BILL NUMBER: S5813
SPONSOR: SEPULVEDA
 
TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the tax law and the penal law, in relation to an excise
tax on the sale of firearms and ammunition; and to amend the state
finance law, in relation to creating a gun violence prevention and
school safety fund
 
PURPOSE:
To levy a NYS excise tax of 11 percent to match the federal excise tax
on the sale of firearms and ammunition and create a gun violence
prevention and school safety fund.
 
SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS:
Section 1: Adds a new Article 19-A to the Tax Law establishing a state
excise tax on firearms and ammunition.
Section 2: Adds a new section 400.04 to the penal law providing for the
administration of the Firearm and ammunition excise tax.
Section 3: Adds a new section 99-ss to the state finance law creating a
Gun violence prevention and school safety fund.
Section 4: Provides for a severability clause. Section 5: Provides for
the effective date.
 
JUSTIFICATION:
(a) Gun violence is a public health and safety crisis nationwide.
Firearms are now the leading cause of death for American children. New
York's gun death rates are substantially lower than the national aver-
age, yet firearms remain a leading cause of death, injury, and trauma
for young people and especially young people of color in this state.
(b) Gun violence also contributes to significant racial and socioeconom-
ic inequality in safety. The most recent available data from the federal
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) indicates that in 2021,
nationwide, the parents of a Black son 13 to 19 years of age were more
likely to lose their child to gun homicide than every other cause of
death combined.
(c) A majority of gun assault victims survive the shooting but are often
left to grapple with severe physical and mental injuries and long-term
expenses, impairments, and pain. People who have been direct victims of
violence are at substantially higher risk of being violently reattacked
or killed, in part because a large majority of nonfatal shootings do not
lead to arrest. Strained by the overwhelming number of shootings and
related challenges, law enforcement agencies across the United States
cleared less than one-third of aggravated assaults with firearms in
2019. Victims who have been shot, shot at, or chronically exposed to
threats of gun violence and associated traumas may seek safety by affil-
iating with armed groups or engaging in retaliatory violence themselves.
(d) Gun violence imposes enormous harms on those who are not direct
victims as well. The Director of the CDC's Division of Violence
Prevention presented research to Congress demonstrating that "youth
living in inner cities show a higher prevalence of post-traumatic stress
disorder than soldiers" in the nation's wartime military. Many studies
have documented how witnessing a shooting or being chronically exposed
to gun violence is correlated with increased risk of negative health
outcomes, criminal system involvement, reduced educational engagement
and achievement, and longer-term negative impacts on workforce potential
and earnings.
(e) The CDC notes that "Community violence can cause significant phys-
ical injuries and mental health conditions such as depression, anxiety,
and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Living in a community experi-
encing violence is also associated with increased risk of developing
chronic diseases. Concerns about violence may prevent some people from
engaging in healthy behaviors, such as walking, bicycling, using parks
and recreational spaces, and accessing healthy food outlets. Violence
scares people out of participating in neighborhood activities, limits
business growth and prosperity, strains education, justice, and medical
systems, and slows community progress."
(f) In addition to its enormous human toll, gun violence also causes
economic harm in impacted communities and imposes enormous fiscal
burdens on state and local governments and taxpayers. A 2021 report by
Everytown for Gun Safety found that gun deaths and injuries cost New
York $11.4 billion annually, of which $301.2 million is paid by taxpay-
ers every year. Gun violence also imposes broader indirect costs in the
form of reduced home values and reduced profitability for local busi-
nesses. A report by the Urban Institute found that each additional homi-
cide in a census tract in Oakland, California was "significantly associ-
ated with five fewer job opportunities among contracting businesses
(businesses losing employees) the next year."
(g) The firearm industry has also enjoyed record growth and profits for
years. A 2020 Economic Impact Report by the firearm industry trade asso-
ciation, the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), noted that "the
economic growth that America's firearm and ammunition industry has expe-
rienced in recent years has been nothing short of remarkable." A 2022
NSSF Economic Impact Report said the same thing and documented a
269-percent increase in the firearm and ammunition industry's estimated
economic impact from 2008 to 2021 and an 11-percent increase from 2020
to 2021 alone.
(h) There has also been an unprecedented spike in shootings and gun
homicides across the United States. According to CDC data from 2011 to
2021, the nationwide firearm homicide rate increased 85 percent. Every-
town Center reports that in an average year, 939 people die and 1,991
are wounded by guns in New York. Additionally, 48% of gun deaths are
suicides and 49% are homicides. This is compared to 57% and 40% nation-
wide, respectively. In New York, the rate of gun deaths increased 12%
from 2012 to 2021, compared to a 39% increase nationwide. The rate of
gun suicides decreased 19% and gun homicides increased 43% compared to a
19% increase and 73% increase nationwide, respectively. Guns are the
leading cause of death among children and teens in New York. In New
York, an average of 73 children and teens die by guns every year, of
which 22% of these deaths are suicides and 75% are homicides. In the US,
33% of all gun deaths among children and teens are suicides and 62% are
homicides. Every year, an average of 477 people in New York die by gun
homicides and 1,151 are wounded by gun assaults-a rate of 2.5 homicides
and 5.9 assaults per 100,000 people. New York has the 42nd highest rate
of gun homicides and gun assaults in the US. In New York, 62% of all
homicides involve a gun, compared to 78% nationwide.
(i) Firearms and ammunition sold by licensed manufacturers, dealers, and
vendors of these products contribute to gun violence and broader harms.
Gun dealers, for example, are the leading source of firearms trafficked
to illegal markets, often through straw purchases, as well as negligent
losses.
(j) The excise tax on firearm and ammunition retailers proposed in this
act is analogous to longstanding federal law, which has, since 1919,
placed a 10-percent to 11-percent excise tax on the sale of firearms and
ammunition by manufacturers, producers, and importers. Revenues from
this excise tax have been used, since passage of the Pittman-Robertson
Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Act in 1937, to fund wildlife
conservation efforts that remediate the effects that firearms and ammu-
nition have on wildlife populations through game hunting, particularly
through grants to state wildlife agencies, and for conservation-related
research, technical assistance, hunter safety, and "hunter development."
(k) This act will similarly place a reasonable surtax on firearm and
ammunition industry members profiting from the sale of firearms and
ammunition in order to generate sustained revenue for programs that are
designed to remediate the devastating effects these products cause fami-
lies and communities across this state.
(1) The National Rifle Association has referred to the Pittman-Robertson
federal Firearms and Ammunition Excise tax as a "legislative model" and
"friend of the hunter," and NSSF has repeatedly emphasized the impor-
tance of this federal firearm industry excise tax as well. A 2019 state-
ment by an NSSF director published on NSSF's internet website emphasized
that "an often overlooked, and certainly under-communicated benefit, is
the impact that excise taxes on firearms and ammunition have on conser-
vation and wildlife populations," and a similar 2018 statement from NSSF
praised Key Pittman and Willis Robertson, the legislators who sponsored
the Pittman-Robertson excise tax, as "heroes of the most successful
conservation model in the world."
(m) This act would similarly provide dedicated revenue to sustain and
expand effective gun violence prevention, healing, and recovery programs
for families and communities across New York, particularly in communi-
ties most disproportionately impacted by gun violence.
(n) This act is consistent with our nation's longstanding historical
tradition of regulating commercial firearm and ammunition manufacturers
and sellers, including through federal, state, and local taxes on this
commercial activity. An 1883 California statute, for instance, directed
local governments to provide for payment of all revenue assessed as a
tax, or received for licenses, on the storage, manufacture, and sale of
gunpowder and related products in order to fund a "Fireman's Charitable
Fund" to support professionals tasked with remediating the collateral
impacts of firearm-related commercial activity on public safety through
fire risk.
(o) In the historical record, other states, including Mississippi
(1844), North Carolina (1857), Georgia (1866), Alabama (1867), Hawaii
(1870), Nebraska (1895), Florida (1898), Wyoming (1899), and Virginia
(1926), have similarly enacted longstanding commercial, occupational, or
other taxes on those selling, purchasing, or possessing firearms and
other dangerous weapons.
(p) The tax specified in this act is a modest and reasonable tax on a
profitable industry whose lawful and legitimate business activity
imposes substantial harmful externalities on New York's families, commu-
nities, and taxpayers. The modest tax proposed in this measure mirrors
the Pittman-Robeftson federal excise tax on firearm and ammunition
industry participants, is similarly dedicated to funding programs to
remediate the harmful externalities of firearm industry commerce and is
similarly unlikely to discourage lawful sales and commerce in firearms
or ammunition. A gun policy research review by the Rand Corporation
noted that the available "research suggests that moderate tax increases
on guns or ammunition would do little to disrupt hunting or recreational
gun use."
(q) The revenue from this act would provide sustained, dedicated invest-
ments in programs that are effective at addressing and remediating harms
caused by firearm and ammunition industry products, including invest-
ments in: (1) community gun violence intervention and prevention initi-
atives that help address risk factors for violent behavior, protect and
heal victims, interrupt cycles of shootings, trauma, and retaliation
among those at highest risk, and address racial inequality in access to
safety for communities of color; (2) gun violence research that helps
stakeholders identify leading causes and evidence-based responses to gun
violence; (3) initiatives that train health care providers about effec-
tive clinical tools for preventing firearm suicide and injury; (4) crime
victim services, including mental health services, for victims of mass
shootings and other gun homicides, and individuals chronically exposed
to gun violence in their community, including students in school
districts disproportionately impacted by gun violence in the school or
broader community; (5) coordinated efforts to ensure firearm and ammuni-
tion purchasers are adequately informed about how to comply with New
York's gun safety laws and responsibilities associated
with safe use and possession of firearms, including child access
prevention, and to promote effective and equitable implementation of New
York's gun safety laws and programs; (6) programs that promote victims'
and public safety by ensuring the prompt, safe, and consistent removal
of firearms and ammunition from people who become prohibited from
possessing them, such as after a gun violence or domestic violence
restraining order; and (7) evidence-based activities to effectively and
equitably support gun homicide and shooting investigations in order to
deliver justice for victims of gun violence in communities bearing the
brunt of these tragedies.
(r) In a report published in August 2023 by the American Academy of
Pediatrics, researchers found that the increase in firearm purchasing
during the pandemic increased the risk for pediatric firearm injury,
resulting in a 41.6-percent increase in the firearm death rate for Amer-
ican children between 2018 and 2021. During this period, racial dispari-
ties in gun deaths also significantly worsened. According to the report,
communities of color bore the brunt of this burden, with Black children
comprising nearly 50 percent of children killed by firearms. Unlike
other age demographics in the United States, nearly two-thirds of youth
gun deaths were attributable to homicide, while less than one-third are
attributed to death by firearm suicide. State variability in access to
preventative strategies like violence intervention, suicide prevention,
and firearm safety programs all contribute to disparities in pediatric
firearm death rates. With this legislation, New York affirms its commit-
ment to increasing access to these vital preventative strategies,
particularly in our state's most vulnerable communities.
(s) It is essential that the Legislature adopt this act for the purpose
of reducing and preventing gun violence, including by addressing risk
factors for gun violence, and promoting healing and recovery for victims
of gun violence, particularly in communities that are disproportionately
impacted by shootings and gun homicides.
 
LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
S.7733 of 2023-2024: Referred to Budget and Revenue
 
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
To be determined.
 
EFFECTIVE DATE:
This act shall take effect immediately, provided that sections one and
three of this act shall take effect January 1, 2027. Effective imme-
diately, the addition, amendment and/or repeal of any rule or regulation
necessary for the implementation of this act on its effective date are
authorized to be made and completed on or before such effective date.