Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan outlines plan to reduce gun violence

Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan announced she’s developing legislation within the next month to address gun violence.

Thousands expected to attend March for Our Lives on Saturday

Durkan said on Wednesday that the legislation will request safe storage of firearms and increase civil penalties and legal responsibility for not reporting lost or stolen firearms. Her office will work with stakeholders including gun owners, safety advocates, community members, and public health experts on the legislation.

“We should not pretend for one second that the level of carnage in our country from guns is inevitable. We cannot allow it to become the new normal,” Mayor Durkan said. “Unsecured, unsafely stored firearms are more likely to be stolen, used in a suicide, accessed by children and teens and unintentionally fired.”

According to the mayor’s office, Seattle police says 250 stolen guns were reported from burglaries and car prowls in 2017.

In 2013, the Seattle City Council passed a tax on guns and ammo to help fund gun violence prevention research and to help fund work by the Harborview Injury Prevention & Research Center.

Most recently, the City of Seattle and Seattle Police Department launched a new website, so that residents can easily complete an Extreme Risk Protection Order. According to the city’s website, “an ERPO was designed to give family, household members, and law enforcement a way to petition the court to restrict the access and ability for a person with health crisis issues to purchase or possess firearms.”

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