A proposal from the Mamaroneck town board that sought to ban guns on town property has been shelved after vehement public backlash as well as trepidation over the law’s constitutionality.
“We were definitely wrestling with what kinds of protections can we really provide,” said Town Supervisor Nancy Seligson, a Democrat. “We decided that we would table it for now.”
Among the major discussions leading the board to sideline the initiative, Seligson said, was difficulty in deciding just how to enforce the law; specifically, whether the town had the resources to conduct adequate searches on members of the public entering a building.
“We started to think about what it would take to have some kind of search when people come into a building,” she said. “We decided we didn’t have the wherewithal to do that at this time.”
After some contentious discussion at a public hearing last month, the town board also realized that it could be facing several potential lawsuits if the proposal had moved forward.
That public hearing saw dozens of owners and activists voice their concerns. Among them was Scott Sommavilla, president of the Westchester Firearms Association, who told the Review that his gun rights collective was “lawyered up.”
Increasingly throughout the past several months, municipalities across Westchester County have begun to tackle the regulation of guns, following the controversial opening of a gun store in Harrison that operates less than a mile away from an elementary school. The store sparked widespread criticism throughout Harrison as well as an online petition to find a way to close down the store that was signed by 3,500 people.
While the county Board of Legislators introduced legislation to ban gun shows in county-owned facilities—a law that was later vetoed by County Executive Rob Astorino, a Republican, and has since been retooled and sent back to committees—the village of Rye Brook has taken preliminary steps to ban gun stores within a certain proximity of schools.
Currently on the county level, lawmakers will mull over the codification of a slew of provisions regulating gun shows countywide.
That discussion stemmed from the administration of County Executive Rob Astorino, a Republican, moving forward, last month, with a gun show at the Westchester County Convention Center; the first gun show held by the county since 2010; a previously scheduled show was canceled in the wake of the 2012 shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.
Critics of the proposed law—modeled after New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s model gun show legislation—say it is redundant to many of the regulations mandated by New York state’s Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement, SAFE, Act.
As for whether the town board plans on revisiting its proposition banning guns, Seligson told the Review the issue may turn out to be long-term.
“It’s not likely in the near future,” she said.
Sommavilla could not be reached for comment as of press time.
