GUN CONTROL : Weapon Swaps Span the U.S.
Gun buyback programs have made headlines from New York to Los Angeles in the past month. But such programs are not new. Baltimore successfully used such a program 20 years ago. Here is a review of some of the bigger or more unusual gun buyback programs in recent years:
Salt Lake City: Offered $25 per gun beginning Nov. 9
Denver: NBA team offered tickets for gun at Jan. 22 event
New York: Offered both a toys-for-guns plan and $75 gun amnesty program
Norwalk, Conn.: Toystore offerd $100 gift certificates for working handguns
Paterson, N.J.: Food-for-guns plan offered gift certificates worth $50 to $100
St. Petersburg, Fla.: Baptist ministers offered $25 per gun on Martin Luther King’s birthday
Los Angeles: $50 worth of concert or other tickets from Ticketmaster in December
PAST PROGRAMS
Baltimore, 13,000 guns, three months in 1974, $650,000.
St. Louis, 7,500 firearms, October 1991; cost $341,000.
Hennepin County, Minn., 6,200 guns, seven days in February, 1992; $50 per gun.
Syracuse, N.Y., more than 2,700 firearms, May 1992; $50 for handguns, $25 for long guns.
Buffalo, N.Y., 2,000 guns, four days in February, 1993, cost $75,000.
Seattle, nearly 1,800 guns, September, 1992; $50 per gun.
San Francisco, 1,730 firearms, October-December, 1991; cost $89,500 (buyback didn’t accept rifles, shotguns or guns that didn’t work).
Boston, 1,300 guns, June-September, 1993, $50 per gun.
Jefferson County, Ky., more than 1,000 guns, February and October, 1992; $40 worth of coupons for each gun.
Philadelphia, more than 1,000 firearms, July, 1991; cost $20,880.
Washington, D.C., 400 guns in two days in September, 1992 before being suspended due to lack of funds. Cost: $20,000 in private donations.
Los Angeles, more than 130 assault weapons, 1989, in return for $300 cash apiece offered by City Councilman Nate Holden.
Sources: Associated Press bureaus, Handgun Control Inc.