Opinion: Letter to the Editor: Keeping Kids Safe
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Votes

Opinion: Letter to the Editor: Keeping Kids Safe

Thank you for your excellent work, Connection! I was happy to see approximately half of the March 7-13 issue of the Oak Hill / Herndon Connection devoted to the conversation on keeping kids safe from shootings.

A law to restrict purchasing of guns to one per month only was passed in 1993 in Virginia, and then repealed in 2013. Statistics about gun violence at the time showed that having that particular law on the books prevented so much tragedy. Statistics show that gun violence went back up when the law was repealed; gun traffickers take advantage of Virginia's weaker gun laws and illegally traffic guns to other states. I did a small amount of research on the one-handgun a month law, and I understand it was repealed, but this legislation needs to be revisited.

I was also surprised to learn about Virginia Law SB 288 - a common sense law that was going to require citizens who legally own guns to report if their gun was stolen or transferred. This law failed in committee and was never voted on. It’s a common sense gun law, I can’t understand how something so simple could not even go to a vote in the Senate?

We need to enact common-sense laws that protect our nation's children.

Jodi Beatty

Herndon