Illegal local ordinances defeated
Jeff Niles asked his local police chief about his ability to openly carry a gun a few months ago. The response from the Police Chief to Jeff was essentially no you can’t carry a gun because Milton has a local ordinance that prohibits open carry. However Jeff knew the ordinance was unenforceable and he was just trying to determine if the Police Chief knew the ordinance was unenforceable as well. It turns out the Chief apparently did not know that Wisconsin Stat. § 66.0409 (local regulation of firearms) effectively repealed the local ordinance which prohibited citizens from carrying a gun, almost fourteen years ago.
Jeff took his time to educate the Mayor, the city attorney and Common Council about Wisconsin’s preemption law and the states open carry law Wisconsin Stat. § 941.23. The leaders of Milton did not know that the Chief of Police was proposing an illegal ordinance, until an informed citizen educated them about these two Wisconsin state statutes. Jeff then encouraged the city’s leaders to change the local firearms ordinances to be the same as or similar to state statutes. His efforts resulted in the following “new ordinance” to bring the city into conformity with state law.
Under the be careful what you wish for category, recently a group decided to hold an open carry picnic at a public park in Green Bay.
Some folks showed up had a good time and as expected nothing much happened, except it got the mayor’s attention.
Well, the mayor of Green Bay happens to one of those people who are opposed to citizens doing what they are lawfully entitled to do, but he apparently has no problem proposing an unlawful ordinance to infringe upon the protected rights and statutory authority of the people of Green Bay. So, the mayor asked for an unlawful ordinance to be drafted to ban the lawful carry of guns in the city's parks and proposed it to the city council for adoption.
The mayor and council members were met by a number of citizens who were armed this time with the law. They forced the mayor to back off and the council took no action, effectively leaving things as they were.