More TN Department of Safety Stuff
arfcommer calls the DOS and does some digging:
I called this afternoon and spoke with a very nice lady in the Handgun Permit department.
The reason for the change is that there have been some ‘forged’ certificates coming in, and the purpose of sending the rosters is to match them against the certificates.
The lady I spoke with said that they were revising the roster form so that there would not be any record of the specific firearm that was used in the class.
The only thing that she said that was even remotely negative was that she wished that NRA-ILA, TFA, etc. had contacted them directly so that they could have avoided the ‘fuss’.
I understand her point of view, but occasionally it’s good that the government be exposed to some fuss so they know we’re watching them.
December 19th, 2008 at 11:06 am
I am sure that if most gun owners didn’t feel like their own government was against them, we would be more civil when it comes to this sort of thing. But when a basic civil right is under daily attack, it tends to make most of us a little snippy.
December 19th, 2008 at 11:13 am
I wonder how much more fuss will be generated once the politicians come off Christmas break and see their inboxes.
I’m just hoping for a response.
December 19th, 2008 at 11:50 am
Well, the way to avoid the fuss is to think before you do. This is looking like your typical gov’t response to a problem. They needed to record the type of gun to monitor the cert issuances. Some low level employee was tasked with creating a form and thought, guns have serial numbers so we should have a place for them. Then no one thought outside their box about what the provision of a gun’s serial number to the gov’t signifies to others. Kind of like when gov’t or businesses create an new acronym and fail to run it by the middle school boys to see if they find it funny so you end up with the Center for Artistically Refined Programs. They should have asked a few gun shop owners to review the form as at least one or two would have pointed out the serial number issue.
Or use the rule of thumb of never asking for more information than is legislatively mandated since it almost always causes a fuss.
December 19th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
Why do they even need to know anything about the gun?
You can do a firearms safety class with a rubber handgun retention training gun.
Just the name of the person taking the class, if they intend to use it as certification.
December 20th, 2008 at 3:00 pm
“You can do a firearms safety class with a rubber handgun retention training gun.”
No, Tennessee’s HCP has a “marksmanship” requirement.
December 20th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
And how is it that knowing the make, model and serial number of the gun helps to verify who is taking the class, particularly since we don’t live in a gun registration state?