Not to put too fine a point on it, gun buybacks have about as much to do with reducing crime as Jenna Dewan has to do with arc welding (that’s Jennifer Beal’s thing). At best, the practice Hoovers up a few big boxes of deeply unloved and unloveable broken-ass firearms. Gun buybacks do, however, afford politicians the opportunity to prove that they’re “doing something” about “gun violence.” As we’ve pointed out many times, gun buybacks are a lot more expensive (i.e. wasteful) than their sponsors let on. Even when the gift cards involved are donated by private business, running the programs costs a fortune. Specifically, taxpayer money pays for cops to take, collect and destroy guns. Thanks to azstarnet.com, we can put some numbers to that . . .
Tucson Police Department records show just under $10,000 was spent on 42 police officers who worked at Councilman Steve Kozachik’s gun buyback event last January.
A local gun-rights advocate said the numbers prove Kozachik was misleading the public when he claimed the buyback wouldn’t waste taxpayer’s money.
Ken Rineer, president of Gun Owners of Arizona, said with TPD resources already stretched thin, the department could ill-afford to take officers off the street just “to take in a bunch of .22 bolt-action rifles from people’s closets.”
But Kozachik said he’s not to blame for the number of officers present that day.
OK, I just have to interrupt here. Who the hell could Kozachik blame other than himself for $10k out of city coffers to collect 206 lame guns? Give up? Before I reveal the “real” culprit know this: taking 42 officers off the roster at one time impacts response times to 911 calls.
“If people like Ken Rineer hadn’t hyped this, it wouldn’t have been a volatile issue,” Kozachik said. “This was a benign event. If they had treated this like it was an ice cream social instead of Armageddon Day for the Second Amendment, there wouldn’t have been a need for so many officers.”
Records indicate TPD recognized in advance that protesters and a large number of people turning in guns would likely attend. The department wanted to ensure staffing levels could properly monitor and protect all those who showed up.
TPD spokesman Sgt. Chris Widmer said no serious issues occurred because officers were assigned to the buyback, although he conceded response times could have suffered slightly since some of the officers would have been on patrol at the time.
“We wouldn’t want to be in the habit of doing this all the time,” Widmer said. “Call response times may have been slower. … But there were no losses on the streets.”
Three more points. One, they weren’t protesters. They were gun collectors and gun rights advocates looking to save guns from the crusher. Two, can we stop this stupidity already? And three . . .
Rineer said the true cost remains unknown since the city won’t reveal how much it cost to destroy the guns.
TPD cites “security reasons” as to why it doesn’t give out information regarding the company it contracts with to dispose of the firearms.
I can understand that. Gun buybacks? Not at all.
Just try to keep it where you’re smarter than what you’re hunting or the ending has more ways of going badly.
I see some of the same, perfectly healthy people, out there begging year in and year out. laughing, smoking, and drinking beer. Sure seems like a carefree life style to me. No clock to punch. What’s not to like. Maybe if they put out a fraction of that energy towards trying to better there situation they would not be there year in and year out. Ow but wait maybe they like it there.
I Wish Sitting On Porches Was Illegal Lots Of Problems Start With This Practice
Just a side note. If you are carrying, you should be on yellow alert already.
Bad part of town?, red alert.
The last attempted robbery of me and two buddies was at a boat ramp near a town.
Chief Muck-luck-(two click noises), fu*k-a-duck, decided to try and extort money for trespassing on Indian land or he and his two homies were going to take their guns and “rock and roll” on us.
I had pre-positiond my boat gun on the dash of my boat.
20 feet behind me…might have well been non existent.
Things turned out ok, only by the grace of God and opportunity.
Lesson learned, NEVER be over an arms reach of protection.
My three previous attempted robberies were prevented by having a firearm in hand.
After too many years, I got lax. Never again.
How does she even walk without hurting herself with such a lack or reasoning power. I guess what she really does is decide what she wants then builds a path to that conclusion. She is a very dangerous threat to liberty.
Has anyone tried a FOIA request to determine the cost? Or are the newspapers seriously that lazy?
206 guns purchased, town claims to have spent circa 10g. that’s just short of $50 per unit. That number just makes no sense,as Much mores money is spent is on administrative and police costs. This of course is without accounting for whatever was spent for disposal. People turning in the firearms, for the most part are law-abiding citizens, hence these guns were not a problem in the hands that held them. Criminals for the most part, will not give up guns to buybacks, lest of course they were used in crimes, yet these being no questions asked scenarios, it is a win-win situation for the criminal, allowing them to dispose of evidence which could have been used against them. In the long run these are nothing more than feel good projects to allow politicians to pat themselves on the back, while the taxpayer does not, as usual, see the folly and waste.
Typical liberal democrat; let’s sneak it through by calling it something else and hope no one notices.
My two year old has a better chance of making one of these than I do. So I appreciate those among us who can make these to further our cause.
suggestion…
put them on someplace like cafepress to be bought. I’d add them to the signs I already have on my property that I did on vistaprint. alternatively, links to hi-res copies suitable for printing to 18″x27″ size?
Reference the concerns that GBB programmes are a great way to dispose of evidence, I’d be quite surprised were something akin to the following not occurring:
– guns of type used in a recent (say one year) unsolved regional crime are held aside for a closer look-see;
– all guns are fingerprinted;
– a luminol or similar blood test is conducted on the muzzle area;
– if complete and operational, a reference shot is made with ammunition of type apropos to any unsolved regional crime for later comparrison;
– high resolution, multi-camera surveillance footage of the event is kept so the dicks’ll have a jumping-off point.
It ain’t rocket science.
EDIT: The “cost of disposal” is nothing more than the hourly of an officer to ensure that they actually go into the shredder at a scrap yard. The yard will even pay by weight for the steel.
Garish. It might be the best knife in the world but I would never use it due to the price.
So for me at least, it’s useless and ugly.
Touche.
“Many people think there are cheap guns at shows, but I haven’t seen them. Mostly it’s about selection, and not having to pay transfer and shipping fees on a gun you’ve never even laid eyes on.”
This echoes completely my experience.
I always carry my P-3AT in a pocket holster (DeSantis Nemesis). I never worried about needed a pocked holster with my old Colt Mustang because it had a manual safety.