Gun backers challenge SF's new prohibition on handguns
BY Bob Egelko
Gun owners and advocates wasted little time today in challenging San Francisco's newly enacted prohibition on handgun possession, filing suit in the same court that tossed out a local handgun ban 23 years ago.
The suit argues that Proposition H, approved Tuesday by 58 percent of the city's voters, oversteps local government authority and intrudes into an area entirely regulated by the state.
California law, which authorizes local police agencies to issue handgun permits, implicitly forbids "local attempts to ban the possession of handguns by law-abiding, responsible adults,'' said the suit, filed in the state Court of Appeal in San Francisco.
Prop. H takes effect Jan. 1 and requires residents to turn in their handguns by April 1. It also prohibits all gun sales and transfers in San Francisco.
Plaintiffs in today's lawsuit include the National Rifle Association, the California Association of Firearm Retailers, two other organizations and seven individual gun owners. They argued that the new handgun ban is virtually identical to the 1982 ordinance that was struck down by the appeals court on the grounds that it conflicted with state law.
They also claimed Prop. H is so loosely drafted that it would force museums to give up their gun collections, require police to leave their guns at the station, and interfere with television productions and even the performances of operas like "Tosca" and "Carmen.''
Supervisor Chris Daly, author of the measure, said police are exempt from the handgun ban and that TV productions and operas can use props. Daly also said Prop. H was drafted to stay within the limits of local authority by prohibiting only San Francisco residents from owning handguns.
That limitation "makes it more likely that courts would say it is a municipal affair,'' said City Attorney Dennis Herrera, whose office will defend the measure. He also noted that the state Supreme Court, in a 2002 ruling allowing counties to ban gun shows on public property, declared that California law does not entirely prohibit local gun regulation.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/11/09/MNGG1FLINR5.DTL.
