Seattle Brings Back its Gun Buyback Program
“Let us study war no more,” said Aaron Williams, senior pastor of Mt. Zion Baptist Church, quoting Isaiah about beating swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks.
Williams was introducing this morning’s panel of city, county, and civic leaders who had gathered to announce the return of a gun buyback program in Seattle, after a hiatus of 20 years.
“I wonder how many guns were purchased between then and now,” asked former mayor Charles Royer, rhetorically.
The first gun buyback is scheduled for Saturday, January 26, 2013, from 9:00 am to 3:00 pm, in a parking lot between Cherry and James Streets, beneath I-5. At present, the buyback program’s coffers contain about $70,000 but $100,000 is the goal, said Mayor Mike McGinn.
The program is being supported, so far, by Amazon ($30,000 in gift cards), Seattle Police Foundation ($25,000), SEO Moz ($10,000), PEMCO ($5,000), Eli Lilly ($1,500 in advertising), Nucor “We Melt Guns” Steel, and the Five Point Café and Big Mario’s Pizza ($500). Individuals who want to support the effort can make a donation through the Seattle Police Foundation.
“Law enforcement officials will not be taking pictures of participants, nor will they be logging license plate numbers or running ballistic tests on the guns that are turned in,” reads the press release, but at the conference, Seattle Police Deputy Chief Nick Metz said that the department did plan to check serial numbers to determine if a particular gun had been stolen or reported lost. Anyone who drops off a hand gun, shotgun, or rifle, can collect $100 gift certificate; an assault weapon will net you $200.
“Taking guns off the street is a concrete action we can take now,” said King County Executive Dow Constantine, but he didn’t necessarily mean the “mean streets.” Usually the guns collected from buyback programs are what’s known as unwanted guns. That being the case, Chief Metz also mentioned that anyone who has a gun in their home they’d just like to get rid of–no gift card wanted–can simply call their local precinct and an officer will come pick it up for free.
Previous Seattle mayors Greg Nickels, Norm Rice, Charles Royer, and Wes Uhlman are co-chairs of the larger Gun Safety Initiative that the buyback program is part of. Another element is free trigger locks, which the Seattle Police Department will provide at each precinct.
At the press conference, the media was concerned about whether the program would impact crime rates, displaying a startling blindspot when it comes to gun safety. The fact is that the person most likely to be shot in a home is the gun owner or a member of the family. In 2010, as I wrote earlier, Washington State recorded 462 suicides by firearm to 113 homicides. So crime is not the primary factor to consider.
There’s a 1994 evaluation of Seattle’s previous buyback program that says 1,172 guns were collected, 95 percent of which were handguns. Nearly 70 percent had been owned for at least five years. At least two were handed in after they had been used to commit suicide. 33 had been reported stolen. While many people just wanted to get the gun out of their home, younger participants were more likely to turn the gun in because they wanted the money.
It’s estimated, in the evaluation, that you probably need $1 million to remove enough guns from circulation to see a definite impact in gun-related crimes. After that 1992 experiment, Seattle let it drop, even in the aftermath of the 2006 Capitol Hill Massacre.
King County Public Health director Dr. Dr. David Fleming called the new program “just the kind of public health initiative we need,” comparing it to a step in a longer journey, like that of the fight against smoking. But he also elided the danger of suicide via handgun. The danger of accidental shooting — as when a child brings a gun to school — gets brought up more frequently.
