No, it's not. And THAT is very disappointing.
The fact that we NEED a permit AT ALL is disappointing and flies in the face of the 2nd Amendment!
However, it DOES have SOME good in it.
1) They're fixing the parking lot loophole, so we will be allowed to park our cars anywhere we want with our weapons in them.
2) Like it or not. 790.053 is BETTER than it was without the Borg's amendment. It's a FAR CRY from what we wanted, but at least it's not FLAT OUT ILLEGAL to have an accidental show now.
3) The un-enforcable contiguous state long-gun sales law will be repealed.
I'm trying to be optimistic. In truth, we really "lost" nothing and we did gain SOME benefit, however slight.
I'll still mourn the next college girl who gets raped or murdered because she couldn't carry on campus.
I'll lament over the next mass killing that open-carry COULD have prevented.
But I refuse to consider ground gained to be a loss. It's just less of a gain than we wanted.
1) They're fixing the parking lot loophole, so we will be allowed to park our cars anywhere we want with our weapons in them.
There never was a parking lot loophole!
Under state law, there are no locations in the state where it is illegal to have a firearm in your car, in a parking lot. Well, to be honest there are some problematic ones regarding Jails/Prisons (and a couple others contained in FAC, but those will get tossed when the reviced preemption bill is passed), but that is a discussion for another day..Oh, and restircted areas of Seaports (you cannot get in there anyway.)
Someone, anyone, please tell me of a location in Florida (not Federal property) where one could be arrested based solely on having a gun securely encased in their car, if that person is not otherwise prohibited from possession by State or Federal law.
People seem to think that 790.251 had something to do with the legality of keeping a gun in your car, it does nothing of the kind.
Plus this change only applies to CWFL holders and is written is such a way to make it unconctutuionaly vague.
3) The un-enforcable contiguous state long-gun sales law will be repealed.
[This is a very, very minor plus, that can be addressed in a another bill.]
It is easily enforceable, if the feds choose to do so. Out of state FFLs are required to abide by both their state law and the laws of Florida when transferring a long gun to a resident of the state. Therefore they are in violation of Federal law if they transfer a long gun to a Florida Resident in states other than Georgia & Alabama. This one is so completely benign there will be no issue getting it attached to another bill. Plus the impact of it is exceedingly small, it's basically a non-issue.
So what we ended up with is nothing, but an invitation for further problem in this area. If some can give me an objective definition of "Brief", I'd love to see it. "Inadvertent" and "accidental" are impossible to define as well - one would have to know the state of mind of the person to determine.
I guarantee you, based on the position of the law enforcement testimony in committee and personal discussions I've had with LEOs this new version of the bill will not change how they operate, period. Folks will still get hassled, and more folks will likely get arrested - "You may beat the wrap, but not the ride!" mentality is alive and well in the LEO community.
It's bad law, period.