I remember mine started at 8am and ended around 2-3 including an hour lunch break and shooting time.
I remember mine started at 8am and ended around 2-3 including an hour lunch break and shooting time.
Unfortunately I don’t disagree with you. They got us all by the balls. It’s called supply and demand.... they got the supply, we got the demand.
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I'll concur with this assessment. I can assure you that being an instructor for 20+ years, I've not turned a profit. In fact I'd venture to say it's cost me money when I consider the fact I have loaned out pistols and ammo for people when they needed them, never charged military personnel or recently separated military, Don't charge the full fee for couples when they take the training together as a couple and never turned anyone away from a class if they didn't have the money to pay for it. In addition, I have donated seats and even entire classes to charity events and as fund raisers for worthy organizations by having them sell the seat in the class and collect the fees. I then show up on a Saturday and provide instruction at no cost.
I'm sure there are many that do in fact make money and I have no issue with that as they are spending the time and effort to instruct and that may be how they feed their children. In fact, most people expect to be paid when they work. Personally, I consider myself fortunate to have a decent paying full time job and I instruct these classes to provide a public service to the community (In my mind at least).
I know there are bad instructors. Those that do not meet the minimum requirements of the training as mandated by CLEET and should be stripped of their certs. I also know that I and many others go well beyond the mandated requirements and do so happily.
My only point is that people tend to paint with a very broad brush because they had one bad experience. By and large I believe the community of instructors in this state are well meaning and take the responsibility seriously. I also don't believe anyone is "getting rich" off of providing training.
My class was at HH and there was no overhead. The lawyer did all the work and there were easily 30 or more in that class. 10 at a time on the range in 3 groups IIRC
A certain instructor I know at BLA told me all about his bread n butter teaching these classes. I never said it was simple but the overhead in any business can be largely mitigated usually.
And we taxpayers already fund this agency to serve us.
Yes, to some degree. What many in Oklahoma don't know is that the OSBI gets fees for criminal history checks, some court costs, and from the SDA program. What they also don't know is that the legislature looks at what the OSBI is getting in those fees and cuts back funding from general funds by roughly that same amount.
Exactly.
I just submitted my renewal online, and got an email confirmation that it was received by OSBI and is "in process". The last time I renewed, it took I think it was 27 days from submission to receipt of renewed license. I consider the fee to maintain my SDA license a minimal one, and one I am fine with paying for because:
1. Personally, I think it's a good idea to have it "just in case'' even still here in Oklahoma. Why? For many of the reasons discussed in this thread. There is simply too much confusion still. I've read and re-read the laws yet...
?2. It does show that I have at least had the minimum amount of "training'' previously required. Are you a LEO? If you pull me over, at least you know I have gone through this "vetting" process, as it were, to get and maintain a license and am more than likely not a bad guy.
3. I do travel out of state and want to be able to legally carry my handgun with me when I do with the minimum hassle.
4. I do NOT want to be a test case in Oklahoma or anywhere else.
4. C'mon, $85 lousy bucks for a license to carry a firearm? Seriously? I drop that on mediocre dinners all too often and don't gripe about it nearly as much as some do about this. Let's do some math: So it's $85 to renew for 5 years. That's $17 per year, or $1.42 per month. Or less than a nickle per day; the equivalent of like one round of cheap .22lr ammo.
I don't know what the actual breakdown of the cost to get an initial or renewal SDA license is; it most likely varies with each individual case and how much time and effort it takes to insure that all the boxes get checked off to issue one. Go look at the OSBI website and check the numbers. I bet the total number annually issued goes down, way down, with this new permit-less carry law. Maybe it will free up some resources at both the local and state levels and they can go catch bad guys better now. Nobody is getting rich off the costs to process and issue a SDA licenses. It wouldn't surprise me to find out it was actually costing more than they are charging to be honest.
Like @TerryMiller says; "If one isn't going to want to carry in another state, then don't worry about the cost and just carry under the new law while here in Oklahoma. If you do want to carry elsewhere, then pay the piper and get a permit".
Actually, I'd rather maintain my OK SDA license any way, until this all becomes a little clearer than it is now.
Reminds me of the old equation about funding for higher education in Oklahoma. The legislature puts pressure on the colleges and universities not to raise tuition and fees as they reduce the amount of state funding awarded. So glad I am retired now.
The federal student loan program is the one single reason college tuition is so high. They are shoving money at those universities like its through a fire hose with guaranteed student loan funding.
What happens when any business starts getting tons of money for the product? The price goes up.
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