Longtime supporters of Bearing Arms’ Cam & Co (as well as its previous iteration at NRA News) have seen today’s guest featured on the show many times in the past. Rick Ector is a staunch Second Amendment supporter as well as a firearms instructor, and for the past ten years one of Rick’s special passions has been putting on a weekend of free firearms instruction for women in the Detroit area. Last year, despite all of the concerns and chaos surrounding the COVID pandemic, Rick and a number of other volunteer instructors were able to put 1,900 women through a basic firearms safety course, and this year Rick’s hoping to double that number.

On August 21st and 22nd, Rick’s bringing his annual event to two separate ranges in the Detroit area, and his plan is to give 4,000 ladies of all ages and skill levels the opportunity to train and shoot for free. That’s right, even the ammo is included in Ector’s training weekend, thanks to a donation of 80,000 rounds from the folks at Fenix Ammunition.

Even though the plans for the weekend are shaping up nicely, Rick tells me that he could always use more instructors, so if you’re interested in lending a helping hand you can reach out to him on the Facebook page for Rick’s Firearm Academy of Detroit. It promises to be an outstanding event, and it comes at a very opportune time. A new poll of Detroit residents released this week shows an overwhelming number of them are concerned about crime and aren’t interested in seeing city officials defund their police department.

By an overwhelming 9-1, they would feel safer with more cops on the street, not fewer. Though one-third complain that Detroit police use force when it isn’t necessary – and Black men report high rates of racial profiling – those surveyed reject by 3-1 the slogan of some progressives to “defund the police.”

“It’s scary sitting in the house, and when you go outside to the gas station or the store, it’s possible someone will be shooting right next to you,” said Charlita Bell, 41, a lifelong Detroit resident who was among those called in the poll. Last year, when her car was hit by stray bullets during a shopping trip, she hurried home rather than wait for the police for fear the shooter might return.

“It’s always some random shootings,” sighed Rita Gibbs, 70, who is so distressed she hates to turn on the news these days. “I just can’t stand it.”

It doesn’t help that Wayne County, where Detroit is located, has been accused of slow walking the issuance of concealed carry licenses. In fact, the county’s now facing a lawsuit over the delays, which in some cases have left residents unable to lawfully carry for more than a year while their carry applications are being processed. In the Detroit suburbs of Macomb and Oakland County, applications are generally approved in a matter of weeks, not months, but in crime-plagued Detroit some residents have been waiting for 14 months or more to hear back from licensing officials.

Ector’s big weekend won’t involve any concealed carry instruction, but it will provide women with the basics of gun safety, allow them to send a few rounds downrange under the watchful eye of an instructor, and hopefully get a better understanding and appreciation for gun ownership and their right to keep and bear arms in self-defense.