Gun enthusiasts, including an Olympic sport shooter, confronted Toronto Mayor David Miller yesterday over his plan to shut down two shooting ranges on city property and ban all new gun clubs, persuading his executive committee to offer a kind of reprieve.
After nearly six hours of hearings and debate, the mayor and his executive committee voted to recommend that city council allow the two gun clubs - one in the rafters of Union Station, the other in a Scarborough community centre - to relocate to private property, since the city's proposed ban would not affect existing gun clubs on private land.
The two decades-old gun clubs on city property - the Canadian National Recreation Association handgun range in Union Station, and rifle range in Scarborough's Don Montgomery Community Recreation Centre - would have been closed under a plan meant to complement the mayor's campaign to persuade the federal government to completely ban handguns.
Mr. Miller - who acknowledged his preference that all shooting ranges in the city be shut down - said Union Station, a major transportation hub through which 80,000 commuters pass every day, is an especially inappropriate place for one.
"Look at the security at Pearson. You can't take a tube of toothpaste through security at Pearson, yet we're allowing people to walk around Union Station with guns," the mayor told reporters, adding that police say many legitimate gun owners see their guns stolen by criminals.
The president of the Union Station gun range, founded in 1927, said he doubted his 130-member club would be able to afford a new range of its own, but may be able to share space with another club.
"If they grandfather the club, we will make every effort to find another location," said Thomas Bradbeer, adding that he may have to look for space outside the city.
Earlier, Mr. Bradbeer and other gun club members told the committee the proposal would target law-abiding gun owners, not criminals.
"I've never met a gang member at any shooting range in Canada," said Avianna Chao, a member of Canada's pistol-shooting team who has trained at both ranges and is heading to Beijing this summer, addressing the executive committee in her red-and-white team T-shirt.
The mayor and city bureaucrats cited an estimate from Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair that "up to 40 per cent" - the mayor later said the number was 30 to 40 per cent - of guns used in crimes came from domestic sources, with the rest likely from the United States.
Tony Bernardo, executive director of the Canadian Institute for Legislative Action - an anti-gun-control group - said numbers he obtained through a freedom-of-information request showed just 5.5 per cent of guns seized by a Toronto Police anti-gang task force could be proven to come from domestic sources, with 60 per cent from the United States and the rest unknown.
"What you know is 5.5 per cent," Mr. Bernardo said. "The rest is junk science."
Others pointed out that Toronto, if it banned shooting ranges on its property, would not be able to host the Olympics or the Commonwealth Games, which include shooting events.
Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong (Ward 34, Don Valley East), who had supported Mr. Miller's call for a handgun ban, yesterday called the crackdown on the two shooting ranges "gratuitous symbolism" that would have little effect.
"I think this report is shooting blanks, Mr. Mayor," he said.
Jeff Gray