City Council OKs Revamped Gun-Discharge Law

Simpsonville City Council on Tuesday night gave tentative approval to a revamped gun-discharge ordinance that would pave the way for a controversial indoor shooting range to operate within city limits near the heart of downtown.

The Council voted 5-2 in favor of the amended law on first reading, with Council members Geneva Lawrence and Sylvia Lockaby dissenting.

While some city residents have opposed plans for The Gun Shop and Indoor Range from opening their 13-lane indoor shooting gallery at 622 NE Main Street, next door to the library and near Hillcrest Middle School, it was the scope of the revamped law that gave Lawrence and Lockaby the most problems.

The law originally was planned to simply be amended to allow the shooting range within city limits, a use currently not allowed under the existing city ordinance. Instead of a simple rewording to allow for licensed shooting ranges, the Council was presented with a totally reworked ordinance that Lawrence and Lockaby argued was overly vague and complicated.

"This is way more than we need," Lawrence said. "it just doesn't need to be this wordy, or this complicated."

Lawrence and Lockaby, both of whom are gun owners with no opposition to the gun range, said they specifically were troubled about the new law allowing the firing of a gun "in cases of urgent necessity," which Lawrence said she'd like defined, especially since the law already allows for the firing of a gun in self-defense. 

Further, both Lawrence and Lockaby objected to a provision in the new law that would seemingly allow city residents the right to shoot "any rabid dog or other dangerous animal." Lawrence argued that was the responsibility of police or Animal Control, and that the wording might give residents the false assumption they could shoot nuisance or other animals with impunity.

Lockaby also took issue with a provision in the law that would exempt people or businesses from certain provisions of the law if they owned at least 25 contiguous acres within the city. Lockaby expressed doubt that any such landowner existed within the city limits.

Lawrence also expressed shock that the city attorney, who drafted the proposed new law, did so without any input from Police Chief Steve Moore, who told Council a simple rewording to allow for the gun range would have sufficed. Lawrence said that before the proposed ordinance comes back for second and final reading that Moore be consulted in the law's wording.

City Attorney David Holmes said the proposed ordinance was virtually the same as the one the city of Greenville has and that he merely attempted to bring the city's ordinance in line with other cities.

Council member George Curtis said that he had no problem with the proposed ordinance, and added that its vagueness, such as in the case of "urgent necessity," was probably reasonable since it would give courts greater leeway in rendering any judgments.

The only person to oppose the new law's provision allowing the shooting range was city resident Mike Newman. While Newman also expressed problems with the some of the issues raised by Lawrence and Lockaby, he said amending the law to benefit a single business set a bad precedent. Newman argued that the gunshop's owners failed to do their due diligence when opening their business and should have known city law did not allow for a firing range.

The proposed ordinance, which Mayor Perry Eichor said will be subject to possible amendments, will face one more reading before becoming final.