NFATCA REPORT

By John Brown

This year has been an interesting year concerning all things NFA related. We have seen a brand new director appointed to BATFE and politics has been in the headlines every day. I wish I could say the political stories have been good ones but we all read the newspapers and know what looms on the horizon. The organizations that have been silently working in the background to undermine gun rights in this country are gaining ground faster than any of us can imagine. The rumble isn’t even faint today. It is loud and we all know with the coming of elections the news isn’t good. It is time to seriously pull together.

Many times during the last year I have been approached by a number of people who ask, “What has the NFATCA done for me?” If you don’t know the answer to that question you have not paid attention to presentations at Knob Creek, the SAR Show, or read the monthly articles that we have published in Small Arms Review – the only magazine today that stands fast in our community, and has for nearly a decade.

This single organization, the NFATCA, and its membership, have worked diligently to secure a relationship with the BATFE that is unprecedented. We have regularly met with the highest officials in the agency to find a better way to work together. We have worked on virtually every aspect of NFA regulations from reviewing the new 4473s to helping the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) with the Department of Justice in reviewing problems with the National Firearms Registry. No one in history has had that invitation.

We have worked jointly now for one year to develop and publish for our community the first NFA Handbook designed to answer virtually every question an NFA dealer, manufacturer, or collector could have. BATFE will publish that document in web form and paperback in the very near future. The NFATCA is directly responsible for this effort.

It is true that the NFA Branch has made many changes to the transfer process. The NFATCA has worked directly with the NFA Branch to insure we get involved and support every step of that process. We have met with the examiners and NFA officials to insure that this is a collaborative effort where the community and the NFA Branch work hand-in-hand to increase speed and efficiency. That effort has been a huge success.

We started this collaborative process and we will continue to move forward in creating success. Current efforts are underway to establish a new relationship with the Firearms Technology Branch to aid manufacturers in every aspect of this regulatory process. Once again, a collaborative effort is underway with this Branch to help detail some of the same issues that we approached with the NFA Handbook.

When you sit back and look at what we have accomplished, the effort is unquestionably better than any efforts by anyone in our community at any time. We are not an elitist group. We work for you. We started this organization by taking some of the top dealers, manufacturers, and collectors in the country who believed there was a better way to protect all of our interests. That Board of Directors has worked tirelessly for nearly two years to create a path of success for everyone. We have done that with a small group of NFA owners, manufacturers, and collectors who have contributed to and believe in our work. But we don’t want to be a small group. We want to be a juggernaut with the talents and resources that come from all in the NFA community. We just don’t want you – we need you to help us achieve the positive successes that affect us all.

The work has just begun. As this is being written, the mid term elections are just weeks away and I don’t think I have to tell anyone that the coming elections predict a storm of anti-gun sentiment that we have not seen for quite some time. Our efforts and successes at BATFE will surely be questioned by astute politicians who don’t exactly have our interests at hand. The only way to protect what we have, what we have accomplished and our plans for the future is to recruit every single NFA owner nationwide and to establish and organization that is so large in stature that it represents a lobbying group that is a force that truly represents the NFA community’s entire interests.

Join today and be part of the solution and help protect what we all cherish so much: NFA Ownership.

As a final note, please read our Mission Statement. Read it and believe. We are the only viable answer to coming together in all of our interests and making certain that our sons and daughters enjoy the same privileges that we do today.

This Corporation is organized as a non profit corporation for the following purpose: To promote the interests of collectors, manufacturers, and dealers dealing in the firearms and devices covered by the National Firearms Act; To promote educational and cultural interest among the members of the public and government in firearms and devices covered by the National Firearms Act; To address matters of public policy regarding firearms; To encourage the research, development and innovation in the firearms community; to promote the sporting purpose of firearms as that term is defined in the Gun Control Act, as amended, 18U.S.C. 921, et sep., and to engage in any other lawful activity, within the State of Nevada, which may be conducted by a non profit corporation under Chapter 82 of the Nevada revised statutes.

UNITED WE STAND,
DIVIDED WE FALL
www.nfatca.org