Takeaways:
- In both Missouri and Kansas, state laws restrict how cities and counties implement their own gun control regulations.
- Some local politicians are determined to take action on gun control despite state-level restrictions.
- Polls say a significant portion of the population supports measures such as age restrictions for gun purchases and background checks.
It’s possible to imagine Kansas City — anguished by chronic gun violence and freshly angered by Wednesday’s nightmarish Super Bowl rally — clamping down on guns.
If only it could.
State lawmakers and the governor of Missouri see guns more as a tool of self-defense than as the source of carnage. They put laws in place that bar Kansas City, Jackson County or anywhere else in the state from imposing local gun control.
Likewise, Kansas suburbs would find their hands similarly tied when it comes to placing tighter local limits on firearms.
But some local politicians appear determined to try anyway, pushing for local action even if it means a possibly doomed battle to try to overcome state restrictions on what gun restrictions a city or county can impose within its borders.