If you ask the majority of people why they own a firearm, they’ll likely tell you that it’s for self-defense. Most, particularly in California where it’s extremely difficult to get a carry permit, get them for home defense. After all, bad things can happen when you’re home and it makes sense to have some way to deal with those potential threats.

However, some cities seem to think you should be required to lock your firearms up at all times, thus making it all but useless for home defense.

The city of Dublin, CA is one such city, apparently.

Gun owners in Dublin will soon be required to store their firearms inside a locked container or keep it disabled with a trigger lock while inside their home after the City Council unanimously approved the new ordinance at its meeting last week.

California already has similar laws in effect for guns in households with children living there, or that require a gun owner to store their guns from a household member who is prohibited from having guns.

“What we’re doing in this case is just expanding that definition beyond those two scenarios — children in the home or criminal record — and applying it to all households,” City Manager Linda Smith during a presentation at the Dec. 1 meeting.

Added to the Dublin Municipal Code, the ordinance known as Chapter 5.89 to Title 5, states, “No person shall keep a firearm within any residence unless the firearm is stored in a locked container or disabled with a trigger lock.”

Two exceptions were added: when the firearm is lawfully carried on an individual, or when it is under the control of a peace officer.

Councilmember Shawn Kumagai said the ordinance “will state clearly to our community that we embrace a culture of gun safety” and “safe gun storage helps to prevent unintentional and intentional injury and death of minors, helps prevent gun suicide, and deters gun theft.”

A staff report stated “the unsafe storage of firearms threatens public health and safety,” and that 54% of gun owners in the U.S. don’t lock away all of their guns. This year, there have been at least 236 unintentional shootings by children, resulting in 102 deaths and 141 injuries nationally. Seven of those were in California, resulting in two deaths and five injuries.

I’m calling BS on that staff report, particularly that storage differences somehow “threaten public health and safety.”

After all, California is the most populated state in the nation, and they had a grand total of seven kids hurt or killed by unintentional shootings. I’m sorry, but in a state of almost 40 million, seven people’s deaths, while tragic, is statistically insignificant.

But what will happen, though, is that those law-abiding citizens who secure their guns in accordance with the law won’t be able to access those firearms in an emergency, thus making them and their families less safe.

Luckily, there’s one upside to this, and that’s in the fact that the law is unenforceable in most cases.

Police can’t do spot checks or anything else. They just have to infer whether or not you had your gun secured after something happens. Don’t let something happen and there’s really no way they’ll know if you locked your gun away or not.

In other words, the city council managed to virtue signal and little else.