On Wednesday morning North Carolina State Rep. Jacqueline Schafer, R. Mecklenburg, pulled house bill 562 from a scheduled committee hearing.  HB 562 would have repealed the requirement for a state criminal background check for private handgun sales in North Carolina.  Mounting opposition to this bill has certainly helped to postpone any action on it.  Over 80% of residence in North Carolina do not want to see the repeal of the current laws on background checks according to one survey.  It does make a difference.  Many thanks to the efforts of the Moms Demand Action group and the Brady Campaign for their efforts to oppose this bill.   Yesterday we sent a donation to Moms Demand Action to help them in their fight for gun safety. Please support these groups as much as you can.  They are having a positive impact on gun violence prevention.

And most importantly – Let your voice be heard!!  It is making a difference.

North Carolina has had a fairly good set of laws for background checks for handgun purchases.  The North Carolina legislators are currently discussing HB 562 which is a bill to eliminate the Brady background checks for handgun purchases at gun shows and online.  Having been informed of this potential action by the Brady Campaign, I placed a call to Rick Caitlin’s office and requested that he oppose this legislation.  I urge all residents of North Carolina to do the same to prevent this type of dangerous legislation from moving forward and becoming law.  Call 18557821436 and ask for your representative and state your name, that you are a North Carolina resident and ask them to oppose bill 562. Background checks are a proven way to prevent those who should not possess guns from obtaining them.  States that have these background checks have a significantly lower level of gun violence.

Thanks to Po Murray from the Newtown Action Alliance group, I was made aware of the National Shooting Sports Foundation’s meeting in Washington, D.C..  Executives from the firearms and ammunition manufacturers, distributors and leading retailers are convening in Washington, D.C. to meet with members of both houses of Congress to promote their agenda.  I called Senator Lindsay Graham, Senator Kelly Ayotte and Representative Paul Ryan and asked them to support background checks not the corporate gun lobby which NSSF represents.  Please call 202 2243121 and ask them to support background checks.  Let your voice be heard.  We can not let organizations such as NSSF out shout us with Congress to get their way.  Gun violence prevention is too important to our country.

With a final push last Friday when another 7 stickers were posted in restaurants and bars serving alcohol in the downtown area, the canvassing of Wilmington, NC, has been completed.  We were successful in placing 28 postings and found even more establishments than that who already had a notice posted requesting no firearms be brought into the establishment.

Many thanks to Barbara Brooks for her assistance in contacting the owners and managers of all of the establishments and for providing administrative and motivational support for this initiative.

The thought process for the next initiative is well under way.  Stay tuned!

Of course, we are still not shopping at Harris Teeter until Kroger, who owns them, establishes a reasonable gun violence prevention policy for its customers.  The current open carry policy is not acceptable and only serves to intimidate customers who are only trying to purchase food products for their families.

Be well, be safe and let your voice be heard.

Senator Kay Hagan stopped in Wilmington to urge on supporters and to encourage early voting.  She gave a very good  speech that helped motivate those of us who have been campaigning for her.  I have spent the last three days going door to door trying to gain more votes for Kay.  She indicated that we have 5 days left to rally all of the registered voters to get out and vote for her.  I already have done early voting and I hope all of you who follow this blog will too.  We need good common sense senators in DC representing the best interests of the people.  Go Kay Hagan!!

We briefly discussed actions she has taken to help veterans and the importance of gun control legislation.

It was my pleasure today to meet Senator Kay Hagan at a campaign rally in Wilmington, NC. It provided an opportunity to thank her for voting for broader background checks and to ask her to continue to pursue gun violence prevention legislation. She indicated that she was a strong supporter of gun violence prevention laws even at the state level before she became a U.S. Senator. She said she would continue her efforts and try to help build a safer America.  Please help keep Senator Kay Hagan in office and vote for her.  I know I will.

Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America has requested Kroger to establish a no open carry policy in all of its stores. I have signed the petition, called the headquarters and sent an e-mail to support this effort. I recommend that you do the same to stop the dangers of open carrying guns in stores where everyone shops, particularly women and children. My statement to Kroger was that I would walk out of any store if I saw an open carried weapon. Who knows the intent of such a person and the fact that a gun of any kind is available leads me to the conclusion it could be used. I do not want to be any where near a Kroger store that allows this type of activity. We have switched our buying patterns from the local Harris Teeter ( owned by Kroger ) to Trader Joe’s and Food Lion until Kroger gets some gun sense. Please support this effort to help prevent gun violence in our country.

The Kelly Report 2014 is a comprehensive review of the status of gun violence prevention in the United States.  It offers status as well as common sense recommendations to the epidemic we face in our country of gun violence.  Please read and forward to all persons you think would benefit from its contents.  If you want to be informed on this issue, this is it.  Let your voice be heard!

newtownaction.org/kellyreport2014

Recently I received a response from Senator Burr to my request that he support broader background checks.  I would like to thank him for his personal letter and for supporting Senator Grassley’s amendment SA 275 to improve and reauthorize the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), to criminalize the straw purchasing of firearms and gun trafficking and addressing mental illness in the criminal justice system.  Even though this amendment did not pass, I appreciate Senator Burr voting for it.

It was a disappointment that Senator Burr did not support increased requirements for background checks on private transactions of firearms or the Manchin/Toomey amendment expanding background checks due to serious concerns about how this proposal would affect both privacy of mental health records and due process for our nations veterans.  The exemption of mental health records submitted to NICS from current Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) requirements is a concern to Senator Burr that this could jeopardize the privacy of certain individuals medical records and may deter patients from seeking the mental health care that they may need.  To me this is saying the privacy of mental health patients is more important than the safety of our nations children and citizens.  Furthermore, he believes these individuals with mental health issues should be allowed to buy firearms up to and including assault weapons.  I will never agree with this argument and urge Senator Burr to reconsider his approach to preventing violence with guns.

Regarding the due process for our veterans, I think getting veterans the medical help they need and deserve on a timely basis is a much more important issue he should address than who refers veterans that should be placed in the NICS system.

Our country desperately needs to close the loop hole and provide background checks for all firearm sales whether at a certified gun dealer, a gun fair or on the internet.  Congress can not continue killing our children for such weak arguments as put forth by Senator Burr.  The rights of the victims of gun violence whose numbers are continuing to grow every year in this country must be given a much higher consideration and weight than is currently being done by Congress and Senator Burr in particular.

Yesterday I ordered some additional stickers to continue the campaign in Wilmington to place them in the front window of restaurants and bars serving liquor.  It will continue until we have contacted as many establishments in Wilmington as possible.  Our success rate has been surprisingly good and the reception from owners and managers has been very positive.  It has been encouraging to find all of the places that already have their own signs placed in the front entrance.

The total stock index fund which I have owned for decades included two large gun manufacturers.  Today I divested all of the money I had in this account and reinvested it in a mutual fund that does not include any gun manufacturers.  The performance over the last 5 years has been very similar for both of these funds.  So you do not need the money from gun manufacturers to maintain a good, balanced, profitable portfolio.  I urge everyone to research your investments and eliminate the gun manufacturers from your own, personal portfolio.

There has been a reasonably good response to our “Firearms Not Permitted” sticker campaign in Wilmington, NC.  We have now posted over a dozen stickers and have yet to move into downtown.  It is also very encouraging to see the establishments that already have stickers of their own posted.  We will continue our efforts until we have covered downtown and all of the major commercial streets.  Even some of the locations that have not placed a sticker have agreed to have discussions with their corporate management on the issue.  In addition to  keeping guns and alcohol form mixing we want to keep this subject under discussion and in the public eye until Congress passes a sensible gun violence prevention law with a minimum of broader background checks to include gun fairs and internet purchases. 

Guns and alcohol are a bad mix and on Jan 24, 2013, we began a campaign to ask restaurants that serve alcohol and bars to post a sign indicating ” Firearms Not Permitted”  Many establishments have posted such signs for which we are very grateful.  We have had some success and have learned much regarding the type of sign that may be acceptable.  We are currently modifying our sign to make it smaller and very easy to interpret by using a a circle with a line through it over a gun and the words ” Guns Not Allowed”.  Interestingly, almost all of the managers want to have the signs posted but some owners won’t allow it.  To our delight there is another individual whom we do not know representing North Carolinians Against Gun Violence that has also approached many of the locations to post such a sign.  We will continue our campaign to try and address all alcohol serving locations in Wilmington.  We have had some limited success to-date and look forward to more in the future.  
 

In memory of the the anniversary of the Sandy Hook tragedy, Moms Demand Action has sponsored a week of “No More Silence” activities.  I have sent e-mails to Representative McIntyre, Senator Hagan and Senator Burr. Today I called Representative McIntyre and Senator Burr ( at both Raleigh and DC offices ) to encourage them to sponsor and/or support common sense gun violence prevention legislation, specifically broader background checks.  Go to momsdemandaction.org and you can get all of the information for participating in the activities they are sponsoring.  

Let your voice be heard!!

Barbara and Charlie Brooks and I had a positive discussion with Michael Jones, Regional Liaison, at Senator Hagan’s Raleigh office.  We again thanked Senator Hagan for supporting broader background checks and asked her to support and sponsor legislation that she would favor with appropriate definitions of assault weapons and magazine limits.  Michael indicated he would pass this on and let her know we paid the visit.  He also stated that community involvement is one of the strongest methods to influence gun violence prevention.  We discussed the gang situation in Wilmington and asked Senator Hagan to help change the North Carolina laws regarding concealed weapons on campuses and in bars.  Michael said her influence with the Republican North Carolina legislature is limited but understood our request to do what she could.  My feeling is this type of visit helps keep the gun violence prevention topic in front of legislators.  We told Michael our goal is a meeting with Senator Hagan in person and that we would keep pressing until some common sense legislation is passed in Congress.

The Moms Demand Action organization has sponsored a ” No More Silence” campaign to represent the 90% of Americans who support broader background checks at a bare minimum and stronger gun violence prevention legislation in general.   Please support their efforts where you can.

After my meeting at Representative Mike McIntyre’s office in Leland, NC he called me on the phone but unfortunately I was not able to receive the call at that time.  Bad luck.  I will try again.  He and his staff get credit from me for following up and making the effort.  If we can only convince him to support gun violence prevention legislation, he can help sponsor legislation to help keep our kids and everyone safer.  Please send him letters so he knows how strongly his constituents feel regarding this topic.

Today I made a trip to Leland to find the local office of Representative Mike McIntyre.  After it was found, I went in and met one of his staff, Roselie.  She was very welcoming and talked to me at length regarding the pros and cons of gun violence prevention legislation.  I was able to encourage her to ask Representative McIntyre to support the following legislation:

H.R. 1565 the King/Thompson bill

S 1290 – Protecting Domestic Violence and Stalking Victims Act of 2013

H. R. 2648 – Keeping Guns from High Risk Individuals Act

H. R. 1914 – Preventing Victims of Stalking Act of 2013

H. R. 1117 – Domestic Violence Survivors Protection Act 

She agreed to help me at least have a phone conversation directly with Representative McIntyre.  She indicated he is very willing to visit with constituents but it is difficult to set it up with his schedule.  

Today is the day to call your representatives and make them aware of the 9 women killed each week by gun violence from an intimate partner.  Request their support in passing common sense legislation to braoden background checks that will help this situation.  I have attempted today to make the calls and , due to the government shutdown, only was able to leave a message for both Senators Hagan and Burr.  Representative McIntyre had a full mailbox and I could not even leave a message at his Washington, DC office.  I was able to get through to a voicemail at his Leland office (9103991134) and did leave a message there.

Let’s do what we can to support this effort from Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America and try to get legislation passed that will make women safer.

Jenn Hoppe also sent out an e-mail with a request to e-mail your Congressmen.  Use their simple format to easily send a very well written letter to each Congressman with just one click.  Go to momsdemandaction.org.  

Newtown Action Alliance is planning some activities for the anniversary of the Sandy Hook tragedy.  Please support their efforts.  Click on attachement to see their announcement.

Newtown Action Alliance One Year Anniversary Strategy

Jenn Hoppe, the Program Director for Moms Demand Action, sent out a request today for everyone to take action next week to make our representatives aware of the 9 women shot dead every week on average by their husband or intimate partner.  She requests the following –

Monday, Oct 14, 2013 Call your Members of Congress and tell them to support expanded background checks and other common sense legislation.  You can call the US Capitol switchboard at 2022243121 to reach Senators and Representatives.  In North Carolina you can call directly to Senator Kay Hagan at 2022246342, Senator Richard Burr at 2022243154 and for me in my district Representative Mike McIntyre at 2022252731

Tuesday, Oct 15 Join the Thunderclap they plan.  I have signed up GunControlToday to be part of this on Facebook.  If you wish to do so independently you can go to momsdemandaction.org 

Wednesday, Oct 16 Tweet from 1-3 pm facts about domestic gun violence.  I do not have a Tweet account so I encourage those that do to participate.

Thursday, Oct 17 E-mail Congress and tell legislators to enact common sense reforms to prevent gun violence.  Moms Demand Action has an e-mail tool to reach all of your members of Congress.  Use it!  Go to their website.

Friday, Oct 18 Post photos of a number 9 you have designed to Facebook – on your own page and your Congress members’ pages and send your photos to photos@momsdemandaction.org.  This is to remind the members of Congress of the 9 women who are killed each week by gun violence.

Jenn and her daughter met us at the steps of the Capitol building at the end of our March from Newtown, CT to Washington, DC.  Her support of GunControlToday should be returned with our help during this week long event to maintain the pressure on Congress and keep this topic in everyones mind until common sense legislation to prevent gun violence is passed.