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Cities across Utah are amending their gun ordinances in response to lawsuit threats from a national gun-rights group.
The founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, Alan Gottlieb, said the threats are part of the group's legal pre-emption project. They're aimed at identifying areas where local rules conflict with other gun laws.
Utah is not the first state to receive such attention.
"We're going state by state and within each state we have to look all the municipal codes of every city and county in the state, which is rather time consuming, and find which laws violate state law," Gottlieb said. "Then we notify the local counties and cities that they need to write them off their books."
He said the group has already seen success in Utah.
"So far every city that has responded to us has said yes, they realize the law is not legal in the state and will therefore be removing it."
West Point city Manager Kyle Laws said he received one of the letters a few weeks ago.
"We didn't feel like we were in violation of any state law, but the city has no intentions to infringe on any legitimate Second Amendment rights. So we felt like it would be okay to change our ordinance," Laws said.
Laws met with the city's mayor and attorney, then presented an amendend ordinance to the council on Tuesday night.
"They discussed it briefly," Laws said. "They ended up approving the ordinance."
The change was simple. Laws said the ordinance previously said all firearms were prohibited within the city cemetary. Now, it allows guns but bans the brandishing or discharging of guns unless it is accompanied by a military escort or a veteran's funeral.
Gottlieb said West Point City's ordinance is a good example of the laws his organization has challenged in other states.
"We've already removed over 100 anti-gun rights laws without even going to court and we hope by the end of this year that number will cross 200."
Gottlieb also said in Utah alone, his organization has demanded 49 local governments repeal various ordinances. Brianna is a reporter and weekend anchor for KSL News Radio. Contact her at: bbodily@ksl.com or on twitter: @briannabodily
