Archive for May, 2010

I spoke with Diane McNamara tonight and she gave me an update on the three bills discussed on the original post and asked that I pass it on to the group.

She called and spoke with the people in Kevin Jeffries office in Murrieta and found out that Assemblyman Jeffries and everyone in his office are opposed to this legislation, which is a good thing. However, she was told that these bills had already been pushed through the Assembly and were headed to the Governor’s desk and there was nothing more that Assemblyman Jeffries could do.

So, if you are concerned about losing your 2nd Ammendment rights to bare arms in the State of California, the only avenue left is to contact the Governor’s office directly and let your voice be heard.

Here are the phone numbers to contact the Governor:

• Riverside District Office:
  • Voice: 951-680-6860
  • Fax: 951-680-6863
• Sacramento Office:
  • Voice: 916-445-2841
  • Fax: 916-558-3160

If you want to email the Governor, you can use this link to get to his email page. Be sure to select “Gun Control” from the Subject drop down. http://gov.ca.gov/interact

Please refer to the assembly bill numbers AB1810, AB1934, & AB2223 when contacting the Governor’s office.

John Bucholzer will be leading the group on our next metal detecting outing on Saturday May 22nd and we will be going to Holcomb Valley looking for gold.  In your GPAA Mining Guide it is CA-46 & CA-47. We will meet at 8:00 am at the Big Bear Discovery Center which is located at 40971 North Shore Drive (Highway 38), Fawnskin, CA 92333.

Items to bring:

• Lunch
• Water (a must have)
• Adventure pass (so you can park your vehicle)
• GPAA membership prospecting permit or bring a friend with one
• Metal Detector

There is no phone reception where we are going, so call before Saturday with any questions.

The TVP Outing is this Saturday (5/15/2010). The group will be going to the Crystal Group claims (GPAA # CA-45) and will be meeting at 8:00 am.

For more details on the outing, please see Wagonmaster Jay’s post in the TVP Forum. Click Here to go directly to the post.

The following letter was received from Chris W. Cox (NRA-ILA Executive Director). If you value your rights as a U.S. citizen to keep and bear arms (2nd amendment), then please read this letter and take action today. All three of the bills listed in this post are still active (as of this writing) which means they can still be influenced.

I am contacting you today with an urgent message. Your rights as a gun owner are under attack in Sacramento and you must act now if we are going to stop this unprecedented assault on the Second Amendment.

In the next few days, the California Legislature will consider three radical anti-gun bills that will pile even more restrictions on law-abiding California gun owners and sportsmen.

First is AB1810. This bill will expand the California’s registration requirements to cover all long guns. California already registers handguns. Now, California’s politicians want to waste billions of taxpayer dollars to keep track of your legally owned long guns as well, in spite of the fact that long guns are rarely used in crime.

This is nothing short of a direct assault on your fundamental Second Amendment rights. It will set the stage for even more gun laws, including more gun bans, gun rationing and other extreme proposals. Time after time, gun registries have been used to assist anti-gun governments to confiscate firearms.

Long gun registration is not a new idea. It’s been tried and it’s failed. Right now, the Canadian government is considering the elimination (if its long gun registry, which has cost billions of dollars and served no useful purpose for law enforcement. In the midst of a budget crisis, California can’t afford to waste billions of taxpayer dollars on such a useless system.

Next is AB1934, to ban the open carry of unloaded handguns. Anti-gun politicians in the legislature are not satisfied that law-abiding people are almost completely denied the Right to Carry in California; now they want to ban unloaded guns. And why? Because they fear even the sight of a firearm! This irrational fear of firearms is one of the main reasons anti-gunners continue to attack our right to keep and bear arms.

The open or concealed carry of firearms by law-abiding citizens is no threat to public safety. This bill extends California’s unnecessary restriction on the Right to Carry to include even unloaded firearms! AB 1934 is a knee-jerk reaction by anti-gun legislators to punish citizens for engaging in a legal act that harms no one. In reality, the open carrying of firearms-by-law-abiding citizens is caused by California’s unfair concealed carry law, which allows citizens from one county to apply for and receive a permit to carry, while their neighbors in the next county are denied that basic right in a capricious and arbitrary manner, usually due to political, and not public safety, reasons.

Rather than add to the restrictions on the rights of law-abiding gun owners, the legislature should take steps to ensure that all the people of California are treated equally under the law by enacting a state-wide shall-issue Right to Carry law, with clear standards for the issuance of a carry permit that all counties must follow.

Finally, AB2223 would ban the use of lead shot for hunting in wildlife management areas. This bill is not about the environment or protecting wildlife. It is about attacking our hunting heritage. It has the support of extremist animal “rights” groups, like the Humane Society of the United States, as well as radical environmental groups. What it does not have is one shred of legitimate scientific data to back up the claims that using lead shot in hunting has any negative
impact on wildlife populations or the environment.

This bill will make hunting more expensive and force hunters to use hard-to-find non-lead ammo,
in turn reducing the revenue that flows to conservation programs from the sale of hunting licenses.

But the truth is, this bill has never been about protecting wildlife or the environment. It’s about reducing the number of hunters. The anti-hunting radicals want to make hunting so expensive and the laws so intrusive that hunters give up.

Please act immediately to stop these anti-gun bills! There is no time to wait! The anti-gunners have these bills fast-tracked. You must contact your Assembly Member and State Senator TODAY!

Every Californian’s Second Amendment freedoms will be seriously damaged if these bills are allowed to pass. Please call and write your lawmakers immediately and urge them to oppose AB1810, AB1934 and AB2223.

Here is the contact information for our representatives:

Assembly Member Kevin Jeffries (66th Assembly District)
Capitol Office: (916) 319-2066
District Office: (951) 894-1232
41391 Kalmia Street, Suite 220
Murrieta, CA 92562

Assembly Member Paul Cook (65th Assembly District)
Capitol Office: (916) 319-2065
District Office: (909) 790-4196
34932 Yucaipa Blvd
Yucaipa, CA 92399

State Senator Barbara Boxer
112 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington DC, 20510
202-224-3553

State Senator Diane Feinstein
331 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington DC, 20510
202-224-3841

7 Members participated in the APRIL Finds of the Month.

GOLD FINDS WINNERS:

• Jim & Sue Jeffrey Won a vial with Gold for their find at Two Quartz & Dome Rock, AZ.
• Tom Clark Won a Bicentennial Coin for his find in the Desert
• Diane McNamara Brought in her find from Dale Mining Area
• Tracy Snethen Brought in his find from the GPAA Crystal Area
• Frank Ramirez Brought in his find from Dale Mining Area

April 2010 Gold

April 2010 Gold

April 2010 Gold

TREASURE FINDS WINNERS:

• Diane McNamara Won a vial with Gold for her find in Desert/Beach
• Lorrie Young Won a Bicentennial Coin for his find in Parks

April 2010 Treasure

DISPLAY:

Diane McNamara Brought in a large quantity of Garnets she found at the Horse Thief Area

Thanks for sharing your finds with the membership. Good luck and bring home the gold!

Doug Balhorn

The May 2010 Temecula Valley Prospectors meeting will be held on Saturday, May 8th, at 9:00 am. Our meetings are held at the Temecula Community Center located at 28816 Pujol St., Temecula CA.

The Grand Prize Raffle (Roy’s Rocker Picture & Garrett Scorpion Gold Stinger Metal Detector) will be drawn this month, so be sure to come and get some additional tickets. You don’t have to be present to win the Grand Prize, but the more tickets you have in the bucket, the better your chance to win!

Our speaker this month will be Cory Rudolph who has been prospecting for more than 40 years. Cory will be touching on some real interesting topics, so plan on being there. You definitely don’t want to miss this one!

All are welcome, so we hope to see you there.