A Member sent me a link to a
post by Shane McCrary (a/k/a MR REDNECK), President of the Lone Star Citizens Defense League on OpenCarry.org. It deals with SB766, the range protection bill.
In the post, Mr. McCrary falsely claims that SB766 removed protections that the TSRA and NRA previously obtained for Texas gun owners. Specifically, he claims that SB766 deleted Tex. Local Gov't Code §229.001(c) & (d). Subsection (c) prohibits city regulation of firearms in certain areas like hunting grounds. Subsection (d) contains protection from firearm confiscation during emergencies (the "emergency powers bill" enacted to prevent a New Orleans style confiscation.) His claims are false.
All bills start with a description of the specific sections and subsections of codes and statutes that are added, amended, and/or repealed. (See the quote below.) This portion of SB766 makes it clear that the only changes to Tex. Local Gov't Code §229.001 were amendments to Subsections (a) and (b) and the addition of a new Subsection (e). Subsections (c) and (d) of which Mr. McCrary complains, are not listed because they were not changed, much less repealed, by SB766.
Mr. McCrary claims to have written the open-carry bill, HB2756. If this is true, then surely he must know how bills are drafted. More importantly, he must know that SB766 didn't repeal Tex. Local Gov't Code §229.001(c) & (d) as he claimed. No one can be sure why he would make such a blatantly false statement, but perhaps a second post in that thread gives some insight. According to Mr. McCrary:
Shane McCrary wrote:Oh yea, be sure to call the TSRA and thank them for "protecting" your rights! This was their bill and YOU were better off without it!
Mr. McCrary hates the NRA and TSRA and he will stop at nothing in his attempt to discredit both organizations. His motive for posting this latest false allegation is obviously to discourage OpenCarry.org readers from supporting the TSRA. If he will do this on OpenCarry.org, then we can only conclude that he will do likewise within the Lone Star Citizens Defense League, since he is the LSCDL President. This is the man and the organization that claims to be leading the fight for open-carry in Texas.
So once again, it becomes necessary to stop the spreading of yet another falsehood about the TSRA and SB766.
The bottom line is SB766 provides much needed protection for sport shooting ranges and it does not repeal any previously obtained protections. Does anyone want to give odds that Mr. McCrary will retract his false allegations? I didn't think so.
Chas.
SB766, Pg. 6, Section 5 wrote:SECTION 5. Section 229.001, Local Government Code, is amended by amending Subsections (a) and (b) and adding Subsection (e) to read as follows: