The presiding officer of the Borough Assembly said openly displayed sidearms at a meeting on Feb. 25, when emotions ran high, didn’t bother him. But some assembly members said it concerns them. Borough officials said no one complained to them about the firearms, however.
On the agenda at that Feb. 25 meeting was the introduction of an air pollution control plan, and it drew more than 100 people to the meeting, including vocal opposition. Many criticized the plan and some criticized the municipal leaders. People held picket signs. There was shouting at assembly members and at the mayor. There were threats.
Officials with the three area municipalities said firearms are allowed in most municipal buildings and at public meetings. State law prohibits local governments from restricting gun rights any more than the state’s restrictions.
But that doesn’t mean openly carrying a firearm to a stormy public meeting is an exercise in good judgment, according to Assemblywoman Nadine Winters and Assemblymen Tim Beck, Guy Sattley, Hank Bartos and Matt Want.
“I think it’s an intimidation factor,” Beck said. “And that’s impeding the public process.”
Want, one of the newest assembly members, said if the firearms were meant to intimidate, then that’s wrong.
“I very much appreciate people’s ability to exercise their Second Amendment rights. Bbut to me, if it’s used to intimidate, then it’s an abuse of that right.”
Bartos said openly carried firearms at heated public meetings make him nervous.
Sattley said the fact that bringing a gun to a meeting is legal doesn’t make it advisable.
“I think that’s not the place for it,” he said. “It’s already heated enough without that added to the twist.”
None of the assemblymen said they saw the openly displayed firearms. But Winters did.
“Did I feel threatened the other night or worried? No, not even one little bit,” she said. But Winters said she wonders why anyone would want to openly carry a firearm to a public meeting.
“I can’t think of any reason why you come to a public hearing on something that affects the community and you need to bring a gun,” she said.
Three other assembly members said they think residents openly carried firearms to the meeting to show their support for Second Amendment rights.
“I don’t know why. I just don’t feel too worried about it,” Assembly Presiding Officer Mike Musick said. “They are exercising one of their fundamental rights.”
Assemblyman Joe Blanchard said he sees no problem with it.
“I think people have the right to carry their firearms wherever they are,” Blanchard said. “As long as you’re not threatening anybody with it.”
Assemblywoman Natalie Howard missed the meeting but said she has seen openly displayed firearms at other public meetings.
“I definitely think that carrying your gun open or concealed to the Borough Assembly chambers, you are just exercising a freedom,” Howard said.
National groups, including OpenCarry.Org, encourage the open carrying of firearms, but not all Second Amendment enthusiasts agree.
The point, according to OpenCarry.Org’s Web site, is to “naturalize the presence of guns, which means that guns become ordinary, omnipresent and expected. Over time, the gun becomes a symbol of ordinary personhood.”
Joe Nava, a local firearms safety instructor who formerly sat on the board of directors of the National Rifle Association, said openly carrying firearms unnecessarily upsets people uncomfortable with guns.
Nava made the point in a short essay he posted on the Web site of Fairbanks radio station KFAR, where he hosts a weekly show on gun issues.
“I am not jumping in on any side of any argument that you might put in the newspaper,” he said when reached by telephone.
In the essay, Nava urges gun owners to conceal their firearms.
He wrote: “We are not hunting. We are merely carrying our guns for protection. There is no advantage to carrying a gun openly.”
According to e-mails to the Borough Assembly, there were people who wanted to testify in disagreement with the rest of the crowd at the Feb. 25 meeting and didn’t. They said the fiery rhetoric stopped them.
Contact staff writer Amanda Bohman at 459-7544.
Where is the accountabilty, responsibility and compassion of the elected officials and power hungry bureaucrats?
Don't be fooled again by this diversion, it is still a battle and the borough will use any tactic to create bogus issues.
When is the next meeting on the woodstove issue?
BTW, thanks TAC for your support on being "lost" on Alaska. I'm just trying to keep the peace.
There will come a time that those people who think that guns are scary will wish they were trained on how to use it and owned one. The police arrive after the crime has been committed, so get educated and stop feeding fear to those who are uneducated about what freedom we have and the right to exercise.
Joe Nava will train you and you'll have more respect for those that do carry openly.
It's interesting to note the people that imply that the armed citizens arm themselves because of some inadequacy on the part of the firearm carrier. I guess having a fire extinguisher in the home or car is a sign of inadequacy too. I suppose the same is true of having a smoke detector in the home. none of these things are likely to be needed, as is a firearm for self defense, but who would argue that they are not prudent to have. There is nothing wrong with having a firearm on the off chance one might need do defend oneself or family. I can't imagine anybody believes that the police can be expected to supply personal protection on a moments notice, so I think it is obligatory to provide adequate protection for oneself and family, including having a fire extinguisher or homeowners insurance.
An obvious sign of inadequacy is the need to render the good people around oneself defenseless in order to calm one's own baseless paranoia.
And you imply that the people that carry firearms are ones that are 'scared'. sheesh.
I wished I lived there instead, in that place and time. Everyone had a gun or two on their hip and just went about their business. I doubt they would be reading about it in the newspaper.
The next time we have a public meeting on fluoride, can I openly display my water pistol?
I honestly never gave a first thought, much less a second one, as to whether attendants at borough meetings were armed or not, and I can't say it bothers me that they are. I find the disrespect some showed toward the testimony of others to be far more disturbing. Everyone has the right to offer their thoughts at public forums, and to do so unimpeded.
But here's what I was thinking about today:
Whenever I enter a federal building or take a flight, I have to empty my pockets, take off my shoes, have my belongings x-rayed, and walk through a metal detector. I resent this, but not because I don't think these steps are necessary. I resent this because every time I go through this process I realize that the reason I have to endure it is because someone else has so grievously abused the freedoms that this country offers that now we have all lost a bit of those freedoms as a result.
When I go to testify at a borough meeting, I sign my name up, take a seat, and wait my turn. I don't have to pass through intrusive security or offer prior proof that I don't have criminal intent. I do not want this situation to change.
If metal detectors and gun checks ever do get instituted by the assembly, such a move will be prompted by one of two things:
1. An actual shooting in the assembly chambers, the possibility of which I consider extremely remote.
or,
2. A continued public display of guns at borough meetings by individuals who fail to understand the difference between the right to own guns and the importance of doing so responsibly. If this scenario occurs enough times, the public outcry will overwhelm the demands of gun owners, and local government meetings will become one more place we can't travel freely in and out of.
I do not want this to happen. I also don't want people to lose the right to carry guns with them where and when they so choose.
I was not at this particular meeting, and I do not know if the gun was exposed with the intention of intimidating the opposition or if the individual was in fact simply too warm and removed his jacket. (A third theory is he did it to impress his buddies.) Regardless of why it was shown, it has obviously caused a ruckus. So I would ask those who are contemplating displaying weapons at public meetings to refrain from doing so, because if you keep it up, not only will your freedom ultimately be compromised, so too will be everyone else's.
They're probably nothing more than a bunch of wanna-be "gunslingers" who think they're the only people in the country who know about the second amendment, meanwhile anyone with an elementary education should know all about the constitution and the bill of rights, no big deal.
If anything the current administration has been working to BROADEN gun rights for law-abiding citizens. Crying wolf and parading your firearms about doesn't really help the so called gun rights "issue", because there is nothing threatening any law-abiding citizens second amendment rights.
In other words y'all have been duped by the same people who duped y'all during the big (funny) "Y2K" scare. So apparently y'all didn't learn not to believe every little piece of that "conservative" anti-anything-liberal hype y'all brainwash yourselves with every day.
I can think of a another place where everyone walks around openly displaying their weaponry. AK-47's on every shoulder. They are also out to "control their government and their country". You can guess where that is. Think very many people feel safe there...no. Would they be much better off if every AK-47 suddenly vanished? Yep...
I asked twice, so the alleged events must not have happened.
Oh wait I get it, this is a sound bite for a campaign! Sort of like I promise to lower your taxes and increase services. Why the sound bite? If the powers that be want this, they will get this regardless.