Supreme Court rejects gun regulations challenge signed by Tallahassee, other Fla. communities

Tallahassee and Leon County could still face stiff penalties for enacting gun regulations based on a Supreme Court ruling Thursday rejecting a challenge to state firearms preemption laws.

The city and county were among 33 communities around Florida that signed onto the lawsuit last year in which former Agricultural Commissioner Nikki Fried was also a plaintiff. The lawsuit contended that penalties in the 2011 law were unconstitutional.

The 5-1 ruling is a victory for state Republican leaders and Second Amendment advocates such as the National Rifle Association.

In 2014, Tallahassee city officials were defendants in a similar lawsuit amid discussion whether to repeal local gun laws barring the discharge of firearms in public parks and urban spaces of less than five acres.

Background:DCA weighing gun preemption lawsuit

More:Local leaders take aim at preemption gun law in Florida

The targeted ordinances were passed in 1988 and 1957 and continued to be printed in the municipal codes after 2011 when legislators said the state, not local governments, holds the right to determine uniform gun laws.

Florida since 1987 has barred cities and counties from passing regulations that are stricter than state firearms laws, and the penalties in the 2011 law were designed to strengthen that “preemption.” The law, for example, could lead to local officials facing $5,000 fines for passing gun regulations and would allow members of the public and organizations to receive damages and attorney fees if they successfully sue local governments for improper gun regulations.

The case did not challenge the underlying 1987 law but contended the penalties in the 2011 law were unconstitutional, in part, because they violated legal immunities for local officials and governments. Also, attorneys for the cities and counties argued the 2011 law violated the constitutional separation of powers because it would lead to courts delving into the motivations or intentions of local elected officials.

But Justice Ricky Polston, in Thursday’s 25-page majority opinion, rejected the arguments, including that the law violated what is known as “governmental function immunity,” a legal doctrine that helps shield government bodies from liability.

“The imposition of these civil statutory actions for violations of the (1987) preemption statute does not violate governmental function immunity,” Polston wrote. “It is not a core municipal function to occupy an area that the Legislature has preempted, and local governments have no lawful discretion or authority to enact ordinances that violate state preemption.”

Polston was joined in the opinion by Chief Justice Carlos Muniz and Justices Charles Canady, John Couriel and Jamie Grosshans. Justice Jorge Labarga dissented, while Justice Renatha Francis did not participate.

In his dissent, Labarga argued that the 2011 law violated the separation of powers because it would empower judges to determine whether violations by local elected officials were “knowing and willful.”

“(The) requirement of judicial involvement in determining whether the action of the public official was ‘knowing and willful’ amounts to nothing less than an impermissible judicial intrusion into the official’s legislative thought process, and it undermines the official’s ability to effectuate the constituents’ will,” Labarga wrote.

The majority upheld a decision by the 1st District Court of Appeal. The case involved three lawsuits that were consolidated in Leon County circuit court. The lawsuits were filed by cities and counties from various parts of the state, such as Tallahassee, Gainesville, Orlando, St. Petersburg, Fort Lauderdale and Miami Beach.

Attorneys for the local governments wrote in a 2019 court document that city and county officials had been urged to take actions after the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting, which killed 17 people at the Broward County high school. Those requests involved such things as requiring procedures or documentation to ensure compliance with background checks and waiting periods for gun purchases and requiring reporting of failed background checks.

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But the attorneys said local governments refrained from going ahead with the proposals because of the potential penalties in state law.

The News Service of Florida contributed to this story

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Florida Supreme Court rejects gun challenge signed by Tallahassee