Posted on 06/18/2002 3:51:04 PM PDT by tarawa
Gun enthusiasts blast proposal to close shooting range Give us another place, they plead
By Amos Maki maki@gomemphis.com June 17, 2002
On a nice sunny day like Sunday, 81-year-old Bill Hall couldn't think of a better place to be than at the Shelby Farms gun range with his 12-gauge Beretta.
"I like the smell of the powder and the feel of the jolt," said Hall. " My daddy taught me to shoot and I've been doing it for 70 years."
Dressed in a green fishnet hunting vest and safari hat, Hall was one of a couple of dozen people who stopped by the range for a relaxing afternoon of safe gunplay.
"I feel safe here," said Joe Pegg, 64. "The name of the game here is safety."
The county's only publicly supported gun range is tucked into a small section of sprawling Shelby Farms south of Walnut Grove.
"A lot of people don't know one end of a gun from another when they first get here," said Hall. "These guys around here make sure everybody is safe. And believe me, they'll let you know if you're doing wrong."
"Safety first" warning signs are posted everywhere at the nearly 20-acre site. And if someone breaks a rule and the range manager doesn't see it, the trusties will.
Stationed throughout the range are trusties on loan from the Shelby County Penal Farm.
"They're generally good people out here," said Danny Elstrom, 25, serving time for a drug conviction. "Some people don't know what they're doing, but that's what we're here for."
The trusties pick up shell casings, 1,000 at a time, and do their best to make sure everyone follows the rules.
"Behind the yellow line sir," trusty Billy McCaine told a man who made the mistake of stepping over the clearly marked line that divides the active area of the range from a rest area for tired marksmen.
County officials recently announced plans to close the range to the public by the end of 2003, news that hit gun enthusiasts like a shotgun blast.
"I'll just have to do without because I can't afford a private club," said Hall. "Golfers have public golf courses and shooters should have a shooting range."
Hall pays $4.50 for a round at the trap shooting range. The fee to use the firing range is $7 per person a day.
County officials said the range costs $76,106 a year to run, about $9,000 more than it collects in fees.
The proposed closing is part of a number of changes in the works for Shelby Farms, which tentatively is scheduled to be renamed Shelby Park on July 1.
Under a proposal crafted by retired First Tennessee chairman Ron Terry, the Shelby Park Foundation and the Shelby Park Conservancy will oversee the park, backed by an initial endowment of $20.5 million.
The conservancy will take over day-to-day operations of the renamed Shelby Park on July 1 provided the County Commission and state legislators take action on final legal details.
Tom Fox, director of public works for Shelby County, told the commissioners last month that the range, which is near two hiking trails, is a "liability."
The range will remain open to Shelby County law enforcement for practice.
Bill Gregory, 53, and Sammy Jobe, 55, have started a petition to halt the closing of the range, or get the county to build a new one.
"Our request is that there be another place for us," said Jobe.
It is uncertain whether the two men will get their wish. County officials are looking at whether another range should be built.
"Why not take it and do something positive instead of getting rid of it," said Gregory.
While some people came to work on their shooting skills on Sunday, others came to spend time with dad on Father's Day.
"I think it's a wonderful way for me and my son to spend some time together," said Dr. Mark Reiner, a podiatrist from Jonesboro, Ark. He said his 12-year-old son Benny couldn't wait to get out to the range.
Benny used a camouflaged Remington 870 20-gauge shotgun to practice on the trap shooting section of the range. He waited patiently for the 3-inch targets to be ejected from a concrete bunker before he opened fire.
Reiner said he drove to Memphis because the shooting range in Jonesboro was closed to the public.
"It would be horrible to close the range," said Reiner.
Andrew Smith, 20, a student at Ohio State University, said taking practice at the range with his father, Richard Smith, 49, was a "great way" to spend Father's Day.
- Amos Maki: 529-2322
Just what would a police state look like?
If it's just a trap and skeet range, cleaning it up is not that difficult. My uncle worked for a company that was reclaiming lead from trap and skeet ranges all around the central states. And that was in the 1950s.
Rifles and handguns are harder because the lead is burried deeper. OTOH, it's mostly in the berms, so you can just remove the berms.
Actually the provision of a public shooting range was different than other recreational facilities, in that it contributed that ideal of yesteryear, a well armed and trained populace, i.e. a well regulated militia.
</sarcasm>
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