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Shooting banned in Big Falls , WEAU.com TV-13
- Thread starter Doug Huffman
- Start date
johnny amish
Regular Member
imported post
What was the reason for this?
What was the reason for this?
BROKENSPROKET
Regular Member
imported post
A news story with 3 sentences. WOW. They sure know how to cover a story. I will find out more from township residents, but I think that they are opening a public shooting range within a few miles so there is a tradeoff. OR concession. However you want to put it.
In otherwords, no more shooting a county park land that has hiking trails galore. It makes sense to me.
A news story with 3 sentences. WOW. They sure know how to cover a story. I will find out more from township residents, but I think that they are opening a public shooting range within a few miles so there is a tradeoff. OR concession. However you want to put it.
In otherwords, no more shooting a county park land that has hiking trails galore. It makes sense to me.
Captain Nemo
Regular Member
imported post
Not knowing the whole story makes it hard to cast an opinion on whether this move is good or bad. It is allowed as an exemptionn under the preemption statute. Also there may be some environmental concerns. Many people use gravel pits as a place to shoot thier firearms. It could be that lead contamination compromises the use of the gravel extracted from the pit. The move by the county may have nothing to dowith gun control.
Not knowing the whole story makes it hard to cast an opinion on whether this move is good or bad. It is allowed as an exemptionn under the preemption statute. Also there may be some environmental concerns. Many people use gravel pits as a place to shoot thier firearms. It could be that lead contamination compromises the use of the gravel extracted from the pit. The move by the county may have nothing to dowith gun control.
BROKENSPROKET
Regular Member
imported post
It has nothing to do with gun control.
People have used the gravel pits to shoot for generations. This has been a concern for awhile. A new public range is going to open in the township, not in the park,to emiminateSHOOTING in the park.
That is the way I understand it, but I could be wrong.
It has nothing to do with gun control.
People have used the gravel pits to shoot for generations. This has been a concern for awhile. A new public range is going to open in the township, not in the park,to emiminateSHOOTING in the park.
That is the way I understand it, but I could be wrong.
bluehighways
Regular Member
imported post
I've been shooting at Big Falls for years, and I attended a town meeting last winter regarding the closure of this site. Big Falls county park has a couple of gravel pits in it which provided a suitable backstop for shooting, and the public has been shooting there without fees or hassle for over 50 years. Now that has changed. The gravel pits are permanently closed, with large boulders blocking any entrance by vehicle, and shooting is prohibited. This was effective June 1, 2010.
Now I'm not going to sugar coat things here, there was a MAJOR garbage dumping problem at the gravel pits. Tires, television sets, computers, old furniture, thousands of glass bottles, even car and truck doors were routinely brought here to shoot up by locals and left as discarded garbage.
The real fight to close it began several years ago when a local doctor built a new house adjacent to Big Falls county park. Several years ago this person began complaining to the county about the sound of gunfire, which he could hear from his property. The county told him it was legal to shoot there, and that they would do nothing about it. (They basically told him if he didn't like the sound of gunfire, he shouldn't have built a new house right next to an existing range). Well, this person did not like this, and so he did something about it.
A class action lawsuit was filed against EC county demanding the closure of Big Falls to shooting. 39 plaintiffs filed in total (EC county's defense attorney told me this).
A meeting at the neighboring town of Fall Creek was held last december with the county board to discuss the issues. In the "discussion" was the proposal for revamping an existing shooting range in EC county for public use in the event that Big Falls be closed permanently. Over 60K dollars in GRANT MONEY was secured for this, with the only stipulation being that the range had to be open to the public and not just reserved for the cops.
Well, the meeting was a total charade and there was no "discussion". The anti's were there in force and were on a collective rant about how they didn't want anyone but LEO's and military to be able to shoot in EC county. Time was wasted with ridiculous arguments like -- "well, what's to stop someone from going crazy with a machine gun and shooting all over the place? (at the proposed new range) -- another one I heard was -- "look, if you want to build or fix a range for the police or military to shoot at, fine, we're all on board, but we don't want just average people to have guns and be shooting them. At the conclusion of the meeting, both issues were in limbo. Big Falls remained open for the time being, and the new public range proposal was all but dead in the water. Interestingly, the environmental impact of all the electronics and tires being dumped at the Big Falls shooting pits was never brought up by any of the anti's. Their sole platform was that they didn't like the sound of gunfire and they didn't like the public to be armed. The only people concerned with the garbage problem were other shooters. Hmmm....
Fast forward to May, 2010. The decision has been made. Big Falls shooting pits will be permanently closed effective June 1, never to reopen. How did this come about? My sources tell me that someone who had a great interest in closing the shooting pits, someone with relatively deep pockets, someone with a bit of "pull" in the community, someone who lives nearby, put forth roughly 39,000 dollars of his/her own money to have the boulders trucked in and the earth moving machines block off the area. The county took the bait, the decision was railroaded through and the class action lawsuit mentioned earlier has been dropped. Now Big Falls is closed to shooting. Forever. No new public range was built, and the time window for receiving the grant money to do so has expired.
Now we know what the starting price is to buy off the EC county board. $39,000 and change.
:cuss::banghead:
I've been shooting at Big Falls for years, and I attended a town meeting last winter regarding the closure of this site. Big Falls county park has a couple of gravel pits in it which provided a suitable backstop for shooting, and the public has been shooting there without fees or hassle for over 50 years. Now that has changed. The gravel pits are permanently closed, with large boulders blocking any entrance by vehicle, and shooting is prohibited. This was effective June 1, 2010.
Now I'm not going to sugar coat things here, there was a MAJOR garbage dumping problem at the gravel pits. Tires, television sets, computers, old furniture, thousands of glass bottles, even car and truck doors were routinely brought here to shoot up by locals and left as discarded garbage.
The real fight to close it began several years ago when a local doctor built a new house adjacent to Big Falls county park. Several years ago this person began complaining to the county about the sound of gunfire, which he could hear from his property. The county told him it was legal to shoot there, and that they would do nothing about it. (They basically told him if he didn't like the sound of gunfire, he shouldn't have built a new house right next to an existing range). Well, this person did not like this, and so he did something about it.
A class action lawsuit was filed against EC county demanding the closure of Big Falls to shooting. 39 plaintiffs filed in total (EC county's defense attorney told me this).
A meeting at the neighboring town of Fall Creek was held last december with the county board to discuss the issues. In the "discussion" was the proposal for revamping an existing shooting range in EC county for public use in the event that Big Falls be closed permanently. Over 60K dollars in GRANT MONEY was secured for this, with the only stipulation being that the range had to be open to the public and not just reserved for the cops.
Well, the meeting was a total charade and there was no "discussion". The anti's were there in force and were on a collective rant about how they didn't want anyone but LEO's and military to be able to shoot in EC county. Time was wasted with ridiculous arguments like -- "well, what's to stop someone from going crazy with a machine gun and shooting all over the place? (at the proposed new range) -- another one I heard was -- "look, if you want to build or fix a range for the police or military to shoot at, fine, we're all on board, but we don't want just average people to have guns and be shooting them. At the conclusion of the meeting, both issues were in limbo. Big Falls remained open for the time being, and the new public range proposal was all but dead in the water. Interestingly, the environmental impact of all the electronics and tires being dumped at the Big Falls shooting pits was never brought up by any of the anti's. Their sole platform was that they didn't like the sound of gunfire and they didn't like the public to be armed. The only people concerned with the garbage problem were other shooters. Hmmm....
Fast forward to May, 2010. The decision has been made. Big Falls shooting pits will be permanently closed effective June 1, never to reopen. How did this come about? My sources tell me that someone who had a great interest in closing the shooting pits, someone with relatively deep pockets, someone with a bit of "pull" in the community, someone who lives nearby, put forth roughly 39,000 dollars of his/her own money to have the boulders trucked in and the earth moving machines block off the area. The county took the bait, the decision was railroaded through and the class action lawsuit mentioned earlier has been dropped. Now Big Falls is closed to shooting. Forever. No new public range was built, and the time window for receiving the grant money to do so has expired.
Now we know what the starting price is to buy off the EC county board. $39,000 and change.
:cuss::banghead:
Support The 2nd
Regular Member
imported post
And here I thought the NRA and there state cronies WI-FORCE were supposed to be defending and improving ranges throughout the state.
Looks like they missed the boat on this one. Should give you guys something interesting to discuss as your picnic on Sunday, Aye?
And here I thought the NRA and there state cronies WI-FORCE were supposed to be defending and improving ranges throughout the state.
Looks like they missed the boat on this one. Should give you guys something interesting to discuss as your picnic on Sunday, Aye?