Firearms Owners Against Crime
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
A pivotal hearing in the decadelong saga of the city of Delafield vs. the Hartland Sportsman's Club is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Thursday in Waukesha County Circuit Court.
Lawyers for the gun club are expected to ask Circuit Court Judge Maria Lazar to overturn a 2013 decision by the city to deny a conditional-use permit for the gun club. They are also seeking to have the city reinstate the permit that it revoked in 2010.
The city's decision to revoke the permit came after a pregnant woman was grazed by a stray bullet that escaped from one of the club's firing ranges.
The accident occurred the day after city officials had decided to begin an investigation into possible safety violations at the gun club.
Three years later, the club applied for a new permit that was denied by the city.
In 2005, the city ordered the club to install equipment to contain noise at one of the club's firing ranges. City officials contended that the club was failing to meet standards spelled out in the original conditional-use permit issued in 1997.
The original permit was issued after the city agreed to annex the gun club from the town of Delafield, which was considering taking action against the club because of neighbors' complaints.
The state legislature later passed, and the governor signed into law, the Range Protection Act, which strictly limits local government's ability to regulate through local zoning codes the operations of gun clubs.
Lawyers for the gun club have argued that the city violated the state law and the U.S. and Wisconsin constitutions when it revoked the conditional-use permit in 2010 and refused to issue a new one in 2013.
Gun club attorney Jeremy Levinson has asserted that city officials wanted to close the gun club so the 35 acres on Maple Avenue, adjacent to Interstate 94, would become available for commercial development.
Attorneys for the city have argued that the plan commission and common council had the authority to revoke the original permit because the operators of the gun club violated safety conditions and standards in the permit.
The Range Protection Act could be not applied when the city rejected the 2013 conditional-use permit application because the gun club was a new applicant, rather than an existing gun club, and therefore was subject to the city land-use plan and zoning code regulations and not the state law protecting existing gun clubs, according to attorneys for the city.
The plan commission determined that the gun club was not a land use compatible with the surrounding neighborhood.
In May 2010, Raluca Buznea of Waukesha was grazed by a 45-caliber round while sitting on an outdoor dining patio at the Delafield Brewhaus, less than a quarter-mile north of the gun club.
The incident occurred the night after then-City Administrator Tim Schuenke announced the city would launch an investigation to determine whether the gun club was meeting safety standards required by the conditional-use permit.
Schuenke made the announcement after a series of public meetings at which home and business owners living near the gun club presented evidence of possible safety violations by the gun club.