Coronavirus Danbury: Buying A Gun? It's Not Easy

DANBURY, CT — Across the nation, the sale of guns and ammunition has soared in synch with the spread of the new coronavirus. You can't shoot a virus, naturally, but it's clear that many people feel safer knowing they've got a Mossberg 500-series in their pantry next to that tower of Scott two-ply.

In Los Angeles, gun shops were ordered to close. Here in Connecticut, Gov. Ned Lamont named them to the list of essential businesses that get to remain open during the COVID-19 pandemic. Ironically, Connecticut has among the most stringent gun control laws in the nation, and many would-be first-time buyers have been lining up outside gun shops throughout the state, only to be turned away disappointed.

"They come in here and half of them grimace and make remarks like, 'I thought this was a free country!'" said the owner of Maxx Gun & Pawn in Danbury, who requested his name not be printed.

The other half, he says, thought the gun control regulations only applied to handguns and not shotguns, or that a hunting license could substitute for a state permit. That may have been the case in Connecticut once upon a time, he said, but "after Sandy Hook, they tightened everything up drastically."

The owner says that having to turn away a store full of potential customers ready to throw money down on the barrel has been more than a little bit frustrating.

"I'm here, I pay rent, insurance, tax, all kinds of things to open a store, and then to have to tell customers 'no' is against my religion," he told Patch.

The owner says he tells his potential customers that stick around after the initial shock and denial that the process of applying for a license, taking a safety course, and getting a background check could take "about 4-5 months."

"...and then they say, 'what? I need it now!' And then they get animated," he said.

He says that once the customer has been properly papered and the sale can go through, the gun shop owner needs to get an authorization number for the transaction. "But the state has been so overwhelmed, sometimes it can take three or four days before you can get through.

Still, gun sales have soared, significantly. Ammo.com has reported sales up nearly 70 percent from Feb. 23 to March 4 over the previous 11 days. In 2019, the Connecticut State Police Firearms Unit processed 12,572 authorizations for firearms sales. In 2020, as of Monday, 18,119 authorizations have been processed.

The first-time shooters who are successful in navigating the legislative labyrinth and get their guns still have a lot to learn, according to the owner of Maxx. In the last couple of weeks at his store, everyone is coming in looking for buckshot, he said. That's ammunition his store hasn't sold much of in over four years.

"These are the people who are first-time buyers, think they can buy a shotgun, put some buckshot in it, take a shot in the general direction (of a target) and hit something, which is not true," the owner said. "So you're getting hundreds of thousands or maybe millions of people nationwide who are buying stuff that they really do not know anything about."

Republican State Senator Craig Miner, of Litchfield, said that Connecticut's inability to keep up with background checks, fingerprinting and licensing is a matter of inadequate staffing as hiring fails to keep up with retirements. He fears that it may be a foreshadowing of possible legislative changes that could make it more difficult to buy a firearm.

Miner told the Republican-American that he was stocking up on ammunition not out of any virus apocalypse fears, but because of a bear has been moving closer to his home due to a warmer than usual March.

And how 'bout dem bears? Officials from the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection released updated black bear sighting statistics this week (see below). Sen. Miner's menace is just one of 182 spied over the past year in Litchfield, which is no slouch in the bear sighting department. But that's nothing compared to the 687 eyeballed in Avon other the past year. If you lived there, you might be stockpiling ammo, too...