Montezuma County residents are flooding the sheriff’s office with request to obtain concealed-carry permits.
Montezuma County Sheriff Dennis Spruell said his office has received 276 permits so far this year from residents wishing to carry concealed weapons. The agency received a total of 162 applications last year.
“Carry conceal applications and permits issued are at a record high in Montezuma County,” Spruell said.
The sheriff’s department is responsible for reviewing all concealed-carry weapon permits issued to applicants in Montezuma County. The application process requires fingerprinting and a Colorado Bureau of Investigation background check. The applicant is also required to take a concealed-carry class by a certified instructor, Spruell said.
Due to a huge volume of requests, Spruell said the state background check is currently backlogged. If local officials don’t receive confirmation from the Colorado Bureau of Investigations within 90 days, then the application can be approved.
Records show the number of people getting permits to carry concealed weapons has risen nearly 90 percent this year in Colorado.
During the first half of 2013, the Colorado Bureau of Investigation processed nearly 32,000 background checks for concealed-carry permits, according to The Denver Post. Last year, fewer than 17,000 were processed during the same period.
University of Colorado at Boulder professor Hillary Potter told The Durango Herald, a sister company to the Cortez Journal, the driving force behind permit-seekers may be political, with increasing concern about moves to tighten gun laws.
“A lot of people are concerned with what the government did (by passing gun-control laws), and they are feeling restricted,” said Potter, an associate professor in the department of sociology.
New Colorado laws mandate universal background checks for gun sales, a 15-round limit on firearm magazines and banning online-only concealed-carry certification training.
Spruell, who is pictured on the cover of this month’s National Rifle Association’s magazine America’s 1st Freedom, is a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. One of 55 Colorado sheriffs who have filed suit challenging the constitutionality of the state’s new gun control measures, Spruell said he does not believe in a national database of firearms owners, but he does keep local records.
“You will be required to fill out paperwork for a concealed-carry permit, which is kept by my office,” he explained. “This information, however, will not be released to anyone.”
History reveals former California Governor Ronald Reagan fired the first shots in contemporary gun-control measures after the Oakland-based Black Panthers movement took up arms to protect their neighborhoods from unwarranted government oppression. Following their effort to police the police, Reagan sought gun-control legislation, telling reporters at the time that he saw “no reason why on the street today a citizen should be carrying loaded weapons.”
tbaker@cortezjournal.com