Is that a county regulation?
It could be that's what the county sheriff said to me and the local police officer confirmed this with a warning and not a ticket. I grew up in New Castle and have shot and hunted all over the country but now is starting to fill up with people and things have changed.
Yeah, those county regulations can come back to bite you. We have zero noise regulations where I live in Osage county and where our range is located in Kay County.
A thread about using tires as a shooting "suppressor" on acreage.
https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/silencer-made-from-old-car-tyres.86614/
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https://www.thehighroad.org/index.php?threads/silencer-made-from-old-car-tyres.86614/
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Thanks for posting those. They settle a lot of questions.
Title 63 over at OSCN; scroll down to sections 701-709, and have a look at 709 and 709.1, which were part of the same set of law as 709.2 until being repealed (if you click through the section number, then click on "repealed document available," you'll see the old text). "Shooting ranges" were defined as allowing persons to "fire a weapon for a fee or other consideration." Property you already own would fall outside that definition.
There doesn't appear to have been a replacement definition enacted, so the law is murky there, but I'd be careful depending upon 63 O.S. 709.2 as an absolute bar to suits since, in the context in which it was passed, your own land wouldn't be a "shooting range" within the meaning of the act.
Similarly, 76 O.S. 50.6 doesn't provide a solid definition of "gun range," but links them with "gun club" and "gun shop;" it also groups "owner" with "employee, participant, member, guest or customer" of those establishments, which seems to contemplate a formal operation--think OKC Gun Club, TCGC, or (on the commercial side) Banner Road (folks outside the OKC area, you're on your own for examples).
I'm not saying that those laws definitely don't protect your personal range, just that there's enough ambiguity to make it uncertain. Unfortunately, there's no caselaw listed in those statutes to clarify (OSCN has links to relevant cases right under the text of the statute when the courts have made definitive rulings).
There doesn't appear to have been a replacement definition enacted, so the law is murky there, but I'd be careful depending upon 63 O.S. 709.2 as an absolute bar to suits since, in the context in which it was passed, your own land wouldn't be a "shooting range" within the meaning of the act.
Similarly, 76 O.S. 50.6 doesn't provide a solid definition of "gun range," but links them with "gun club" and "gun shop;" it also groups "owner" with "employee, participant, member, guest or customer" of those establishments, which seems to contemplate a formal operation--think OKC Gun Club, TCGC, or (on the commercial side) Banner Road (folks outside the OKC area, you're on your own for examples).
I'm not saying that those laws definitely don't protect your personal range, just that there's enough ambiguity to make it uncertain. Unfortunately, there's no caselaw listed in those statutes to clarify (OSCN has links to relevant cases right under the text of the statute when the courts have made definitive rulings).
It appears to protect those that own, run or operate gun ranges or clubs that do not facilitate any accident on the range by negligence though or am I reading that wrong?
709 specifically said:
"Shooting range" means any public or private establishment, whether the establishment is indoor, outdoor, or mobile, and whether it operates for profit or not-for-profit or whether a commercial or noncommercial range, that supervises or designates an area for the discharge or other use of firearms or archery equipment for silhouette, skeet, trap, black powder, target, self-defense, hunter safety, or similar recreational or competitive shooting, provided the noise decibel level when measured at any point along the property line of the range does not exceed one hundred fifty (150) decibels
Then went on to define "indoor range," "outdoor range, "mobile range," etc.
I'm not an attorney, let alone one in OK, but the definition of "non-commercial range":
"Noncommercial range" means a shooting range operated by any not-for-profit organization or any club, association or group which is formed for social or recreational purposes
seems incredibly broad, and a bar that could easily be met. My friends and family are a "group," and plinking is "social" and "recreational."
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That's how I read it. There's a similar statute for privately-owned airports that are open to the public.
There's the ambiguity. That "group" is not any sort of formal, or even informal-but-relatively consistent arrangement, and the "group" isn't operating the range ("operated by any...club, association, or group").
I'm not saying it couldn't be made to work, just that it's not plainly evident from the text that it would.
