AJAX22 said:
On a more relevent note, does anyone know how this process is going? Any time frame on a definite outcome? Will AK's be affected? Is there any way to sit in on the discussion? will there be any future opportunity to offer input?
I, along with 25-35 other people, as well as a very senior region NRA person (H. Paul Payne) and Chuck Michel (noted CA gunrights attorney) presented comments about the DOJ's proposed regulatory scheme. This actually was the right amount of folks - we didn't need raving loonies in camo talking about 2nd amendment rights, this was a technical/legal regulatory meeting about fine details of a regulatory definition - and their major, major side effects.
CA AW law is an odd collection of statutory laws further shaped by regulations/regulatory definitions and court decisions. They all play against each other. The Democrats in the legislature really helped us, in some ways, by leaving some of the technical handwaving to an administrative organization (the AG's office - DOJ, in its Firearms Division). The patchwork of poorly written laws - by folks with little technical knowledge other than 'do-gooderism' left an odd interface between the various sections of the law. This was best demonstrated by the easily attacked (and now moot) DOJ "Category 4" memo of Feb 3. While this was publicly rebutted (and its author, Dept AG Alison Merrilees publicly rebuked) by myself and others on Calguns point-by-point with in a day or two of its issuance, the NRA was working on this in a nonpublic way - calling DOJ FD Director Randy Rossi at his home (recovering from an operation) and telling him "this sh*t just won't fly, and you know it."
While the DOJ insists it's a 'clarification' of existing law, it's plain that it's *new* law thru regulation, unsupported by statutory law and in conflict with 6 years' of previous DOJ memos, and documents from the 2000 SB23 regulatory comment period. That is, the DOJ switched course in the middle of the stream due to the embarassing off-list AR/AK situation. Additionally, prior DOJ approvals of various semiauto rifles in CA indicates there was to be no standard of permanence of mag attachment, just that you couldn't change mag in normal course of weapon operation.
Anyway, most of the speakers/presenters brought up a ton of good points. But the paid help really came thru: Chuck Michel (and his law firm) had a ream of documents from DOJ they'd been collecting that, to my mind, really shot the hell out of any current or prospective DOJ argument.
The DOJ may issue "comments to the comments" we gave on Aug 16 (or mailed in) and then request further comments. We'll see what happens, but I believe the DOJ has a bad case of indigestion since a variety of technical and legal issues were brought up that were not even conceived of by DOJ staff.
If anything of import happens, you'll hear of it almost instantaneously on Calguns.net - about the best place to hear up-to-date accurate info on CA gun law/political issues.
Bill Wiese
San Jose, CA