Our friends at Black Wing Shooting Center are raffling off a new 2012 Harley-Davidson FXS Blackwing motorcycle.

Tickets are only $25 each and a portion of the proceeds will benefit Buckeye Firearms Association, along with Wounded Warrior Project, Simon Kenton Council Boy Scouts, and the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

For more information, see the poster below or visit Black Wing Shooting Center at 3722 Marysville Road, Delaware, Ohio 43015. Or call 740-363-7555.

If you hunt in Ohio, please take a moment to answer the following 4 questions.

by Chad D. Baus

The Dayton Daily News is reporting that according to a DDN analysis of permit data, opinion polls and interviews with firearm and criminal justice experts, more women in the Miami Valley are choosing to purchase and carry handguns for protection, reflecting a national trend.

From the article:

More than one in five who have applied to carry concealed handguns in Butler, Greene, Miami, Montgomery and Warren counties are women, and owners of local gun stores and shooting ranges say women are increasingly participating in training and target practice.

Although violent crime continues to decline in the region, experts said more women are choosing to pack heat because it is becoming more culturally acceptable, and they are also worried about their safety.

"We are seeing more women and that's a good thing because they are the ones who need it," said John Thyne, principal owner of Peabody Sports in Kettering.

After citing national statistics which show an upward trend in firearms ownership overall, and according to Gallop more sharply among women (23 percent of women say they own a gun, up from 13 percent in 2005), the article continues:

Under Ohio law, concealed-carry permits are not public records, but the Dayton Daily News was able to obtain data about the number of permits issued by gender. However, not all sheriff’s offices could produce the same type of information.

In 2011, women accounted for 459 of the 2,029 new and renewal concealed-carry permits issued in Montgomery County, according to the county sheriff’s office.

The share of permits held by women increased to 22.6 percent last year from 18.4 percent in 2010. Warren County issued 349 active concealed- carry licenses to women in 2011, up from 328 in 2009, according to the Warren County Sheriff's Office.
About one in five concealed-carry permits ever issued in Greene and Miami counties were for women, according to permit data.

In 2011, about one in four concealed-carry permit applications in Butler County were from women, according to Daily News tabulations. Of the 1,623 conceal and carry permit applications in 2011, 436 were for females.

The article notes that while violent crime is down across the country, about 49 percent of the victims of violent crime are women, according to the National Crime Victimization Survey.