City & County of San Francisco Announce Gun Buyback This Saturday
San Francisco, CA – Supervisor Malia Cohen, Supervisor David Campos, Police Chief Greg Suhr and community based agencies Alive & Free Omega Boys Club, CARECEN, Community Youth Center announce a citywide Gun Buy-Back event for San Francisco. “Gun buybacks are important to our ongoing efforts to keep San Francisco safer by getting violent weapons out of our homes and off our streets,” said Mayor Ed Lee. “Gun violence is an epidemic impacting the entire nation, and San Francisco joins in solidarity with cities across our State including Oakland, Los Angeles and San Jose to promote an end to gun violence once and for all.”
On Saturday, December 14thfour major cities will organize gun buy-back events in their local jurisdictions on the one year anniversary of the tragic mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School. “I cannot think of a better way to honor the memory of the 20 children and 7 adults who lost their lives one year ago at Sandy Hook, as well as those, right here in our own community, than to take these gruesome and tragic events and to bring about some small amount of good,” said Supervisor Malia Cohen. “With this gun buyback, we are taking guns off of the streets and raising awareness about violence among community members, we are limiting high capacity magazines in assault weapons, we are limiting the amount of ammunition one individual can purchase, that’s doing something.” Individually none of these measures are a panacea to put an end to violence but collectively they do keep people safer. If only one life is saved because of our efforts, then it is worth all the time and every penny spent.”
As a part of the IPO initiative -Interrupt, Predict and Organize for a Safer San Francisco- the Mayor’s Office partnered with Supervisor Cohen, Supervisor Campos, Alive & Free Omega Boys Club and CARECEN to sponsor previous neighborhood based gun buy-back events. Past events encouraged residents to turn in anonymously a total of 453 guns to SFPD.“We must do everything in our power to keep the adults and children in our city safe” said Supervisor David Campos. “The terrible tragedy that took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School one year ago is a call to action-- we must continue to be vigilant in protecting the lives of all our community members, especially the most vulnerable. This Gun buyback today enables us to come together as a community to do something about gun violence and increase safety for all of our residents, and I am honored to be a part of it.”
This event is a citywide effort organized in partnership with Alive & Free - Omega Boys Club, Central American Resource Center (CARECEN), and Community Youth Center. Dr. Marshall, Executive Director of Alive & Free Omega Boys Club, states "We at Alive & Free are excited about partnering with the Mayor's office, other elected officials, SFPD and community partners in the effort to reduce gun violence within the city and across the state. One less gun makes a safer community.” Community based agencies are instrumental in working collectively with city agencies to encourage community residents to anonymously submit guns to the police department.
“We see violence as a health issue, and we think that getting unwanted guns out of people’s homes is a harm reduction approach that complements our day-to-day work of providing disconnected youth with alternatives to violence including family support, case management, mental health and other barrier removal services aimed at increasing health outcomes and braking generational cycles of violence in our community. We commend the Mayor’s Office, Supervisor David Campos, community partners and volunteers for pulling our resources together to raise awareness and make a dent in reducing gun violence in San Francisco.“ said Lariza Dugan-Cuadra, Executive Director of CARECEN.
"We are proud to be able to be part of this effort to reduce gun violence in the memory of those who lost their lives so senselessly one year ago at Sandy Hook. Any time we have the opportunity to remove guns out of circulation, we need to take it. Every gun turned in is one less gun that could find its way to the streets to be used to harm someone else – less guns will always be better than more guns," said SFPD Chief of Police, Greg Suhr.
San Francisco’s Gun Buyback
Saturday, December 14th 2013, 9:00am-2:00pm
Alive & Free - Omega Boys Club, 1060 Tennessee Street
This is a drive-through event: participants must arrive in a car, with unloaded weapon(s) already placed in the trunk of the car. Guns in working condition will be exchanged for $100 ($200 for assault weapons), no questions asked. A maximum of five guns may be exchanged per vehicle or per person. Participants will be greeted by ALIVE & FREE, CYC, or CARECEN staff.