(MI) Weapons law draws women to get arms
(MI) Weapons law draws women to get arms
Weapons law draws women to get arms
Oakland County is top in state permits
February 21, 2002
BY KATHLEEN GRAY AND JOHN MASSON
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS
Bullet holes blossom in a square target hanging a few feet from the firing line. A featherweight black Smith & Wesson revolver jumps and pops. A 9mm semiautomatic spits shells.
It’s range night in Royal Oak for a group of shooting enthusiasts who’ve each taken advantage of Michigan’s recently revised concealed weapons law. Tuesday evening, the occupants of the first four lanes at Target Sports talk caliber, ammunition and concealability. The pros and cons of heft and grip, .40 versus .38 caliber and 9mm versus .32.
And they’re all women.
Oakland has led the 83 counties in Michigan in handing out 3,278 concealed pistols permits since the new law went into effect in July. Court rulings have hidden the identities of applicants, so it’s difficult to say how many permit-seekers are women. But Target Sports owner Ray J. estimates the number may be as high as 40 percent.
For Tuesday’s women shooters, three quarters of who are Oakland County residents, the reasons women are getting the permits are simple.
“When I found out how much safer women could be . . . what’s my choice there?” said Jessica Lutz of Huntington Woods, who applied soon after the law was enacted. “One of the things taught in my house was, you have to be self-sufficient.”
The mechanical engineer, co-chair of the local chapter of the Michigan Coalition for Responsible Gun Owners, remembers when authorities told women to feign sleep if a would-be attacker invaded their homes.
Firearms training, she said, allows her to be much more aware of what’s happening around her — and much more active in defending herself and others.
Others say firearms training is no panacea. Nancy Hwa, a spokeswoman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, said there’s more to the story than just training.
“Our position is not so much ‘Everyone who gets a concealed weapon permit is going to go out and commit a crime’ — what we are saying is, there are a lot of consequences when people carry concealed weapons,” Hwa said.
She cites instances of normal disagreements escalating to violence. And she mentioned hundreds of permits that have been revoked in other states with less stringent concealed weapons laws because their holders committed crimes, sometimes while armed, after receiving their licenses.
Lutz and her friends counter that the training they were required to take before applying for their permits emphasized the good judgment required by those who carry weapons.
Ideology aside, the permit process in Oakland County seems to be working smoothly. None of the women had complaints about waiting.
That’s because the county has expedited the CCW process by hiring four people to handle the flood of applications.
The Oakland County Sheriff’s Department, which completes background checks on applicants, raised fingerprinting fees from $5 to $15 in order to pay for two additional clerks.
And revenue in the County Clerk’s office increased enough as a result of the influx of applications that two additional people could be hired.
Each application is $60, $50 of which goes to the state and $10 to the county.
“We went from $20,000 a year in revenues to $90,000,” said Oakland County Clerk G. William Caddell. “And then when the renewals come in, they pay $35 and we get all of that.”
The pace is slowing somewhat since last summer when 40 to 50 people were coming in every day for applications.
“We’re still averaging 20 a day,” said Oakland County Sheriff’s Capt. Mike McCabe. “But we’re still backlogged. We’ve got 400 applications in milk crates that we haven’t even touched yet.”
So far, 4,883 people have applied for permits in Oakland County; 1,530 are pending. But the county has tried to ease the wait by doubling the number of gun board meetings each month — where people who might be denied a permit must appear before a three-member panel.
In Wayne County, 4,252 people have applied for permits but only 595 have been issued, said Sheriff Robert Ficano. More deputies are working part time on the backlog, he said, but the department hasn’t been able to dedicate workers to it full time.
“We had sudden pressures on our resources,” Ficano said. “The CCW law came in the teeth of 9-11, so we were dealing with broader issues, as well as taking over the Highland Park Police Department.”
The crunch has been less noticeable in Macomb County, which has long issued permits under guidelines similar to those in the new law.
Not everyone emerges from the process with a permit, however. Through the end of 2001, 75 Oakland residents had been denied for reasons including any misdemeanor convictions — for things ranging from drunken driving to not having the required number of personal flotation devices on a boat, McCabe said.
On Tuesday, one man was told to come back in three years because he was ticketed for forgetting to carry his boat registration with him last summer during a lake excursion.
Another had to appear before the board because he was arrested in 1950 in Tennessee for “failure to provide” for his children. The case was so old, however, that the gun board couldn’t determine if it was a misdemeanor or a felony and the man got his permit.
“I don’t know why so many people want these,” said Sgt. Moya Hughes, who represents the Michigan State Police at Oakland gun board meetings. “If I didn’t have to carry one for work, I wouldn’t.”
The female firearms afficionados from Target Sports respectfully disagreed.
“Life is a gift from God,” said Novi resident Kathleen Jakes. “It’s incumbent on me to protect mine and others.”
