CCAC violates 1st amendment rights to stiffle the 2nd

[Shawn.L]

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pitt.../s_627098.html
Front Page above the fold
our very own Avestrial
more discussion and history from the beggining here

http://forum.pafoa.org/pennsylvania-...my-rights.html

CCAC student claims school's dean blocked gun-rights group

By Mike Cronin
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, May 28, 2009

A Community College of Allegheny County student said a dean told her she was breaking the law for trying to start a campus chapter of a national organization that supports students' right to carry licensed, concealed weapons on campus.

CCAC spokesman David Hoovler said the college bans weapons on campus. Twenty-four states prohibit concealed guns on campuses, and 15, including Pennsylvania, leave it up to the individual schools.

Christine Brashier of Squirrel Hill said her free speech rights were violated when Yvonne Burns, dean of student development at the school's Allegheny Campus, told her she was not allowed to distribute fliers about Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.

"She literally said, 'You may want to discuss this topic, but the college does not -- and you cannot make us,'" Brashier said Wednesday. "She said I was breaking the law by soliciting on campus, that I was trying to sell the idea of an organization."

Burns was not available to talk to a reporter who visited the campus yesterday afternoon, Hoovler said. He said, however, "We do support the First Amendment and students' rights to discuss any topic they want to talk about."

Burns could not be reached at home last night. CCAC President Alex Johnson was out of town, Hoovler said. Johnson could not be reached by phone.

Hoovler said he could not comment on the April conversation between Brashier and Burns because he was not there.

"We are not blocking the formation of any group," Hoovler said. "The student is free to go through the same procedures to set up an organization that any other student has to go through."

Brashier, 24, a first-year education student at the Allegheny Campus on the North Side, said she wants to be able to carry a gun on campus for safety. She said she was following CCAC's procedures to form a campus organization when she was asked to meet with Burns. Brashier said she left crying because she thought she was about to be expelled.

"She said I already had one foot out of the school," Brashier said.

"The student who was advocating creation of the group has never faced any disciplinary action from CCAC and remains in good standing at the college," Hoovler said in a statement.

In the wake of the 2007 massacre at Virginia Tech, in which a gunman killed 32 people before killing himself, more than 20 states have considered legislation to allow concealed weapons on campus for protection, according to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, a nonprofit organization in Washington.

Robert L. Shibley, vice president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a nonprofit organization based in Philadelphia, made Brashier's cause public yesterday. Shibley said he acted because Johnson did not respond to an April 29 letter from his foundation.

That letter told Johnson that Brashier's actions "in no way constituted solicitation, that CCAC is obligated to permit students to distribute literature and may not ban it on the basis of viewpoint or content, and that if CCAC recognizes student organizations at all, it must recognize an organization that supports concealed carry on campus."

Hoovler said the complex legal issues the foundation raised required that CCAC evaluate them before responding. "A full response" is forthcoming, he said.

"The fact that there are active chapters on dozens of other campuses should've been a major indicator that the group is allowed to exist," Shibley said. "I don't think this was really that difficult a decision to make."

Sam Gupta, Concealed Carry's state director and chair at the University of Pittsburgh, agreed.

"I've helped organize chapters on between 13 and 15 Pennsylvania campuses," said Gupta, 21, a senior studying economics who lives in Squirrel Hill.

"I did the same thing at Pitt and had no problem."

Twenty-two Pennsylvania colleges and universities have student leaders for Concealed Carry, according to its Web site. Area schools with chapters, in addition to Pitt, include Point Park University, IUP and California University, Gupta said.

Suzanne Lupka, 28, a former CCAC student who graduated on Saturday from Chatham University in Squirrel Hill, called Brashier's situation "absolutely ridiculous."

"What makes me angry is that we had groups supporting the legalization of marijuana and everything else -- no one violated their free speech," said Lupka, a Squirrel Hill resident who supports Brashier's effort.

[Shawn.L]

there should be a follow up story in Fridays Trib as well.

[Johannes_Paulsen]

"All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal than others."

-George Orwell, Animal Farm

[Eugene V. Debs]

Kewwwlllll!

[P-11 shooter]

Great article.

[Shawn.L]

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pitt.../s_627265.html

CCAC apologizes for delay in answering gun-rights-group issue




About the writer
Mike Cronin can be reached via e-mail or at 412-320-7884.


By Mike Cronin
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Friday, May 29, 2009




The Community College of Allegheny County's board chairman apologized on Thursday for the school's delay in answering why it prevented a student from establishing a gun-rights group at the Allegheny Campus.

The student, Christine "Christa" Brashier, 24, of Squirrel Hill and the Philadelphia-based Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a First Amendment group, say the school violated her right to free speech when it barred her from starting a CCAC chapter of Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.

"The delay is indicative of how important we believe the issue to be," said Thomas J. Santone, CCAC's board chair and founder, chairman and CEO of PrimeSolutions, a Downtown financial company. Santone said he has read drafts of the formal reply and that it could be released as early as today.

A firestorm erupted on Wednesday when Brashier, a first-year student who hopes to be an elementary school teacher, and Robert L. Shibley, vice president of the foundation, said the dean of student development at the Allegheny Campus prohibited her from founding the club, which supports students being permitted to carry licensed, concealed weapons on campus.

"We apologize to the organization and the student for the delay, but our formal response is of critical importance," Santone said yesterday. "We'd rather get it right than get it out."

Adam Kissel, the foundation's individual rights defense program director, wrote CCAC President Alex Johnson on April 29 asking "that you immediately recognize the college's legal obligation to guarantee freedom of expression and association on campus." Kissel asked that Johnson respond by May 13.

With no response as of Wednesday, Shibley contacted media organizations.

Brashier said that Dean Yvonne Burns told her on April 24 that she was breaking the law by passing out fliers about establishing a chapter of the gun-rights group. Brashier said she left the meeting fearing she would be expelled.

Burns did not return multiple phone calls. CCAC spokesman David Hoovler said that Johnson was out of town and unavailable for comment.

CCAC officials say they support students' First Amendment rights -- and that Brashier never faced any disciplinary action.

"She remains in good standing," said Mike Adams, CCAC's solicitor. "We have no intention to limit her involvement in any group or limit her ability to discuss her own political viewpoints."

Brashier said she was happy to hear that -- and in a chance meeting, told Hoovler that yesterday when both were being interviewed by television journalists at the same location on the Allegheny Campus.

"I said to him, if they had just said that to me in the first place, we wouldn't be in this situation right now," said Brashier. "I never wanted to fight with my school. I'm grateful to CCAC for giving me the chance to get an education."

Brashier has worked for Oce Business Services, a New York-based document-management-process company with an office in Moon, for three years. Before that, she worked at a gas station-convenience store -- a type of place notorious for armed robberies, Brashier said. She earned her GED in 2002 after attending several city high schools and The Pennsylvania Cyber Charter School.

She said she was anti-gun until her older brother, Shawn Lupka, 31, of Squirrel Hill, took her to a firing range in 2005. She said she had been mugged at gunpoint in California's Napa Valley when she was 14 and knows many people who have been robbed or attacked by armed assailants.

"There's no way to know if the atrocious things that have happened to my friends could've been stopped if they had a gun, but at least they would've had a fighting chance," Brashier said. "Just because we want the right to be armed does not mean we're looking for a fight."

A combination of learning how to safely use a gun and becoming a self-described "Constitutionalist" in support of state and individual rights led her to support the right to carry firearms, she said.

Brashier obtained a permit to carry a gun in October 2007. A few days later, she bought a Bersa .380-caliber pistol, nicknamed "The Thunder," she said. Brashier said she is not a member of the National Rifle Association.

Her brother said he thinks his little sister is doing a great job.

"When you stand up for things, you got to bring it all or go home," said Lupka, who said he belongs to several gun-ownership organizations.

CCAC students differed about whether concealed weapons should be allowed at the school, but all students interviewed said discussing the issue should be permitted on campus.

"A public college shouldn't be allowed to prevent the formation of a club. They don't pay our tuitions, we do. The only reason they get paid is because we're here," said Corry DiCarlo, 26, a Munhall resident and second-year computer science student.

Sara Harper, 18, of Brighton Heights, said permitting guns on campus would make students less safe.

"If someone felt threatened, they might feel the need to cause unnecessary violence," said Harper, who is taking two classes at CCAC this summer.

[Shawn.L]

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pitt.../s_627180.html

On the "Watch List": CCAC. Community College of Allegheny County officials could have a serious problem if the allegations of student Christine Brashier of Squirrel Hill are accurate. She says a dean attempted to intimidate her to stop seeking student support to form an Allegheny Campus chapter of a national group that supports the right of students to carry licensed, concealed weapons on campus. CCAC is reviewing Ms. Brashier's allegations. But if the dean said what Brashier says she said, she should be fired.

[Shawn.L]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/...4xL1gD98FDRDG0

Gun supporters say colleges trample protest rights
By RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Colleges nationwide have unconstitutionally barred students from handing out literature, protesting and gathering in support of the right to carry weapons on campus, students and an advocacy group say.

Christine Brashier, a freshman at the Community College of Allegheny County near Pittsburgh, said a dean recently told her she had to stop distributing fliers for the group Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, which has chapters at many colleges, and destroy the pamphlets she had designed.

"I won't be forced into silence. I just wanted to start a student organization. I didn't think it was going to get this much attention," Brashier said. "It only got this attention because they stopped me. People don't like to hear about suppression of free speech."

Brashier is licensed to carry a concealed firearm but doesn't take it to school because CCAC, like most colleges and universities nationwide, does not allow weapons on campus. Some states explicitly ban students from carrying weapons on campus, while others — like Pennsylvania — allow the schools to set policy.

But since April 16, 2007, when Seung-Hui Cho went on a shooting rampage at Virginia Tech University, killing 32 people and injuring 17 before turning the gun on himself, more students have been advocating for the right to carry guns on campus, and state lawmakers have been tackling the issue, as well.

As a result, more universities and colleges have suppressed the rights of students to organize, said Robert Shibley, vice president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit following the cases and writing letters protesting them.

FIRE has not taken any cases to court, but Shibley said the group has not ruled it out. FIRE's philosophy is to work with the universities to get them to independently change their policies.

In the case of Tarrant County College in Fort Worth, Texas, Shibley said he would not comment on whether FIRE would sue. But it's "always an option when constitutional rights are violated," he said.

In Tarrant County, students have been trying to hold an "empty holster" demonstration in the college's designated "Free Speech" zone. The college has repeatedly refused to allow the protest, though it has taken place at other campuses nationwide.

"That case is ongoing. They have not relented," Shibley said.

Donna Darovich, the college's spokeswoman, said the students are permitted to voice their opinions in the "Free Speech" zone but will not be allowed to carry empty holsters anywhere on campus.

"We believe that it would be disruptive to the campus environment for people to be walking around with gun holsters," Darovich said.

However, Central Connecticut State University in New Britain allowed a gun holster protest on its campus last month. That was a month after the school was mired in publicity because a student was questioned by police after he gave a class presentation on gun rights that made a professor uncomfortable.

Mark McLaughlin, the university's spokesman, said that the student was not sanctioned and that the presentation did not affect his grade. The university, he said, was not suppressing the right of a student to express support for carrying a gun and has an active chapter of Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.

In Pittsburgh, FIRE sent a letter to the college stating concern about "the threats to freedom of speech and freedom of association." The "free distribution of noncommercial handbills is a quintessentially American tradition," FIRE said, noting that the Supreme Court has ruled it is unconstitutional to require prior permission for doing so.

Brashier's pamphlets say that while college campuses are generally safe, there are assaults, rapes and murders. By barring students from carrying guns, college campuses are "supermarkets for would-be rapists and mass murders," she wrote, mentioning the Virginia Tech shooting and the February 2008 shooting at Northern Illinois University, where a gunman killed five people.

The Pittsburgh college has declined to comment in detail because its solicitor is reviewing it. However, it said Brashier has not faced disciplinary action. The college is encouraging her to follow CCAC rules for organizing a campus group, including having 10 students interested in joining and finding a faculty adviser.

"CCAC does not have any intention to limit the student's involvement in the group or her ability to discuss her own political viewpoint," the statement said.

Brashier, who is studying to be an elementary school teacher, said when she completes her studies at CCAC in a year she will be continuing at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, a school that also bans students from carrying weapons on campus but does allow Students for Concealed Carry on Campus to remain active.

The group, Brashier said, tries to get university funding for education on firearms and for trips to the shooting range.

"I just wanted to open up discussion and debate on the topic. I didn't think it would be such a big deal," Brashier said.

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

[avestriel]

The first of what are to be much more press, after the FIRE's press release this upcoming monday. I'm also told I was on CBS 3 in Philadelphia this morning. The college invited this specific reporter, I guess they wanted at least some sort of positive portrayal before the press really gets into it.

CCAC allows handouts without prior review
Officials reverse earlier decision
Friday, October 02, 2009
By Bill Schackner, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Community College of Allegheny County will no longer require prior review of student handouts after complaints by a women who sought last spring to form a group advocating the right to carry concealed firearms on campus.

The student, Christine "Christa" Brashier, attempted to organize a campus chapter of a national group, Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.

In June, she said a CCAC employee told her the organizing amounted to "soliciting," ordered her to destroy fliers she created and warned she risked sanctions if she pursued the matter without the school's OK.

Ms. Brashier said the order violated her free speech rights.

The Philadelphia-based Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) and the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania took up her cause.

CCAC officials, including President Alex Johnson, have said it was never the school's intent to deny her the right to organize such a group. They said fliers left on tables throughout the campus cafeteria and elsewhere violated rules by using CCAC's name in a way that suggested a link between it and her as-yet unrecognized group.

Initially, the college defended the prior-review policy, but in recent days senior administrators amended their position on the rule.

"It was set up to protect students from harmful solicitation," CCAC spokesman David Hoovler said. "But looking at it in light of this situation, we realized that there was some ambiguity there and it was probably best to do away with that."

According to CCAC, the language struck from the college's facilities management policies is as follows: "Solicitation: The distribution or display of, and the personal contact with individuals or groups related to non-sponsored college material or events, without prior written approval of the college are prohibited. These actions are limited to public property; however, public property in this context does not include college property."

Both the ACLU and FIRE praised the decision. Both had said the rule was unconstitutional and that using the college's name on the handouts did not imply endorsement.

"We're very pleased that they have come around and corrected the problem," said Witold Walczak, the state ACLU's legal director.

"We are glad that CCAC has finally given its students the right to encourage one another to band together for causes they believe in," said Adam Kissel, director of FIRE's individual rights defense program. "This is another example of how just one college student standing up for her rights can help bring liberty to her entire campus."

Ms. Brashier, 24, a second-year education student from Squirrel Hill, declined comment yesterday on the decision, but she confirmed that her efforts to establish the group are continuing.
-
They ignored my insistence that, although Vic from the ACLU did help draft some of the documents and handle communication in the city I was represented by Michael Rinaldi, Esq. of Drinker Biddle & Reath in Philadelphia - a man to whom I owe a great debt of gratitude for his willingness to pursue this matter to its conclusion while avoiding court which were my specific requests. I may be meeting him for the first time in person at the FIRE's 10 anniversary dinner celebration in NYC on Oct 22nd (www.thefire.org/anniversary) anyone else who wants to come support the people who take care of underdogs like me - I'd love to see you there! The tickets aren't cheap, and there's the travel to NYC - but it promises to be fun, educational, and benefit a good cause. I will be there. (& I've bought a really pretty dress for it too!)

Thanks everyone for your support and kind words over these last few months.

- Christa

[avestriel]

And, AGAIN, for the record - I left nothing on tables - I distributed these fliers to individuals with whom I had opened discussion on the matter, and to some teachers as well. I never posted them anywhere.

Also the college did not put anything in their agenda about this so Mike Cronin did not go to the board meeting at which this PG reporter got his information. The college seems to have picked this reporter and jumped the gun, perhaps so the media coverage wouldn't be quite as negative as it was last time.

The FIRE will have a press release Monday, so expect to hear more about my VICTORY soon.

Victory is mine! Now... on to the next amendment!

- Christa