IL Expects 400,000 CCW Applicants in 1st Year of Shall Issue!

[Paladin]

ISP spokeswoman Monique Bond said an estimated 400,000 applicants are expected to apply for a concealed-carry license next year.

<snip>

Just how many people will apply for a concealed-carry license is not known, but there are 1.6 million Illinois residents with Firearms Owner’s Identification cards, which the state requires people to have before it will issue a concealed-carry license.

Read more: http://www.rrstar.com/article/20131014/NEWS/131019774/0/

[Paladin]

Just to put this in perspective:

~13M people live in IL (2010 US Census)
400k CCW (applicants expected in just 1st year)

~37M people live in CA (2010 US Census)
~40 CCWers at end of 2011

So, we have 2.8x as many people, but, we'll probably have only 1/10th as many CCWers at the end of 2013 (a FOID is a precondition of an IL CCW, so I expect a very high % of those FOID applicants to get approved for CCWs). IOW, by IL estimates, we should have 28x more CCWers in CA than we do. That means we should have, not 40,000, but 1,120,000 CCWers in CA! (if we were Shall Issue)

[Librarian]

Most places where CCW rules loosened up saw about 4% of the eligible people apply (almost all received). There is speculation that that represents a lot of people who were carrying anyway, and who chose to regularize their behavior.

In round numbers, CA has about 28 million adults; about 10% of those are ineligible; 4% of the remainder is about a million. (About the same answer, more conservative methodology.)

Rather different from 40,000.

[Paladin]

Most places where CCW rules loosened up saw about 4% of the eligible people apply (almost all received). There is speculation that that represents a lot of people who were carrying anyway, and who chose to regularize their behavior.

In round numbers, CA has about 28 million adults; about 10% of those are ineligible; 4% of the remainder is about a million. (About the same answer, more conservative methodology.)

Rather different from 40,000.
I know that ~3-5% was the standard range for years, but these past couple of years, I've read that people have been flocking to get CCWs (Zimmerman verdict fallout, Newtown fallout, Obama bans of one sort or another).

Here's some evidence that the times may be a changin':

While this is about OR, it is to encourage us in CA in our political fight for Shall Issue in CA. For us, our political fight is at the county level, since there's no way in heck Shall Issue will pass Sacto. So, we have 58 sheriffs elections where we need to fight to keep good sheriffs who liberally issue CCWs in office and to replace bad sheriffs (who don't believe in our 2nd A RKBA). Hopefully, SCOTUS will take a Carry Case and give us Shall Issue or its judicial equivalent, but that's a topic for the 2nd A RKBA Litigation forum.

The proliferation of CCWs in OR w/o it being a problem is just more evidence that CLEOs and antis fears are unfounded.

Here's the evidence:
http://www.oregonlive.com/clackamascounty/index.ssf/2013/10/oregon_concealed_handgun_licen_2.html

In Oregon, about one in 16 adults [6.25%] is now licensed to carry a concealed handgun, up from one in 22 adults [4.5%] in 2010. The surge has continued this year.

<snip>

In Washington, which doesn't require applicants to take a gun-safety course, concealed-pistol license holders number about one in 12 adults [8.3%], with more than 95,000 issued so far this year. Idaho doesn't compile statewide statistics, but a federal study last year concluded that about one in 16 Idaho adults had a license.

All three states are categorized as "shall-issue" states, where state law requires authorities to issue a license unless the applicants are disqualified for criminal records, mental illness or drug use.

California, by contrast, is a "may-issue" state, where applicants must make a persuasive case before authorities will issue a license. The difference is dramatic, with about one in every 550 California adults holding concealed-carry weapons licenses.

http://media.oregonlive.com/clackamascounty_impact/photo/13553770-large.jpg

[Librarian]

I think that's a good trend :)

[EXTREMEOPS1]

Well what is good for one state should be good for all states issue all legally entitled persons CCWs immediately .....after all this is the United States...

[Rail]

Training is a huge deterrent to people otherwise getting permits. The states with the highest percentages of adults with CCWs are shall-issue states without a training requirement that have been shall-issue (or de facto shall-issue in the case of my home state) for a long time, some even before Florida: Washington, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Alabama, and Georgia are 5 of the top 7 states in total (Texas and Florida are the other two) and are also 5 of the top 10 in percentage. None have a training requirement and all of them but Pennsylvania were virtually shall-issue before Florida.

16 hours is a lot of training, but the good thing is that most people who intend to carry in Illinois already have permits from other states like Utah and Florida that can be credited towards 8 of the 16 hours, so while 400K would be good (and a surprise), I would expect the number to be closer to 200K. But we'll see.