Colorado Springs police may sell seized firearms -- latimes.com

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Reporting from Colorado Springs, Colo. - This conservative city is taking an unusual, some might say extreme, step to try to stem its fiscal woes: It's entering the gun business.

The Colorado Springs City Council is expected in coming weeks to approve the final details of a program that would allow the Police Department to sell confiscated firearms to federally licensed gun dealers. Police have already stopped melting down the hundreds of guns they collect from crime scenes, drug houses or civilians who don't need them anymore.

The sales are projected to bring in about $10,000 a year, only a slight dent for a city that faced a deficit of one-quarter its $200-million annual budget this year. But it still helps, said Vice Mayor Larry Small, who proposed the gun sales.

"Every penny counts," Small said.

Colorado Springs is home to the Army's Ft. Carson, the Air Force Academy and NORAD. Men and women in uniform mingle easily with civilians in the shopping centers and strollable downtown that sits in the shadow of 14,000-foot Pikes Peak. People here are comfortable around firearms.

But even in Colorado Springs, the idea of law enforcement as gun sellers has raised some eyebrows.

The Police Department objected, only to be overruled by the council, which in February voted 8 to 1 to direct the department to draw up the program it will consider this month. Lt. David Whitlock said the Police Department has been moving cautiously to address the many concerns the sales raise.

"There's all kinds of ancillary issues, one of which is the politics of being in the gun-selling business," Whitlock said. "The other is not introducing another weapon into the community."

Jan Martin, the lone council member who voted ...

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