Acosta cites bust in call for funding

Assemblyman mentions recent north county gun operation in call for money aimed at public safety

This week, Assemblyman Dante Acosta, R-Santa Clarita, reiterated a request for funding he’d signed in April, urging the state Legislature to better deal with criminals who still possess firearms.

The request was originally sent to the budget subcommittee for public safety asking for an additional $12.5 million annually to the Department of Justice to address a 10,000-person backlog of the Armed Prohibited Persons System (APPS) database.

APPS tracks people who own firearms but lost their right to own a gun due to mental illness or criminal charges.

“They’ve only reduced that backlog by half,” said David Creager, spokesman for Acosta’s office. “The attorney general isn’t doing his job.”

This week, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department seized more than 500 firearms from the home of a criminal legally forbidden from possessing firearms. As the incident happened in the 38th Assembly District, Acosta said this was indicative of the need for additional funding.

“Keeping guns out of the hands of dangerous criminals is vital to public safety,” he said in a prepared statement. “In the fight against gun violence, Californians deserve results. My Republican colleagues and I have called for the state to provide proper funding to law enforcement to get guns out of the hands of known criminals.”

Creager said the story from Acosta’s district “underlines the problem.”

“This is a particularly egregious example,” he said. “It’s not the only one, but this concerns something everybody agrees on: felons shouldn’t have guns.

LASD/Courtesy photo An arsenal of more than 550 weapons was found in an Agua Dulce home last week. The seizure prompted Acosta to reiterate a request for more funding to help with the 10,000-person backlog in the federal government’s system of background checks for those...