From staff and wire reports | Posted: Tuesday, February 26, 2008 12:00 am
WASHINGTON - Permitting loaded firearms in national parks would be dangerous for visitors and wildlife and would alter the park experience, according to rangers, retirees and conservation groups.
"Parks have long been sanctuaries for both animals and people," said Butch Farabee, a former acting superintendent at Montana's Glacier National Park who is retired. "There need to be places in this country where people can feel secure without guns and know that the guy in the campground across the way does not have one."
But supporters of an Interior Department decision to reconsider a decades-old ban on bringing loaded firearms into national parks say ending the ban could make parks safer.
"If you're hiking in the backcountry and there is a problem with a criminal or an aggressive animal, there's no 911 box where you can call police and have a 60-second response time," said Gary Marbut, president of the Montana Shooting Sports Association. "Here in Montana, we are very used to being able to provide for our own personal protection."
Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said Friday that his department would suggest new regulations by the end of April that could bring federal rules into line with state laws concerning guns in parks and public lands. His announcement came in a letter to 51 senators who have written to him about the issue. A near majority of the Senate, including Democrats and Republicans from Western states, has backed a drive to repeal the ban, which has been in place in some parks for at least 100 years.
U.S. Sens. Mike Enzi and John Barrasso, R-Wyo., are among those calling for an end to the ban.
A Kempthorne spokesman emphasized the review was in its early stages, but said it made sense to update regulations that were last changed in the early 1980s.
"It's appropriate to look at updating these regulations, to bring them into conformity with state laws" on guns use, said Chris Paolino, an Interior Department spokesman.
The federal government would not cede authority over firearms in national parks to the states, Paolino said, but would like to reflect the policies of host states. In drafting proposed new rules, Paolino said, the department also would take into consideration the ban on firearms in federal buildings.
The gun ban "has not been a major issue at national parks in recent years," said Bryan Faehner of the National Parks Conservation Association, an advocacy group.
The restrictions, which require that guns be unloaded and placed somewhere that is not easily accessible, such as in a car trunk, "were reasonable then and are reasonable now," Faehner said.
"This is not about guns. It's not about parks. It's a hardball political issue injected by the (National Rifle Association) in an election year," he said.
Weapons originally were prohibited in national parks to prevent "opportunistic poaching" of wildlife, said Frank Buono, a former assistant superintendent of California's Joshua Tree National Park.
A 1908 Yellowstone National Park regulation, for example, required that visitors "having firearms, traps, nets, seines or explosives" surrender them at the entrance unless they received written permission from the park superintendent. A similar policy was in effect at most parks for decades. Then the Reagan administration in 1983 required that visitors unload and store their firearms before entering most national parks.
Supporters of the repeal effort note that state gun laws currently apply to federal land managed by the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management, and they see no reason why that should not be the case in national parks and wildlife refuges.
Advocates of allowing loaded guns on trails and in campgrounds at national parks believe it is, foremost, an issue of ending an unconstitutional infringement on their right to bear arms. But they also contend that park visitors are "increasingly vulnerable" to crime.
Supporters also believe that gun owners should be able to protect themselves against dangerous animals, dismissing arguments that firearms would ruin the park experience.
Organizations that represent current and retired park workers oppose a repeal, saying it not only would endanger visitors, rangers and wildlife but would change the character of the parks.
Bill Wade, executive council chairman of the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees, said people could be discouraged from visiting certain parks, such as Shenandoah National Park in Virginia, where he served as superintendent. "How many of you would want to go out there if you knew that people were running up and down the Appalachian Trail with guns?"