New York City, gun regs, places to shoot

Dealers/ Manufacturers/ Regional/ Info Mid-Atlantic
1

I will be moving to New York City in a couple of weeks and while I will be leaving my firearms in Texas for at least the near foreseeable future, I was hoping some of the more NY knowledgeable here could educate me on a few things.

I know about the AWB and pistol regulations in New York as a state, but are there any special considerations for the city (manhattan/bronx area) - I ask because I also live part time in the Chicago area and while most of Illinois is relatively free Cook County has special considerations regarding assault weapons, mag capacities, etc.

Additionally, while I won’t have my own guns up there, I would like to continue shooting. If anyone knows of any gun clubs in the area, or ranges that aren’t too far out that’ll rent I would appreciate it.

Any other tidbits of information that may be helpful would also be great.

Thanks,
-Dot.Com

2

WOW. Where to begin? NYC is more limited and more of a pain in the ass & expensive than any place else in the US.

I used to live there a long time ago when it wasn’t as restrictive and have kept track of the laws out of personal interest long after I moved.

In New York City you need a longarms permit to legally own a rifle or shotgun. The permit requres an application, $150ish fee, fingerprints and passport photos & 2 notorized letters of recommendation from people who have known you for several years. In NYC you cannot own any ARs, AKs, SKS, M-1 carbines, M1As, M1 Garands, etc. Any longarms must be modified so that their magazines do not hold more than 5 rounds. The few gunstores in NYC & the 5 borroughs (NYC, Queens, Staten Island Brooklyn, Bronx) carry guns that are already modified. In other words, you cannot own a Winchester 94 or Marlin 336 with a 6 round magazine. They have to be modified to hold 5 rounds.

When you buy the gun or pick it up from the FFL dealer, he will furnish you with a receipt that states how many rounds the magazine holds. If you modify the gun upwards from this figure you could loose your longarms permit. For example, a Remington 870 comes standard with a 4 round magazine. If you want it to hold 5 rounds you need to have that written on the receipt. The gunshop will not falsify it. So what you must do is bring a Wilson 1 round extension magazine with you when you pick up the gun and have the gun store install it or install it yourself. This way you can have a Remington 870 that holds 5 rounds in the magazine and get the gunstore to certify this on the receipt.

Handguns require permits as well with similar requirements–photos, fingerprinting, letters of reference, etc. . I believe the fees for a handgun permit come to around $340. Handguns cannot have more than a 10 round magazine. The permit you will get is called a premises permit, which allows you to keep the gun loaded in your house and take it target shooting anywhere in the 5 burroughs. Technically it is not supposed to be loaded in your house if you are not present (in other words you cannot leave it loaded if you are out–it needs to be locked up). Oh yeah, unless you have a carry permit (very hard to get) you cannot take the handgun outside of the 5 burroughs and must transport the gun unloaded in a locked box. You can also not take it outside of the city by flying and will be arrested if you try to check it in your luggage at an airport, even if you have a license.

NYC Longarms permits: http://home2.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/permits/rifle_licensing_information.shtml

NYC handgun permits: http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/permits/handgun_licensing_information.shtml#license_types

Here is a good reference: http://www.hkpro.com/forum/new-york/78835-muevelonycs-nyc-gun-faq-laws-procedures.html

A good subforum that discusses NYC firearms laws & owning a gun there: http://www.longislandfirearms.com/forum/b-27/

3

Jezz, so glad I live in Mississippi.

Are other metropolitan areas this strict or is NYC a extreme example?

4

Other parts of NY state outside of NYC & the 5 burroughs allow you to buy a longarm without a permit.

NY State has made permanent the 1994 assault weapons ban.

You can own pre-ban longarms and pre-ban magazines, but not ones made after the ban unless they have a certain number of the naughty features neutered (bayonet lugs, flash hiders, folding/collapsable stocks, etc). Your longarms are allowed to have one naughty feature and a detachable magazine if they are post ban. But you can still buy pre-ban longarms and mags from outside of the state that are shipped in to an FFL.

You can own a Romanian Sar AK or WASR because they only have the pistol grip. Metal AK mags are not marked by date and count as pre-ban mags.

They have NY State Legal ARs. I believe the Colt 6400 is one. It has no flash hider or bayonet lug, and has a collapsable stock permanently fixed in a fully extended position.

If I were buying a New AR in NY State I would probably get one with a battlecomp muzzle break and a Sully Stock. This would probably necesitate buying it out of state and having the work done and then shipped in to a NY State FFL.

For handguns there is a ban on any post ban mags that hold more than 10 rounds.

You need a permit statewide to buy and own a handgun. Some places the permit only allows you to carry it laoded to and from the range, other places simply grant you a carry permit. This varies by, town, county, and the judge who approves the permit. If you have handle a lot of cash and make bank deposits you can get a carry permit.

The handgun permit is a lot of paperwork and requires passport photos, fingerprints, and at least 2 letters of recommendation from someone who has known you for at least 2 years. it cannot be from a relative.

You cannot handle a handgun in a NY State gunstore unless you have a permit.

Whenever you get a new handgun you need to write a request from the issuing agency/county/city requesting permission to buy a new gun specifying caliber and make. You then get notification in the mail that the purchase document has been approved and you have to go and personally pick up the purchase document. You then have 30 days to purchase the gun. Upon purchasing the gun you have to bring it to the licensing authority within 72 hours to have them inspect the gun (record the serial number and put it on your handgun license). When you first get the license you are given a blank purchase document to allow you to buy your first handgun. The purchase document dance applies to NYC as well.

I should point out that NY State is always under threat by the state legislature and the senate of having more extreem laws passed.

NYC does not recognize anyone else’s pistol permits, including state permits.

The three worst states for firearms owners are NY, NJ, and MA. Each state is bad for different reasons. At least in NY State (outside of NY City) you can buy longarms without a permit, which is not true in MA or NJ.

NJ has the most contorted and confusing gun laws and people have been jammed for all types of things that would take hours to detail.

5

Ed L,

Thank you very much thats exactly the information I was looking for.

Do you know exactly how they treat out of state long guns? I am assuming that in order to obtain said long gun permits I would have to be a resident of the state which would not necessarily ever take place (I still primarily reside in Texas and plan to keep my permanent address there). I would assume that somewhere there has to be a provision for bringing in out of state firearms for sporting purposes.

“You can also not take it outside of the city by flying and will be arrested if you try to check it in your luggage at an airport, even if you have a license.” - Does this mean to say they solely restrict flying out as a means to take the pistol out of state, or restrict the firearm from leaving the state at all. This law interests me purely out of curiosity as I have no intention of dealing with a handgun within the city, but do you know the rationale behind this restriction?

Thank you for your time,
-Dot.Com

6

I need to point out that what I was writing was somewhat stream of consciousness. If I was writing it in a format suitable for an article it would have taken a lot longer to write.

Anyway . . .

With the longarm, you would be okay if you were transporting the longarm through the city and the gun was unloaded in a locked case for no more than 24 hours. That isn’t going to fly if they catch you with a gun in your apartment.

The official answer is that if you bring to NY City you have 48 or 72 hours, you must surrender it to a nearby Police Precint until you get a longarm permit. The answer is somewhere in here: http://www.nysrpa.org/files/nyc-admincode.pdf

That is the official answer on paper. In reality, I imagine if you were proceeding to a precinct with a longarm in anything that looked like a guncase in NYC I would expect the police to intervene before you got there. Assuming that you had a car, a place to park it or doublepark it near the precint, and someone to sit in the car, I would leave the gun in the case in the car and go into the precinct, explain that I am bringing a longarm to be safeguarded until I get my license, and ask to have a uniformed member of the Service come out to the car and escort me and the cased gun in.

The handguns licensing is a very long story that may not make sense to you from my explanation.

Back when I lived there you could have handguns on a target permit that allowed you to take them shooting whenever you wanted to, but they had to be kept unloaded and locked up with the ammo in a separate place when left at home.

Transportation to and from the range required that it be unloaded–unless of course you had a carry permit. If you wanted to keep the gun loaded in the home you needed a premises permit. But the premisies permit itself only let you take the gun shooting twice a year if you got writen permission. So what I did is had my handguns on both the target and premises permit. This allowed me to keep the guns loaded in the house for home defense and take them shooting whenever I wanted to.

However, in the rest of NY State outside of NYC a Target permit for a handgun allowed the owner to carry the gun concealled to and from the range. Even though the NYC Target permits had the words “Not For Carry” primted on them, they still decided to do away with Target Permits and made it so that the premises permit allowed you to take the handgun shooting–but only within New York City where they had authority.

There are a few indoor shooting ranges in NYC, Queens, & Brooklyn, and an outdoor one on Staten Island, but it is a pain in the ass to get to for most people–especially if you don’t have a car.

When I lived there most recently I lived in a part of Queens that was close to the Nassau County border–in other words right at the edge of the city. I had a car and did almost all of my shooting at the Nassau County indoor gun range located in Mitchel Field, Long Island. It was a 25 yard indoor range that could accommodate handguns and high powered rifles.

If I was feeling very ambitious and had the time I would drive 2 hours to the outdoor range at Calverton on Long Island that had an outdoor pistol range and a 100 yard outdoor rifle range.

7

This applies to the NYC Premises handgun permit. According to the issuing authority, which is the NYC Pistol License Bureau, the permit is only valid within NYC so you cannot take it out of the city or the 5 burroughs. If you arrive at the arport with it and try to check it in, you are attempting to take it out of the city. I don’t know precisely if you will be arrested or simply loose your permit and handgun, but it is not something that I would suggest anyone try.

As I said, back when I lived there handgun licensing was different. I took my handguns outside of the city many times. I took them by car to NH to attend some Massad Ayoob classes and flew with them.

When flying out I would bring a handgun in a hardcase inside my checked suitcase. I would arrive at the airport, check my luggage, and inform the airline person who handles checked luggage that I had a licensed unloaded handgun in my luggage and asked them if they wished to inspect it. About half of the time they asked to see my license. Other than this, they would have me fill out an orange tag and put it inside of my suitcase. The handgun itself was in a small locked case inside of my suitcase. That was a while ago.

These days if you declare a handgun at a NYC airport the airline person who handles checked luggage will call the Port Authority Police to check you out and check out your paperwork and licenses.

NY State does not recognize whatever Federal Laws there are that allow someone to travel with an unloaded firearm, so if you are travelling from one state where it is legal to another state where it is legal and in the process try to check it in in a NY airport, you will be arrested.

8

As a resident of ny, if you value your indivual freedoms stay in Texas. I’m thinking of moving there.

9

Ed L.,

Thank you for all of that information.

It seems I may have been a bit optimistic about my shooting prospects in NYC, I imagine for the time being I’ll have to take advantage of my opportunities whenever I return to Texas.

On another note regarding the handgun laws, I’ll admit that I find them more than a little scary. I can understand the in city limitations, but not even recognizing safe passage boggles my mind a bit.

ICANHITHIMMAN,

Come on down whenever you feel, obviously the freedom has spoiled my perspective a bit which isn’t necessarily a bad problem to have.

-Dot.Com

10

As a recent escapee from the Democratic People’s Republik, I am unfortunately quite familiar with all of the NYC pistol and long gun licensing and registration nonsense. I don’t want to get crosswise with the mods here by sending M4C persons elsewhere on the internet, but there is a LOOONG NYC FAQ thread on another firearms website that more or less covers all of the do’s and don’ts, procedures, expectations, big no-no’s, etc. I used to post on there pretty regularly, and the quality of the information was generally quite good. Many (myself included) included links to the source documents for the NYC Admin Code, the Rules of the City of NY, the NYS Penal Code, relevant court decisions, etc. The thread itself is now ridiculously long, but the owner goes back and updates the FAQ part (the first few pages) periodically, so it’s at least a good place to start. PM me and I’ll message you back with the coordinates and a link.

A quick point on the prospects for bringing in NYS/NYC compliant long guns: I would recommend that you not bother making your existing long guns ban-compliant, particularly given that you can keep them in unmolested condition in TX. I also wouldn’t want to tell anyone to voucher a firearm with their local NYPD precinct (no offense intended to MOS here on M4C). Just go to a NYC or NYC-area local gun shop (e.g., Nassau, Westchester or Dutchess County) and they’ll have stuff on the racks (or available for order) that is already compliant. Suffice it to say that most or all of the fun long guns will be prohibited in NYC anyway, so you’re probably looking at a short tube 870 or Mossberg for apartment defense.

Another quick point on handguns: as pointed out by Ed L., if you get a NYC pistol permit (“Premises-Residence” being the most likely flavor), you will not be able to take the pistol(s) “on” that license (listed by make, model, caliber and serial number on the back) out of the five boroughs of NYC. You can get NYPD to issue you the incorrectly titled “Hunting Authorization Card” (still printed on oblong green card stock) that would amend the terms of your pistol license to allow you to transport your unloaded and cased pistol(s) to and from an “authorized range” within the state (and to carry openly while afield hunting lawfully in NYS), but you still would be prohibited from taking it (them) out of state, even just for a moment. The HAC used to be available just for the asking, but it has been reported that the staff at 1 Police Plaza have (incorrectly) demanded to see valid hunting licenses from some making the request. YMMV.

Either way, I would strongly recommend that you leave all (or most) of your existing handguns with trusted relatives / friends (appropriately stored & secured) back in TX. There, they will not be subject to the NYPD/NYS registration scheme, or the accompanying restrictions on their movements outside of NYS. You won’t be able to bring those handguns into NYS/NYC, but you’ll at least have handguns that are yours (not “loaned…for a sporting purpose” under GCA '68) that you will otherwise be able to use lawfully (carry, transport interstate, defend yourself & others) outside of NYS. You’ll be able to UPS / FedEx those pistols (and their evil, baby-killing standard capacity magazines) to yourself to attend training classes in other free(er) states, while your NYC pistol(s) languish unloaded in a locked container in your apartment…

Welcome to the Big Apple.

Going in a different direction: OP do you HAVE to live within the boundaries of NYC? Living in a nearby non-NYC suburb (or commutable CT, for that matter) would give you much better Firearms Quality of Life ™, but it would also allow you to avoid the NYC income tax (not NYS) on your NY source income, and might allow you to substantially lower your cost of living at the same time.

11

It’s more than a little scary. If you have an unlicensed handgun in NYC or even NY State you are looking at jail time and a mark on your legal record that could prevent you from legally purchasing a firearm where ever you move in the future. If you get caught carrying an unlicensed loaded gun, it is a felony with mandatory jail time. The ranges will ask to see your permit before letting you shoot and will record your permit info.

A few things to keep in mind if you live in the burrough of NYC regarding logistics and longarms. While there is no restriction for taking longarms shooting outside the city or even to better ranges in the 5 burroughs, it is almost logistically impossible without a car. I guess you could rent a car, drive out to the gun range, and then return the car–but that is getting expensive. Going shooting starts getting almost as complicated as going on a vacation.

You have to be rich to keep a car in the burrough of Manhattan given the expense of garages and the problems and limitations of parking a car on the street in that burrough. So many people who live in Manhattan do not have cars.

Without a car it is almost impossible to get to the shooting ranges in Queens and Brooklyn and Staten Island (I believe there may be one or two ranges in each burrough).

Taking a taxi is doable but would be very expensive. If you were going to transport a longarm around it should probably be in a locked plastic hardcase that looks like a keyboard case. I would not want to be carrying it on the subway. Even with a permit, I imagine you would be getting unwelcome attention from the Police and might tempt potential muggers. While NYC is much safer than at any time in the recent past, it still might not be a good idea to be dragging a big case that attracts attention even during the daytime.

There is only one indoor shooting range in Manhattan and it only allows you to use non magnum pistol calibers (only if you have a pistol permit) and .22 Rifles. http://www.westsidepistolrange.com/. If you don’t have longarm permit they require you to take a $65 safety course, after which you can rent a .22 from them for $35 for the next 3 months (not including targets and ammo that you must buy from them). If you do not visit them for three months, you must take the safety course over again. Alternately, if you have a longarm permit you can pay $275 a year.

As I said, when I lived there I lived on the Queens/Nassau County/Long Island border in a building with a garage. All I had to do was lug my guns & accessories down the elevator into the garage and drive 30-40 minutes to the Nassau County indoor range where I could shoot whatever caliber I wanted.

12

I agree.

I also wouldn’t want to tell anyone to voucher a firearm with their local NYPD precinct (no offense intended to MOS here on M4C).

This is a very good point that I should have been clearer about.

While on paper you can voucher your longarm (providing it is NYC legal) to your local precinct, in practice, I’m not sure that they would know what to do with it since it doesn’t happen very often, nor would might be equipped to safeguard it in their building. It might get rusted, misplaced, or moved to some other location. As I wrote, I would want to be very careful about even bringing a cased longarm into a police station in NYC.

Just go to a NYC or NYC-area local gun shop (e.g., Nassau, Westchester or Dutchess County) and they’ll have stuff on the racks (or available for order) that is already compliant. Suffice it to say that most or all of the fun long guns will be prohibited in NYC anyway, so you’re probably looking at a short tube 870 or Mossberg for apartment defense.[quote]

I agree. While by M4carbine.net standards a 5 shot pump action shotgun may be boring and not as capable as an M4 variant with an Aimpoint and all, the shotgun is still a very capable home defense weapon and infinitely better than a baseball bat.

[quote]Another quick point on handguns: as pointed out by Ed L., if you get a NYC pistol permit (“Premises-Residence” being the most likely flavor), you will not be able to take the pistol(s) “on” that license (listed by make, model, caliber and serial number on the back) out of the five boroughs of NYC. You can get NYPD to issue you the incorrectly titled “Hunting Authorization Card” (still printed on oblong green card stock) that would amend the terms of your pistol license to allow you to transport your unloaded and cased pistol(s) to and from an “authorized range” within the state (and to carry openly while afield hunting lawfully in NYS), but you still would be prohibited from taking it (them) out of state, even just for a moment. The HAC used to be available just for the asking, but it has been reported that the staff at 1 Police Plaza have (incorrectly) demanded to see valid hunting licenses from some making the request. YMMV.

This was something that came about after my time in NYC, is outside of my personal experience, and I am hesitant to even try to open that can of worms.

One big problem with the NYC Pistol Licensing Bureau is that anything that is not clearly written down and enumerated in their written regs is subject to the individual interpretation of the person answering the phone or on the other side of the desk.

I would be concerned that if the NYC Postol License Bureau starts collecting information from ranges outside the city regarding NYC residents who shot handguns there that the NYC Pistol License Bureau might decide to start playing semantics and revoking permits, since you were not using the gun for hunting.

I was born in NYC and spent the first decades of my life there. Even though at times NYC seems like the center of the universe and I get nostalgic whenever I see it in a movie or read about it in a book, there is no way in hell I could ever move back there. It goes beyond guns & gun laws, but those reasons are not relevant to this thread.

13

+1 and everything that Ed said is on point, Although I’ll be honest, you tell me you have a gun in the car and you will be a collar :D. NY is very complicated, but if you were to be out of the 5 boros into another county then that’s a different situation, they are more flexible. I know people that live in different county upstate new york (westchester, Putnam, Rockland, Orange) that have all type of things, it depends on the county you live and the rules they have.

14

Nothing to add; just an observer.

Damn, NYC is far worse than I had previously imagined.

Michigan once required a permit which required a 30 day wait period, simple 12 question test and “mandatory inspection” (registration) once you purchased said pistol. This was before the “Shall Issue” clause in MI State Law. One would have to keep the green card that was part of the de facto registration with your local PD (and forms to the State) and whenever you took the pistol to the range the card had to accompany you; the pistol in a locked “non-readily obtained” case separate from any ammo.

The green card and strict “to the range and back” - unless one has a Concealed Pistol License - are still there.

Wow. I never thought NYC would be as restrictive as I’m hearing though it should come to no surprise that they’d be so thorough keeping firearms from citizens.

Good luck, my friend. I do not envy you. A friend of mine from MI chose to live in PA and drive 60 miles into NJ for work due to the satanic laws of NJ…

15

I don’t know if it’s already been mentioned, but as I recall, the long gun permit is only valid for 3 years. So you’ll need to pay a $100+ fee every 3 years to keep your permit valid. It is beyond ridiculous.