Aliquippa to consider Lost or Stolen Gun reporting.

**Rbray** · November 2nd, 2009, 12:30 PM

Aliquippa considers new gun rulesTEXT SIZE By: Michael PoundBeaver County Times
Sunday November 1, 2009 11:30 PM

Aliquippa Mayor Anthony Battalini wants to give his city’s police officers every possible tool available when it comes to stopping gun violence such as the recent shootings in the city’s Plan 12 neighborhood.

And he said he thinks an ordinance that requires residents to report lost or stolen firearms might be a good way to do just that.

“I have some questions about how it could be enforced, sure,” Battalini said. “But even if it gives our officers a heads-up about weapons that might be out there, it would have to help.”

Fourteen municipalities across Pennsylvania — including Homestead and Munhall in Allegheny County — have adopted lost-or-stolen ordinances, which require residents to report lost or stolen firearms within a specified period of time after discovery. The laws also call for fines and even jail time for those who fail to report the discovery within the time limit.

Joe Grace, the executive director of gun-control group CeaseFire PA, said the laws give police departments a leg up when they’re trying to stop the sales or exchange of illegal weapons.

“This is a vital step in stopping the flow of guns into the wrong hands,” Grace said. “It’s important in our big cities like Philadelphia, Pittsburgh or Erie, but it’s crucial in smaller towns like Homestead or Munhall, where small departments can be overwhelmed by gun violence. It’s a tool they need.”

Grace said as recently as a few months ago, his group was approaching municipalities about adopting lost-or-stolen ordinances. Now, he said, it’s the other way around.

“They’re contacting us,” Grace said. “This is really gathering steam, especially since the state police commissioner stated his support earlier this year.”

Grace said Col. Frank Pawlowski pledged his support in a statement to the state Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition, a group of 158 mayors across the state.

“Lost or stolen handgun reporting is a simple reform that does not infringe on the right of law-abiding citizens to bear arms,” Pawlowski said in the statement, issued in September. “I ... pledge my support for your efforts as you advance an agenda for common-sense reforms to reduce access to illegal guns across Pennsylvania.”

Aliquippa police Chief Ralph Pallante said he’d back a lost-or-stolen proposal in the city.

“Most of the guns we see are in the hands of people who aren’t allowed to have them,” Pallante said. “This sounds like a good way of getting a handle on where the guns are coming from — and hopefully before we’re processing them after someone’s been shot.”

The National Rifle Association has pegged the lost-or-stolen laws as gun-control measures and has battled them in court and out. The group filed legal challenges against the laws after they were adopted in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia and has targeted officials who have supported them.

NRA representatives did not return a call seeking comment, but Grace said the campaign is off-base.

“Legal gun owners have nothing to fear when lost-or-stolen comes to their boroughs or cities,” he said. “This is a common sense way of helping police stem the flow of illegal weapons, and that’s all.”

Advertisement Even Battalini, whose city hasn’t formally considered a similar ordinance, has been the subject of an NRA campaign because he joined the state’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition.

“I’m a gun owner, and I’d never do anything to take guns out of the hands of people who own them legally,” he said. “This doesn’t have anything to do with gun control, and it doesn’t have any effect on legal gun owners.

“The thing with the NRA is that they’re not the ones who have to talk to the mother of a kid who’s been killed by a gun,” Battalini said. “I’ve had to do that. Where is the NRA then?”

Michael Pound can be reached online at mpound@timesonline.com.

They’re in

Municipalities in Pennsylvania that have enacted lost-or-stolen ordinances:

l Allentown

l Clairton

l Erie

l Harrisburg

l Homestead

l Lancaster

l Munhall

l Oxford

l Philadelphia

l Pittsburgh

l Pottsville

l Reading

l West Homestead

l Wilkinsburg

Source: CeaseFire PA

Courts have mixed reviews

The lost-or-stolen ordinance has been adopted by 14 municipalities in Pennsylvania; Joe Grace, executive director of CeaseFire PA, the group pushing for the change, said it’s been challenged by the National Rifle Association in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, with results that he said favor CeaseFire PA’s viewpoint.

Pittsburgh: The NRA and other plaintiffs filed suit in Allegheny County court early in 2009 over the lost-or-stolen ordinance, on the basis that the city is expressly forbidden by state law from regulating the use or possession of firearms. The suit was dismissed at the county level; an appeal has been filed.

Philadelphia: A lost-or-stolen ordinance was adopted here as part of a broad package of gun-control measures, many of which were overturned by the state Commonwealth Court earlier this year. The lost-or-stolen law, however, was allowed to stand.

**huntingbeaver** · November 2nd, 2009, 12:52 PM

Yeah, this mayor is one of the guys the times defended wholeheartedly when it came out that he was a member of bloomsberg's mayor organization.

Beaver county is a tricky gun rights battleground. I would say a majority are gun owners and we have a lot of hunters, but a lot have been programmed by the blue 'D' machine and union bosses so long, they'll look at restrictions as 'OK', reasonable, or sensible.

We also have some outstanding patriots.