New State Legislation Would Mandate Insurance for California Gun Owners
By
Marianne Russ
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Listen Now:
Update Required
To play the media you will need to either update your browser to a recent version or update your Flash plugin.
If you own a gun, you’d have to buy liability insurance under a bill introduced in the California State Assembly.
Assemblyman Philip Ting helped write the bill. He says just like current state law requires drivers to have auto insurance, gun owners should be required to have liability insurance.
TING: "It becomes the individual gun owner's responsibility to manage their liability."
Ting says currently, taxpayers are on the hook for some damages caused by gun injuries or deaths. He says the legislation could change that:
TING: "It would probably reduce the impact on taxpayers and on the cost of health care costs in particular."
He says the requirement to have liability insurance would
create an incentive for gun owners to use trigger locks and other
safety measures in order to get more affordable coverage. The
group "Gun Owners of California" says the legislation would make it
harder for law-abiding citizens to own guns by making it more
expensive - and says it will fight the measure.