[Jim March]

Hi all,

One of the questions we face is "how can an honest sheriff run a CCW program that will be fair, yet not leave him open to the liberal media painting him as doing a "CCW free-for-all"?".

In other words, we know how most sheriffs run the program is a bad joke, but until the legislature finally does a fix, how SHOULD sheriffs behave?

Attached is a first draft in Acrobat format.

Before I get flamed for part of what's in here: I've *seen* what happens when the media rips into a pro-gun police chief, and it ain't at all pretty. What y'all have to realize is that it's worth a bit of extra BS to allow the sheriff/chief to remain in office. And that means that while this is a layout for a "shall-issue" program, it's otherwise pretty strict...basically the "bare minimum we could live with".

I'm publishing it here for comments before putting it anywhere else. Criticism welcome, flames aren't :).

[Ledbetter]

1. Thanks for all your positive efforts.

2. This protocol is actually more time-consuming and restrictive for applicants than the one in place in my county, and maybe others.

In my view, it is a mistake to risk what we already have in some California counties on the off-chance that "liberal" counties can be made to issue a reasonable number of permits.

3. The substitution of a "ride-along" for a psych evaluation by a psychologist may be more risky for departments that want to rely on an independent evaluation of the applicant done according to standard protocols and practices.

Regards.

[Jim March]

Right, I know there's already sheriffs that are better than this, especially in rural areas.

The idea is NOT to shift those guys to this. Not hardly. The reason those rural sheriffs CAN do a pro-CCW stance is because they don't have a flaming liberal media and constituency ripping into them for doing so. There's up to several thousand permits in some of those counties now, so it's just a big non-issue.

What made me think of this is a situation in a fairly liberal coastal county, where a past wildly corrupt sheriff was replaced the beginning of this year with one I've gotten some good feedback on. This isn't Kern; the existing number of permitholders is down below 100.

So how do we approach the new sheriff and propose he make a radical change WITHOUT his getting ripped to shreds?

That's what this document is all about - NOT trying to encode it into law. Heck, I wouldn't even mention this to the legislative committees hearing SB435, for fear they'd grab it.

Follow?