On December 14th, voters in Exeter, Rhode Island head to the polls to decide if four of the five Town Council members should be recalled because they tried to put the issuance of local concealed carry permits under the purview of the state attorney general.
According to the Providence Journal, current law allows the Exeter town clerk to issue the permits “with recommendations from the town sergeant.” Exeter’s town clerk is the only clerk in the state that enjoys such a role.
Residents in Exeter argue that augmenting the law to hand the process to the attorney general will only result in longer waits for licenses and renewals, as well as more hassle.
The four Town Council members who tried to shift issuance authority to the attorney general are President Arlene B. Hicks, Vice President William Monahan, Calvin Ellis, and Robert Johnson.
Those pushing recall argue that some of these members would not have been elected if they had admitted their goal of “passing another resolution to remove the local permitting process” in the first place.
Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins.
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