Shooting groundhogs by a school ?

[Jzimm500]

My father inlaw has a house that is right across the street of a school.
He has alot of ground hogs that eat his garden i have shot a few with my bow. question is can he shoot them with a rifle being that close to a school.
from his house to the school i would guess 500 to 800 feet i should measure it. i just dont want him to get in trouble all shooting would be saturdays or in the evening not during school hours. is the 1000 foot rule only during school times or is that year round. hope that all makes sense
Josh

[tl_3237]

My father inlaw has a house that is right across the street of a school.
He has alot of ground hogs that eat his garden i have shot a few with my bow. question is can he shoot them with a rifle being that close to a school.
from his house to the school i would guess 500 to 800 feet i should measure it. i just dont want him to get in trouble all shooting would be saturdays or in the evening not during school hours. is the 1000 foot rule only during school times or is that year round. hope that all makes sense
Josh

If your '1000 foot' rule is referring to the Federal Gun Free School Zone Act of 1995, it does not apply to private property.

18 USc 922(q)(2)

(A) It shall be unlawful for any individual knowingly to possess a firearm that has moved in or that otherwise affects interstate or foreign commerce at a place that the individual knows, or has reasonable cause to believe, is a school zone.
(B) Subparagraph (A) does not apply to the possession of a firearm-

(i) on private property not part of school grounds;

The are potentially other considerations such as local discharge ordinances and/or game laws to which I let others opine.

[God's Country]

Provided you can lawfully shoot the ground hogs per the PGC, and barring any other local firearm discharge ordinance.....it's private property so have at it. Oh someone will probably have a fit and shit themselves, but too bad.

[dlistman]

Regardless of the rules, it's probably going to cause him more headache than it's worth but....

PA hunting regs require 150 yards between the strucutre and where you're shooting from. So, at 500 feet, you should be OK. The other thing to look into is township regs. I don't know the area but my suburbun township prohibits firearms discharge pretty much for any reason. I don't know anything about a 1,000 foot rule.

[Jzimm500]

Thanks for the info i never had a problem but i read somewhere about discharging a firearm within a 1000 feet of a school so i unsure how that worked for private property
thanks agian for the help
Josh

[Steve in PA]

Regardless of the rules, it's probably going to cause him more headache than it's worth but....

PA hunting regs require 150 yards between the strucutre and where you're shooting from. So, at 500 feet, you should be OK. The other thing to look into is township regs. I don't know the area but my suburbun township prohibits firearms discharge pretty much for any reason. I don't know anything about a 1,000 foot rule.

If it's legal to hunt, then the township can not prohibit anything. There is case law on this.

[God's Country]

If it's legal to hunt, then the township can not prohibit anything. There is case law on this.

Interesting.

Can you cite the case law?

There was a fairly recent thread where a township was prohibiting a private land owner from shooting on his own range, where hunting is legal.

[Steve in PA]

Interesting.

Can you cite the case law?

There was a fairly recent thread where a township was prohibiting a private land owner from shooting on his own range, where hunting is legal.

Google "Northampton v Duff"

In short, the court ruled only the PA Game Commission can set the rules as to when and where a person can legally hunt. Kind of like preemption for firearms, except this is for hunting.

[dlistman]

OK, you're saying he is still bound by the 150 yard rule, but if the township code is more limiting, he can ignore it? Just confirming.....

[R.W.J]

OK, you're saying he is still bound by the 150 yard rule, but if the township code is more limiting, he can ignore it? Just confirming.....

Steve is 100% correct.