Ga. Senate cancels gun vote day after Virginia shootings

<p>A day after the deadliest shooting in modern U.S. history, the Georgia Senate at least temporarily halted plans Tuesday for a vote on a bill giving gun owners more freedoms.</p><p>Leaders in the Republican-controlled chamber said it would have been insensitive to the victims of Monday's shootings at Virginia Tech _ including two who were from Georgia _ to debate the plan.</p><p>"Even people who are supportive of this understand that when you have a massacre like we had at Virginia Tech, today's not the time for this," said Sen. Don Balfour, R-Snellville, chairman of the Senate's Rules committee, which decides which bills make it to the floor for a vote.</p><p>On Monday, Virginia Tech senior Cho Seung-Hui fatally shot 32 people and then himself at the university.</p><p>The Georgia bill is actually a combination of two plans. One would allow motorists to store handguns anywhere in their cars, instead of keeping them in plain sight, a glove compartment or front-seat console, as required under current law.</p><p>The other prevents employers from banning their workers from having guns in vehicles in the company parking lot.</p><p>That provision already had split the Senate's Republican majority by pitting gun-rights groups like the National Rifle Association against the state's Chamber of Commerce, which argued it violates the rights of business owners to make their own rules.</p><p>The move came on one of the longest and busiest days of the Legislature's 40-day session and was clearly a topic of concern from the time lawmakers arrived at the Capitol.</p><p>The Senate's majority Republicans held a caucus meeting before the beginning of Monday's session, the 38th of this year.</p><p>At 10:20 a.m., a full 20 minutes after the Senate was scheduled to convene, not a single Republican had arrived on the floor of the chamber.</p><p>The plan's fate remained unclear until about 8 p.m., when Balfour asked that it be moved to the bottom of a list of about 50 pieces of legislation, effectively killing it. None of the chamber's 56 members objected.</p><p>The plan's original sponsor, state Rep. Tim Bearden, R-Villa Rica, said he was upset. He said a bill like his would make it easier for law-abiding citizens to defend themselves in the case of attacks like the one in Virginia.</p><p>"I think now is the perfect time for it," he said Tuesday afternoon.</p><p>Balfour said he believes most Georgians will side with the Senate.</p><p>"I think the average person on the street understands," he said. "The gun owner understands that this is not the day for it."</p><p>With only two days remaining in the Legislature's session, it was unclear whether the plan would re-emerge in the next few days or remain tabled for the year.</p><p>"There's a great feeling among a lot of people not to bring it out, but that decision's not made," Balfour said.</p><p>That's the hope of Frank Rotondo, director of the 565-member Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police. His group has fought both parts of the bill and he said the Virginia Tech shooting shows how loose gun laws can lead to tragedy.</p><p>"The concerns are magnified now," he said.</p><p>___</p><p>On the Net:</p><p>HASH(0x1cde504)</p>