SUNDRE — Council accepted for information a request from the City of Cold Lake to lobby against the federal government’s gun control reforms, which include a sweeping ban on assault-style rifles.
During a special meeting conducted July 28 by teleconference, Linda Nelson, chief administrative officer, presented the item for council’s consideration.
Included in the agenda package for the meeting was correspondence signed by the mayor of Cold Lake that was addressed to Bill Blair, Canada's minister of public safety, and sent to other municipalities seeking their support.
“The City of Cold Lake is calling upon all municipalities in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba to voice their concerns along with their respective provincial government,” reads a portion of the letter, going on to suggest a recommended resolution for councils to “lobby the federal government to revoke the amendments” to the new gun control measures.
“The City of Cold Lake supports initiatives to end violence; however, feels very strongly that the Government of Canada is wasting valuable resources and taking the wrong approach to gun control that will have zero effect on gun crime.”
A portion of the document’s conclusion states Cold Lake “feels that the federal government’s gun ban will be an expensive exercise that will only serve to take law abiding people’s property, while doing nothing to reduce crime.”
The letter, signed by mayor Craig Copeland, goes onto argue that spending hundreds of millions of dollars buying back weapons that were purchased by people who followed legal procedures is “a poorly thought out plan, especially if its aim is to reduce crime.”
The federal government previously announced its intention to reform gun control with regards to amending the regulations prescribing certain firearms and other weapons, components, parts of weapons, accessories, cartridge magazines, ammunition and projectiles as prohibited, restricted or non-restricted.
The move is part of an overhaul of the firearms classification system to ban assault-style rifles, which has been challenged by those who say the measures will only penalize law abiding gun owners. The ban covers some 1,500 models and variants of what the government considers assault-style weapons, meaning they can no longer be legally used, sold or imported.
Nelson told council administration prepared two recommended motions — one being to accept the correspondence for information, and another to direct staff to write a letter of support with a reference of Cold Lake’s lobby to the federal government’s gun control reforms.
Having read the document, Coun. Richard Warnock said he was not prepared to make a motion supporting the lobby, and instead motioned to receive the letter for information.
Speaking in favour of the motion, Coun. Rob Wolfe said the provincial government is already lobbying the federal government on behalf of firearm owners to consider making changes to the proposed amendments.
The motion passed unopposed.
