Please Attend the Public Meeting on Saturday, May 19!
Earlier this spring, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released a draft resource management plan for Ironwood Forest National Monument that proposes to ban all recreational shooting in the 128,000-acre Ironwood Forest National Monument. The Monument is currently open to dispersed recreational shooting but if BLM's preferred alternative (Alternative C) is adopted, ALL recreational shooting will be banned.
BLM recently held five (5) public meetings to present its plan to the public but refused to take oral comments from NRA members and other gun owners who had packed the audience in opposition to BLM’s plan. However, thanks to your actions and attendance, BLM has decided to schedule another public meeting and has promised to give citizens the opportunity to speak.
The meeting will be held Saturday, May 19 from 10 a.m. to noon, at Pima Community College West Campus, 2202 W. Anklam Road, Tucson, in the Proscenium Theater, located on the east side of the campus. If you would like to speak, you must arrive and sign-in at 9:30 a.m.
The meeting will be in a question-and-answer format with a panel of BLM specialists. Each person will be given up to two minutes to ask a question or provide a comment, which will be recorded by a note taker.
It is critical for BLM to hear from NRA members, hunters, and recreational shooters during this meeting to stress how important recreational shooting is in Ironwood. Make no mistake; this is just the first step to banning all firearms and their usage on all public lands. If the federal government can ban shooting on a vast rural area like Ironwood Forest National Monument, it can and it will ban shooting on all public lands. They must be stopped now!
An extremist environmental group called the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) issued an “Action Alert” to its followers calling NRA members who attended the five (5) previous meetings “reckless recreational shooters.” These “reckless recreational shooters” are the same responsible, law-abiding shooters and hunters who pay millions of dollars every year in Arizona for conservation projects and wildlife habitat through license fees, taxes on ammunition, firearms, and other firearms-related equipment.
Please make plans to attend this important meeting Saturday, May 19. If you are unable to attend, please send written comments to the BLM by Thursday, May 30, and let them know that recreational shooting is a legitimate use of public lands, and a legitimate and traditional recreational use in Ironwood Forest National Monument.
The growing campaign to ban recreational shooting on federal lands in Arizona and throughout the United States must be stopped!
Written comments are due Thursday, May 30 and can be submitted by mail to Mark Lambert, BLM Planner, Tucson Field Office, 12661 E. Broadway, Tucson, AZ 85748, or sent via email to [email protected]. To review the management plans; go to www.blm.gov/az/LUP/ironwood/ironwood_plan.htm.
PLEASE ATTEND AND MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD!