the land or premises.

“One of the most important of these rights is the ability to establish rules governing what happens on the property, and to exclude individuals who fail to comply with these rules.”

Cutilletta said enacting SB 338 would “severely hamper” that fundamental property right by denying a landowner the use of the criminal justice system when a trespasser refuses to comply with a no firearms rule.

“This legislation unfairly singles out landowners who have decided to keep all areas of their land free of firearms due to public safety or other concerns,” she said. “While landowners who choose to establish nonfirearms rules could still avail themselves of criminal trespass laws, landowners who choose to prohibit firearms could not.”

Cutilletta described SB 338 as “dangerous and irresponsible” in that it does not require that firearms be kept in a locked vehicle. Although violation of a firearms prohibition in nonparking areas would remain criminal, she said the bill provides no parameters for where a parking area ends.

“The bill says only that criminal trespass does not apply in an area that is ‘primarily’ for parking. If an armed visitor were walking through a parking area to a building, it is not clear at one point a landowner could call law enforcement,” she said.

Uecker, the bill’s sponsor, has said the proposed legislation would modernized access to concealed carry licenses while adding “common sense safeguards that protect all Ohioans.” The bill would reduce the minimum hour requirements for a firearm competency certification course from 12 to eight, but maintain a minimum of two hours of range time and live fire training, while eliminating the requirement that an applicant for a concealed carry permit be a resident of Ohio for at least 45 days and a resident of the county in which the applicant seeks the concealed handgun license, or a county adjacent to that county, for at least 30 days.

Organizing for Action, a grassroots coalition based in Akron, has joined the Law Center in opposing SB 338.

“We understand that the citizens in this state want to exercise their right to bear arms,” said Isa Muhammad, a volunteer with the group. “We understand that the state of Ohio has adopted rules and regulations on concealed weapon permits. The issue we have on SB 338 is that the bill lessens the education standards for being a concealed weapons permit holder.”

Muhammad also criticized the bill’s provisions to lessen penalties for concealed carry holders in violation of state law.

“Citizens of this state have a right to post ‘no-carry’ zones at their business and private property. Nobody should have to be intimidated exercising their rights without police enforcement of this law,” he said.

Other provisions of SB 338 allow investigators of the Ohio Attorney General’s office to be armed in the same manner as sheriffs and police officers while they investigate civil or criminal offenses related to the Medicaid program, nursing homes, residential care facilities and instances of abuse or neglect in care facilities. It also to requires each county to set up a concealed carry license issuance expense fund.

John Gilchrist, legislative counsel of the Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police, previously stated the organization is in the process of reviewing the substitute bill but has concerns about SB 338.

“Proponents talk about their rights and freedoms — what about the rights and freedoms of community leaders and event patrons who do not want guns at their events,” he said. “It appears that the law accommodates a small group of individuals at the expense of the vast majority of individuals who do not want firearms at their events.”

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