Getting a gun in DC
The D.C. Gun Registry office is not where you go for help getting a legal gun; it’s where you go to get more confused by bureaucracy.
Indeed. My sooper seekrit correspondent sent me pics of the registry office and it looks so inviting. Typical government entrance:
Obviously, there’s no bias implied by calling it the Gun Control Unit:
Why not a gun rights section:
October 7th, 2011 at 10:57 am
I moved to the ATL ‘burbs in 1999, and I still remember going to the courthouse to get my carry permit:
There was a sign over the proper door:
“Marriage Licenses
Concealed Weapons Permits”
One-stop shopping!
As for buying firearms: no registry, no “safety” inspections, no waiting period, no hassles. Just one of the reasons why I love the south.
October 7th, 2011 at 11:09 am
Look forward to finally getting AwesomeWife’s and my classes done when I get back to Kansas. Hope none of it is as… sterile and ugly as that. Ugh.
October 7th, 2011 at 11:45 am
In Massachusetts, it’s the “Firearms Support Services” which is part of the “Criminal History Systems Board”. How nice.
October 7th, 2011 at 12:51 pm
There was a county here in NC a couple of years back that was having the gun permit applicants stand in the same line as the sex offender registrants. Course the sign over their head said only “Sex Offender Registry”
October 7th, 2011 at 1:27 pm
Here in Austin, Texas, (Williamson and Travis Counties) to apply for a CHL you used to go to a building where real people took your documents and answered questions to make sure your application was complete. Now you can do most of it online, but some documents still need to be mailed in or delivered to the state agency that issues CHLs.
Presenting documents to the Department of Public Safety is done by mail, or by going to the office in the DPS multi-building complex where they used to have a clerk take your documents. Then you find out they don’t take your documents in person there any more.
Then you read the sign and map taped to the door of that office, or chat with the clerk having a smoke out on the loading dock, either of which (or whom) directs you to the alley behind another DPS building a few blocks away, were you find the big metal box with large envelopes atop it. You deposit your documents (including your current CHL if you are renewing)in a large envelope, in the big metal mailbox, with no way to get a receipt to prove you did so. Then the clerk who was having a smoke out on the loading dock back at the old office comes at 4:45pm (or so he told me) and picks up the envelopes for CHL applications and takes them back where you went in the first place, and they enter the approval process the next day or so.
After waiting a few weeks to see if you submitted everything properly, you can check online and get this message:
At which time you call the Contact Us phone number to see what further documents are required, and wait and wait and wait, but never get off hold (at least during the first hour). Then you send an email asking what further documents are needed for your application to proceed, and wait for a response.
I’ll let you know what comes next when I find out. Texas is a shall-issue state friendly to firearms ownership and concealed carry. But those petty bureaucrats who occupy desks and stamp papers must be the same the whole world ’round.
October 7th, 2011 at 1:31 pm
And for you Douglas Adams fans, if you guessed the DPS is “awaiting the loading of our compliment of small, lemon-soaked paper napkins for your comfort, refreshment, and hygiene during the flight” as the required materials, give yourself five points.
October 7th, 2011 at 2:22 pm
Here in PA, our county sheriff with issue carry permits on the spot in about 15 minutes. No fingerprints, BS safety checks, no classes. Oh, and a 5 year license is only $20. I just took a coworker there today to get one.
October 7th, 2011 at 4:16 pm
Took me six months and $160.
But it is Kalifornia after all.
October 7th, 2011 at 7:17 pm
Andy and I are obviously just cruising for a fight, but in my county of record (actually the one next to where I live, and that’s legal in Ohio), the petty bureaucrat with a rubber-stamp is efficient, almost apologetically polite and helpful, and drop-dead gorgeous. Also, a real deputy. You do have to go once in person to apply, and once in person to pick up the card, but after you’ve met her, you look forward to that.
The high-sheriff swings through the records office a couple of times a day, shakes hands and thanks folks for being good citizens about it. Of course I realize I’m being oppressed, but around here they put nice velvet on the chains.