Mobile Mayor Sam Jones, a member of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, seeks balanced gun control regulations

MOBILE, Alabama ? Mayor Sam Jones today said he would like to see a balanced approach to gun control that would preserve people's Second Amendment rights while controlling gun violence that affects cities like Mobile.

Jones, a member of the growing Mayors Against Illegal Guns group, was one of two Alabama mayors to sign a Dec. 19 letter to President Barack Obama urging his gun control agenda include regulations making it harder for dangerous people to possess guns, and easier for police and prosecutors to crack down on them.

Mayors Against Illegal Guns have seen their membership soar since last month's tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. The organization, which was started by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino, has more than 800 mayors from cities across the U.S.

"I hope we come up with a program to give people the right to bear arms, but we have some stipulations in there with assault weapons sold to cities," Jones said today. "An AK-47 is a larger weapon then our (police) officers are carrying. We are trying to curtail that. I don't know how you do that and still preserve the rights of everyone who wants to bear arms."

The mayors group called on Obama to do the following: appoint a director to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; push the Justice Department to "vigorously prosecute" felons and other prohibited purchasers who fail background checks; require federal agencies to report records to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS); and repeal remaining "Tiahrt restrictions," which are riders to the federal budget that restrict access to federal gun data.

Jones said criticism that the mayors group is an "anti-second amendment" coalition is "an extreme interpretation of what it's about."

"Mayors are interested in public safety of cities," Jones said. "That's their primary interest. We are not interested in keeping anyone away from hunting or bearing arms legally. But we have a serious issue with people dying every day from illegal assault weapons being in communities."

Jones' comments come one day before Obama unveils a package of gun control proposals including a ban on assault weapons.

His comments also come on the same day that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed into law a new package of gun regulations that, among other things, limits the number of bullets in magazines and strengthens rules that keep the mentally ill from owning firearms.

The New York package also includes a statewide gun registry and adds a uniform licensing standard.

John Sharp, Press Register

Source: http://blog.al.com/live/2013/01/mobile_mayor_sam_jones_a_membe.html

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