April 1, 2002 -

This week the State Senate passed SB24, Sen. Ken Chlouber's concealed carry bill.

The bill itself passed out of the Senate with 23 votes, 5 more than the required 18 majority.

Since Republicans now control the Senate, and thus decide who is the chairman of the "committee of the whole" Senate for Second Reading, most of the amendments offered by Democrats were ruled as "not fitting under the title."

Understand what is happening here: the Democrats, mostly from Denver, used just this circumstance 2 years ago as a way to run a series of anti-gun amendments to a concealed carry bill. The Democrats then used these recorded votes to attack sitting Republican legislators - especially on the "guns in schools" issue - in the 2000 elections. 

Though RMGO had worked to add language to prohibit a statewide database of permit holders, which was successful in the Senate State Affairs Committee, Chlouber joined with hardcore anti-gun Denver Democrat Sen. Ken Gordon to strip that language from

SB24. That means that sheriffs can, and will, enter all permit holders into a statewide database, effectively creating a dangerous persons list, a perfect tool for tyranny.

Sen. Doug Lamborn fought hard to keep the database prohibition language in the bill.  Lamborn used a procedure called an "amendment to the committee of the whole" to force a recorded vote on this issue. 6 Senators voted to prohibit a statewide database of permit holders: Lamborn, Bruce Cairns, Mark Hillman, Andy McElhany, Dave Owen and Senate President John Andrews.  For those keeping score at home, this serves as a list of the stalwarts for gun rights in the State Senate.

We were able to slightly move the training requirement. Sen. Bruce Cairns offered an amendment on Second Reading to change the requirement to have training within the last 5 years: it has now changed to 10 years. Though this amendment passed, this hardly makes SB24 a good bill.

SB24 was assigned by the House Speaker into the Local Government, a committee with no conservatives, where it will be heard on Friday, Feb. 28th at 1:30 pm. This wasn't by accident.

What is wrong with SB24? Here is a short list:

• No database prohibition
• Training requirements - hunter safety not included, and there is a 10 year time limit on training.
• Fee -- $100 plus $30 fingerprint fee plus the required training makes this bill affordable to Ross Perot, but out of reach for many Colorado citizens.
• Safezones - K-12 public schools; any facility that has security personnel and weapons screening devices.
• Fingerprint logging - SB24 requires applicants to submit their fingerprints, which are then forwarded to the FBI and entered into their fingerprint database.
• Existing permits expire early
• Residency requirement - Rather than allow sheriffs to issue permits to non-county residents (which would provide a safety outlet when cities like Denver refuse to issue permits, as they are now threatening), SB24 requires you to apply in your county of residence. It also fails to allow visiting out of state citizens to apply.

What you can do: call your State Representative today at 1-800-811-7647 or 303-866-2904 and urge him/her to either fix SB24 or kill it.