OFCC warned supporters about the next battleground in the concealed carry fight just hours after HB12 was signed into law. In Gun ban extremists' expected ''Business Blitz'' begins, we noted that Ohio's liberal media outlets were all-too willing to help "share the gospel" of business bans.

But as April 8 draws near, Ohio's media is placing a new, increasingly objective eye on this issue.

Click on the "Read More..." link below for more.

From the moment the first reports of counties or municipalities passing concealed carry bans on public property broke, Ohioans For Concealed Carry has been informing our website readers that these laws were a violation of Section 9 of House Bill 12.

Last week, OFCC acted to put the violators on notice.

We are now pleased to report the first signs that city officials beginning to follow their obligations under the law, without burdening taxpayers with unnecessary and costly court battles.

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In the past few weeks, opponents of Ohio's new concealed handgun licensure law have been attempting to claim that a year-old Federal privacy law governing medical records (HIPAA) made it impossible to complete the background checks prescribed in House Bill 12 for CHL applicants.

We told you weeks ago, and now the Ohio Attorney General has now confirmed it: they've been making much ado about nothing.

April 2, 2004
Canton Repository

COLUMBUS — Proposed rules for mental health background checks of people who want to carry concealed weapons could cause problems for treatment centers that must keep certain records private, a hospital organization’s lawyer said Friday.

The state, however, says the information needed could be acquired through the courts, which are not subject to the same restrictions.

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Ohio's news media have begun to struggle with reality: the general public is about to learn what proponents of this legislation have long known. Issuing concealed handgun licenses (CHL's) is not going to change daily living in Ohio. There will be no shoot-outs at fender-benders, or normal domestic arguments turned homicide.

What is the anti-gun media doing to prepare for their readers to learn they've been lied to? In the case of the Dayton Daily News, they've finally decided it'd be ok to look past the borders of our state. And for once, DDN readers are finally allowed in on a secret this paper's editors, along with other liberal media in Ohio, have been keeping for years.

April 4, 2004
Dayton Daily News

Michigan sees few problems with concealed carry law

FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. | The woman, robbed four years earlier, now carries a handgun in her purse — legally.

She was a target again March 19. This time she drew her gun. She didn't fire, but police are certain she thwarted a robbery.

"She's very fortunate," said William Dwyer, chief of Farmington Hills' police department. "I firmly believe that she probably saved her own life."

The married mother of two is one of more than 10,000 Oakland County residents issued a permit under Michigan's concealed-carry law.

Ohio's new concealed-carry law goes into effect Thursday. Three years after Michigan passed a similar law, predictions abound about how Ohio will change with the law. The Michigan experience suggests: very little.

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We've been giving Ohio's highest law-enforcement body in the land (our 88 county sheriffs) quite a bit of attention of late, but what about the lower, local law enforcement departments?

For most, April 8 is being viewed as it should be - just another day on the job.

"For so many years we’ve been trained to approach people as if they have a weapon," said Sgt. Kelly Hamilton of the Columbus Police Training Academy in the Columbus Dispatch. Hamilton thinks the law is "absolutely great", a comment which presents a huge departure from past statements made by Columbus PD officials.

The difference now is that most of Ohio's law enforcement offices know full well that concealed handgun license (CHL) -holders will present NO additional threat to officers. Many are likely also aware of incidents in other states where officers' lives have been saved by a legally-armed bystander, or when a CHL-holder has apprehended a dangerous fugitive and held them for police.

But local law enforcement is not without it's doom-and-gloomers. In the villages of Cuyahoga Heights and Northfield, the police departments are visiting businesses, delivering written instructions encouraging (rather strongly, to hear them tell it) owners to post discriminatory signs banning CHL-holders.

The Ohio News Network, Akron Beacon Journal, Marion Star and Columbus Dispatch are reporting that many police officers have been undergoing training on how to deal with people legally possessing concealed weapons.

"We recommend our officers always be cautious, but also courteous and respectful,'' Akron PD Sgt. Jeff Mullins said. "(The law) is new for everybody. We don't want any embarrassment on our part by mishandling a situation.''

In the past, OFCC has told you about how police officers were trained in academy to trump up charges against persons "caught" exercising their Constitutionally-protected "fundamental individual right" (to hear the Ohio Supreme Court tell it) to bear arms for self-defense.

We're glad to hear Ohio's local law-enforcement officers are getting instruction on the new law, and we hope it's far less biased against legally-armed citizens than what they may have received in the past.