Posts Tagged → Kim Stolfer
Gun owners prevail against lawless Harrisburg City
Gun owners have finally prevailed against the lawless and dishonest City of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in a case that was first filed in January 2015, and now, over nine years later, has finally reached a conclusion favorable to logic, to the rule of law, and to fealty to the various federal and state constititional clauses enshrining firearms rights as “Shall not be infringed” and “Shall not be questioned.”
The case was originally brought by Kim Stolfer of Firearms Owners Against Crime, against Harrisburg City, as a result of Harrisburg City openly, brazenly, lawlessly disregarding superseding state law when the city passed and implemented a number of anti-gun ordinances.
In Pennsylvania, state law holds that no political subdivision can enact its own gun regulations, for the same reason that no one wants to go to jail for having an abortion that is legal in the township next door, but illegal in your own township, same state, and because no one wants to encounter different driver’s license requirements in East Succotash, PA, than those found in Wild West Philly, PA. Such a fractured arrangement would be untenable, unsustainable, a legal catastrophe. The law must be unified across the state so that the citizens can live there normally.
And so many years ago, Pennsylvania enacted a pre-emption law that says only the state can pass firearms restrictions, not municipalities. Oh, for lawless leftists this kind of common sense law is a challenge, and of course Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Harrisburg had to test the citizenry. And they have lost time and again, every time one of these places places an innocent gun owner in handcuffs. As a result, numerous large sum financial judgments have been generously granted to gun owners discriminated against by these lawless political subdivisions over the years.
Think about this: Democrat-run Philadelphia, Harrisburg, and Pittsburgh not only wantonly waste taxpayer’s limited dollars by trying to defend the indefensible here in court, they then have to pay out huge awards to aggrieved victims. None of this has to happen, but the mindset of Democrats everywhere seems to be so hell-bent on lawlessness and abusing political opponents.
And we here in Harrisburg are about to begin that financial award phase of our lawsuit, now that it has been successfully decided just days ago, when Judge Andrew Dowling decided that Harrisburg City’s gun ordinances violated state law.
In addition to Kim Stolfer there is another hero here, Attorney Joshua Prince, who has climbed Mount Everest a hundred times over the past nine years in his hard work to keep the city accountable and the rule of law alive. I do not know what the payment arrangement betwen FOAC and Josh Prince is, but I am sure Josh is not getting much more than a few bucks an hour at the present. A financial award commensurate with appropriately smacking down the city’s lawlessness might and hopefully will reset the ledger in favor of Joshua Prince. Josh also maintains a stable of attorneys helping him.
Other people involved in this lawsuit are Kim Stolfer’s successor at FOAC-ILLEA, a dogged and articulate ex-cop named Jim Stoker, a plaintiff named Howard Bullock, who works in the City of Harrisburg, and yours truly, moi, Josh First, who lives in the City of Harrisburg. Part of my sometimes colorful testimony in court last month is highlighted below.
Josh Prince’s blog post today about this important holding is here. The actual court decision is here.
If you are a gun owner, or a freedom lover, or a good government believer, definitely donate some bucks to FOAC-ILLEA. They have earned your support!
Good rally to make
The annual Pennsylvania 2A rally started in either 1999 or 2000. It was then-Melody Zullinger’s idea, as an act of the PA Federation of Sportsmen’s Clubs. Within months the event had been taken over by then-state representative Daryl Metcalfe, and then by Firearms Owners Against Crime’s Kim Stolfer. Kim was the annual face of the rally for close to twenty years.
Now that Kim is gone to hang out with his Marine buddies in the sky, the rally is being promoted the most by Gun Owners of America, a relative newcomer to Second Amendment rights. But GOA is as aggressive as the NRA is tired, and it appears GOA is now claiming ownership of our annual 2A rally.
The political football aspect involved in “owning” this important event says much about the pro-freedom movement’s many faces and facets. What is important is that YOU show up, because irrespective of which person or organization lays claim to this, it is ultimately about YOU and your personal rights.
Hope to see you there.
PA lost a 2A warrior
Kim Stolfer died two days ago, and if you love freedom and liberty, you will miss him, even if you did not know him.
If you ever participated in an annual Second Amendment rights rally at the state Capitol in Harrisburg, then you responded to Kim’s call.
Kim was an effective fighter in every way, most especially for our individual Second Amendment rights. Among a bunch of effective organizations, he also founded Firearm Owners Against Crime, of which I am a life member. FOAC became the de facto PA-oriented 2A group in Pennsylvania, despite the presence of the NRA, PFSC, and other organizations purporting to represent gun owner’s interests, simply because Kim and his passionate FOAC members just would not ever back down. They lobbied and litigated for freedom at the municipal and state level, most notoriously to obtain, and then to maintain, state pre-emption for all firearm laws.
Thanks to Kim and FOAC, Pennsylvania does not have a crazy quilt patchwork of gun regulations and laws that change dramatically from one municipality to the other. Imagine (for example) driving the short distance from Wayne County to Northampton County with a normal gun permitted in one place, but which is outlawed in the other. Merely having such an outlawed gun in the latter location could result in your arrest, detainment, and life-changing prosecution, for the simple “crime” of casually changing your nearby venue. No society can exist this way with any regulations or laws, and thanks to Kim, you Pennsylvanians are not living this way, either.
I personally knew Kim from both 2A activism and wildlife management policy. As FOAC’s city-dwelling litigant against Harrisburg City’s illegal and lawless anti-gun ordinances, I was his devoted servant on the former; and as a conservationist, I was his opponent on the other. Kim advocated for leaving many more deer than I believe the farming and natural landscapes can sustain. We maintained a warm friendship nonetheless for a long time.
Below is a photo I took of Kim at the 2021 2A rights rally in Harrisburg. Kim is unfurling the incredibly long list of existing gun regulations Pennsylvanians (and citizens in most other states) are already subject to, making the point that even more plus additional plus extra gun control measures are not needed, because they don’t do anything to stop crime. If politicians want crime reduced, all they have to do is apply any number of existing gun control laws.
But as we already know, people advocating for more gun control are not interested in controlling crime. Many gun control advocates are actually against applying the law and reducing crime. Rather, they are fiendishly focused on controlling YOU.
Rest in peace, great warrior Kim. We appreciate everything you did for all of us.
It is important to note that throughout Kim’s many legal battles to protect your 2A rights, he had right at his side a devoted and exceptional lawyer, Josh Prince. Josh is a refreshingly competent candidate for Commonwealth Court.
Every Second Amendment 2A Gun Rights lover in Pennsylvania must cast their/ your vote for Josh Prince on May 16th.
Kim’s official obituary:
Kim Stolfer, age 68, of South Fayette, Pennsylvania, passed away on Saturday, April 15, 2023 at home surrounded by his family after a hard-fought battle with cancer.
Born November 7, 1954 in Pittsburgh, Kim was raised by his late mother, Charlotte (Moser) Stolfer. Kim was a 1972 graduate of Carlynton High School in Carnegie.
At the young age of 19 Kim became a Marine sending money home to his then juvenile sister Rose to help care for their then ailing mother. The Marine Corps vocational test scores showed his aptitude in verbal skills, organizational skills, and problem-solving, so they put him through aircraft and powerplant mechanic school and he was assigned as a crew chief on a CH-47 Chinook helicopter. Like many veterans, war molded him from his late teen years into adulthood, and he saw and did more than he ever said.
Kim was crew chief of the last American helicopter to leave Vietnam. Due to a communications error, military personnel and civilians were left behind at the American Embassy in Saigon after the “official” last helicopter departed with the Ambassador. Kim’s CH-47 evacuated those left behind as Saigon fell in South Vietnam.
Following his military service Kim went on to work and serve his country as a body and fender repairman for the United States Postal Service. He retired in 2009 as shop keeper after 30 years of service.
Kim found a love for shooting sports through Greater Pittsburgh Trap & Skeet Club, where he participated in recreational and competition shooting including IPSC practical pistol, rifle and shotgun. He co-founded Shooters Active in Firearms Education (S.A.F.E.) and became active throughout the Pennsylvania region teaching NRA-certified firearms safety and concealed carry classes through various sportsman’s clubs and police departments.
Kim was a founding member of both the Greater Pittsburgh Trap & Skeet Club and the Allegheny County Sportsmen’s League (ACSL) club’s legislative affairs branch, which got him involved in leadership positions in the Allegheny County Sportsmen‘s League (ACSL) and the Pennsylvania Sportsmen’s Association (PSA). His efforts evolved into Firearms Owners Against Crime (FOAC-ILLEA).
Kim took his oath to defend the Constitution seriously and was an effective adversary of elected officials and government employees who violate their oaths. He was a well-spoken advocate for personal freedoms as well as for holding criminals accountable. Kim wrote and or co-authored, dozens of pieces of statewide legislation over the years, many of which are now current law, including the Castle Doctrine law and Preemption Enhancement law.
He is survived by his loving and devoted wife of 36 years, Michelle (Pozzi) Stolfer; his son, Jason Stolfer; his step-son, Michael (Emily) Pozzi; his granddaughters, Paige and Gabriella Pozzi; his beloved sister, Rose (Mike) Johnson; his niece and nephew, Samantha (John) Rothka and Paul (Jennifer) Milavec; and many loved great nieces and nephews.
The family will receive friends and patriots at Thomas-Little Funeral Home, 305 Main St., Imperial, PA on Wednesday, April 19th from 2-4 p.m. and 6-8 p.m. and on Thursday, April 20th from 12-2 p.m. A service to honor and remember Kim’s life will be held at 2 p.m. on Thursday at the funeral home.
The family would like to express their thanks for the wonderful help and care given by Gallagher Hospice. He will be sorely missed by his family, friends, allies, and patriots. We are all diminished by his passing.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to FOAC-ILLEA https://foac-illea.org/ in memory of Kim’s life and legacy.
Support the organizations who support you: FOAC
One of the few curses of serving boards of various non-profit organizations is watching financial support and personal affiliation drop over time, primarily among the younger generations. No matter how much good works these nonprofit groups do, it is a fact that public (private) support and participation is decreasing across America, especially among young people. Groups as diverse as churches, shooting clubs, non profit land trusts and related conservation groups, the Elks, the Shriners, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, etc. are all hurting for income that they used to take for granted from appreciative citizens.
So why does support for outstanding organizations who do so much for us and our own interests continue to drop?
Right now there are two primary reasons that are the same across America, regardless of the type of non profit organization. Everyone volunteering for or staffing non-profits are seeing the same thing. First, older people are are getting older, and with age comes restricted income. With restricted income comes less margin and fewer Dollars for donations, a pretty straight forward reason. Related to this is that as older people age, they eventually die off, and America is seeing the very end of The Greatest Generation that created the America we enjoy today, as well as their children, the heirs to their solid values and sense of community and patriotism.
Second, and the biggest reason, is the younger generations take everything for granted. Literally everything they enjoy – roads, schools, bridges, libraries, churches, shooting clubs, etc. seems to have dropped from the clear blue sky for their sole enjoyment. What they do not understand is how much hard work and sacrifice was done by generations before them, to get us to this rich present. If they have a cool beanie hat, an iPhone, and a ten dollar coffee, these younger Americans are perfectly happy to let the world keep turning and to let someone else make it turn for them.
Hard work does not run in their veins.
Apparently social media is the answer to everything with the younger crowd; despite their ethereal quality, those binary digital photons are just getting everything done right and left, like life is a big MineCraft game. Grown ups know this is not a fact.
Younger Americans are not donating to or volunteering for non-profit groups, no matter how important those groups and facilities are to their happiness. Simple and very sad fact. And at some point, after the various organizations go belly up and go out of business, the younger people will ask “Hey, do you remember that friends of Apple Pie Park group? You know, the people who put in the gravel walkway into the park? Where are they, because that park walkway is all mud now and someone needs to fix it.”
One group that means a lot to me as a gun owner, that gets a lot done for all gun owners, including YOU, is Firearm Owners Against Crime, FOAC, a perfectly named group out of western Pennsylvania run by tireless activist Kim Stolfer, in partnership with tireless attorney Josh Prince out of eastern Pennsylvania. Under Josh’s hard work, FOAC recently won a big precedent before the Commonwealth Court, where years of bizarre precedent had required citizens to go out and break the law before gaining legal standing to challenge that law. Until Josh Prince persuaded them otherwise, the court had actually been requiring people to become criminals to challenge unfair laws!
No longer.
This court decision is especially important to younger gun owners who seem to incorrectly believe that firearms ownership is out of reach of anti-gun prohibitionist crusaders. Like the local park friends group that paves the walkway so elderly visitors and parents pushing strollers can access that park, FOAC is out there battling for you, me, US, so that we can enjoy our Constitutional rights without infringement.
Like so many other non-profit organizations, FOAC deserves our support. They cannot work for us without our support of their work.
(and yes, I am the Harrisburg City plaintiff in FOAC’s lawsuit)
Risk & Sacrifice separate grass roots activists from insulated party professionals
In 2009, like many other citizens shocked at the sudden, dramatic changes and corruption re-shaping America, I greatly increased my political activity.
Part of a grass-roots wave of citizen activists that year, I ran in a four-way US Congressional primary. It’s a long story, and in short I ended up liking one of my opponents so much I hoped he would win. Along the way, several people closely affiliated with the Republican Party tried to dissuade me from running, assuring me that a certain sitting state senator would beat the incumbent Democrat, congressman Tim Holden.
Our campaign still netted about 25% of the vote in a four-way race, which is solid performance, especially considering that one of the candidates had run before, one was a sitting state senator, one was a well-known political activist, and we had gotten a late start and spent little money.
In the general election, Holden crushed the Republican state senator who won that primary race by 400 votes.
Fast forward to January 2012, and the Pennsylvania Supreme Court rejects a new, heavily gerrymandered Republican redistricting plan. At the heart of the court’s decision was the “egregious” and grossly unnatural shape of the 15th state senate district, where I happened to then reside, and still do now, too.
The PA Supreme Court called the new district “the iron cross,” and indeed it looked like a cross shape and was iron clad against upstart citizens asserting themselves in political races reserved for establishment members only.
(My current congressional district is the same, with only about ten blocks of Harrisburg City included in what is otherwise a large, rural district reaching the Maryland state line. Guess who lives in that ten-block area. Yes. Me. )
Given my previous public interest in running for the 15th senate seat, it was obvious that excluding our family’s home from that district was purposeful: It was an attempt by political bosses to artificially silence and thwart an otherwise good candidate who does not see his job as serving political bosses.
The court’s ruling allowed a handful of us to wage a tremendous grass roots 11th hour campaign for that senate seat, getting our start two days into the three-week ballot petition process.
Although we did not win, we did give the political bosses a hell of a challenge by winning a huge number of votes with only pennies spent.
A year later, York businessman Scott Wagner beat those same political bosses for his state senate seat, in a historic write-in campaign against a million dollars of party money. The race, and its remarkable result, drew national attention. Clearly the voters responded to Wagner’s grass roots campaign in the face of a party juggernaut.
This evening I spent some time speaking with an NRA staffer. We met at the Great American Outdoor Show, which is the former Eastern Outdoors Show and now NRA-run at the PA Farm Show complex, and he gave me an opportunity to vent a bit and explain my frustration with the NRA.
To wit: An increasing number of grass roots activists now perceive the NRA as merely an arm of the Republican Party establishment political bosses. The same bosses who oppose conservative/ independent candidates like me and Wagner.
See, back in 2012, I was the only NRA member in that three-way primary race (to be fair, one candidate had been an NRA member for several months, which could never, ever be construed as a political move, even though he was the candidate selected by the same political bosses who created a safe district for him to run in), but the NRA refused to get involved.
If there was any endorsement that was deserved in that race, it would have been the NRA endorsing their one and only member, and a decades-long member at that – Me. (Firearm Owners Against Crime did endorse the one pro-Second Amendment candidate, thank you very much, Kim Stolfer)
And then tonight it dawned on me on the way home from the Farm Show complex…two basic but defining experiences separate grass roots activists and candidates from the party establishment: Risk taking and making sacrifices.
By definition, grass roots candidates take many risks and make many sacrifices, both of which are seen as signs of weakness by the establishment.
Self-starters motivated by principle and passion for good government, the grass roots candidates and activists have to reach into their own pockets to get any traction, and they often risk their jobs and businesses in challenging the establishment power structure. To get invitations to events, they have to reach out and ask, knock on doors, make phone calls. They have to cobble together campaigns made of volunteers and pennies, and they usually are grossly under-funded now matter how successful they are.
On the other hand, party establishment candidates have the ready-made party machine in their sails from the get-go. Money, experienced volunteers, paid staffers, refined walking lists, the establishment can muster a tremendous force in a relatively short time. Establishment candidates also enjoy artificial party endorsements (formal or informal) that give them access to huge pots of party campaign funds or a leg-up in other ways.
Establishment groups like NRA view grass roots candidates the same way as the party establishment views them- trouble makers.
In short, few if any establishment candidates put in their own money to drive their campaigns, take risks, or make sacrifices in their pursuit of elected office. Everything is done for them by other people.
So long as party establishment staff and officials and groups like NRA maintain this artificial lifestyle and view, this alternate reality, this disconnect between the grass roots voters and the party that needs their votes will continue and deepen.
So long as the voters see grass roots activists and candidates struggling against an unfair arrangement that is created solely for the preservation of political power and profit, they will continue to migrate away from the party and support people they can relate to the most.
An elder in my family once told me that taking risks and making sacrifices build character and lead to success, and although a 26-year career full of both risks and sacrifices has often left me wondering at the truth of that claim, I increasingly see it bearing out in electoral politics.
The voters are not dumb; they can see the pure American earnestness in their fellow citizen fighting City Hall. They respect risk-taking and sacrifices made in the pursuit of saving America. That is a strong character which no establishment candidate can or ever will have.
Those political parties and groups that ignore that strong American character do so at their own risk, because they will lose the supporters they need to be successful.
Second Amendment Rally – Tuesday
Tuesday April 23rd at 10:00 am, the annual Second Amendment Rally will be held at the PA State Capitol, and hopefully you can be there. Sadly, it appears that Kim Stolfer may not be there. Kim is the driving force behind Firearms Owners Against Crime (which endorsed me in 2012) and the leader of the rally. His health condition may keep him away, and I know that the thousands of freedom-loving citizens there tomorrow will miss him greatly