South San Francisco City Council Member Admits Gun Ordinance “More Window Dressing Than Substance”

You read that right. Check the City Council meeting video starting at minute 3:50. Councilmember Mark N. Addiego agrees with the city attorney’s advice to drop a proposed ordinance to ban hollow point ammunition and notify the police of any ammunition purchases of 500 rounds or more. Councilmember Addiego confesses his ignorance of firearms and actually admits that the proposed ordinance is “more window dressing than substance.”  We know that politicians often indulge the urge to “do something,” even if it’s terribly wrong. But rarely do we hear a politician so frankly admit it.

The South San Francisco City Council had taken up the proposal at the urging of neighboring San Francisco’s Mayor Edwin Lee to adopt such an ordinance. San Francisco is defending against a court challenge of its own ordinance with the same provisions.

In this case ignorance and a tendency to go with the prevailing political winds provided the conditions for another gun rights infringement to be enacted at the local level. Similarly, it was local activists, helped by NRA and California Rifle and Pistol Association legal counsel, who pointed out to the City Council the serious flaws of the ordinance. Once the City Council felt the heat, they saw the light.

 

Dr. Tim Wheeler

—Timothy Wheeler, MD is director of Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, a project of the Second Amendment Foundation. 

All DRGO articles by Timothy Wheeler, MD.