19,147 licensed to carry handguns in Twin Cities

Minnesota: The land of 42,000 gun permits

Here's the real news: "The annual report also counts "the lawful and justifiable uses of firearms by permit holders ... to the extent known or determinable. The tally for 2006: zero." (last 2 sentences in the article!)

Excerpt:

More than 42,000 people are licensed to carry handguns in public in Minnesota, 19,147 of them in the seven-county Twin Cities area, the state Department of Public Safety reported Thursday.

The total represents more than 1 percent of adults in the state. But it falls far short of legislative estimates that 90,000 permits would be issued within three years of enactment of the 2003 law that made permits available to Minnesotans 21 and older who get handgun training and pass a background check.

Since passage of the law, which overturned a system that gave police chiefs and sheriffs wide discretion to deny permits, the number of permits has more than tripled. The increase has been even more marked in the Twin Cities area, where law enforcement officials previously kept a tight rein on permits.

Hennepin County, the state's most populous, now has the most licensees: 6,612, up from 474 at the end of 2002.

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Comment: Those who opposed (that would the DFL!) the right for a law abiding citizen to get training, pass a test, make application, have a criminal background check, and finally get a concealed carry permit, made it out like Minnesota would turn into the wild, wild, West if citizens could carry a gun. They were wrong!