ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) \u2014 An upstate New York sheriff is urging residents of his county who are licensed gun owners to arm themselves when they leave home, citing recent mass shootings in the United States and Paris.<\/p>\n
Ulster County Sheriff Paul Van Blarcum, a Democrat, posted a message to the department’s Facebook page less than 24 hours after 14 people were killed in a mass shooting Wednesday in San Bernardino, California.<\/p>\n
The post quickly drew hundreds of comments, for and against it.<\/p>\n
Van Blarcum tells The Associated Press he’s “not trying to drum up a militia of any sort.” But he said police are “partners with the public in crime prevention.”<\/p>\n
Van Blarcum says the largely rural county in the Catskill Mountains has 10,000 licensed handgun owners.<\/p>\n
Here’s what Blarcum wrote on Facebook:<\/p>\n
December 3, 2015ATTENTION LICENSED HANDGUN OWNERS<\/p>\n
In light of recent events that have occurred in the United States and around the world I want to encourage citizens of Ulster County who are licensed to carry a firearm to PLEASE DO SO.<\/p>\n
I urge you to responsibly take advantage of your legal right to carry a firearm. To ensure the safety of yourself and others, make sure you are comfortable and proficient with your weapon, and knowledgeable of the laws in New York State with regards to carrying a weapon and when it is legal to use it.<\/p>\n
I also want to remind all Police\/Peace Officers both active duty and retired to please carry a weapon whenever you leave your house. We are the thin blue line that is entrusted in keeping this country safe, and we must be prepared to act at any given moment.<\/p>\n
Thank you,<\/p>\n
Paul J. Van Blarcum
\nUlster County Sheriff<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) \u2014 An upstate New York sheriff is urging residents of his county who are licensed gun owners to arm themselves when they leave home, citing recent mass shootings in the United States and Paris. Ulster County Sheriff Paul Van Blarcum, a Democrat, posted a message to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":89049,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-89043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=89043"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":89045,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89043\/revisions\/89045"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/89049"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=89043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=89043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=89043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}