Another local business is closing its doors in Prince George.
K.K.S. Tactical and Supplies made the announcement official over the weekend via Facebook.
Co-owner, Cassy Premack told MyPGNow.com that increased sanctions by Ottawa as well as a challenging economic landscape were the final straws.
“A big part of it is government legislation from the federal government, which started in May of 2020 and that still leaves us sitting on $70,000 worth of inventory that we have not been able to recoup and more recent changes like the prohibition on handgun sales and future sanctions from C-21.”
Premack added hunting and fishing are considered niche activities in today’s economic climate, making their business seem “non-essential”.
“As much as hunting and fishing are essential to so many of us, our government and many other people they just look at it as a luxury. It’s been really challenging and I think it will continue to be challenging as we navigate through the process of closing the store down.”
The store’s inventory clearance and liquidation sale begin tomorrow (Tuesday) with the store expected to close sometime in December.
“As we navigate the next few weeks we will see how long the stores remain open and we are going to hopefully clear out all of our inventory and then it will be the clearing out of the store fixtures and those sorts of things as well.”
Premack and her husband and business partner David are also closing down Crispy Pig as well as KKS Hydro Dipping and Graphics, and Five High Clothing in the Pine Centre Mall.
As for what’s next, she would like to focus on family and find another way to be employed in the outdoor community.
“I have some plans in the works and I hope to be able to continue to serve the hunting and fishing and outdoors community in new ways I am going to focus on the children that we have making sure they are able to get through this change in our family structure together.”
The distress for gun owners and similar businesses began in the summer of 2020 when Ottawa announced a ban on 1,500 firearms and their variants. In total, 9,000 firearms were banned, which at the time, amounted to over half of K.K.S’s inventory.
The announcement came following a mass shooting in Nova Scotia that left 23 people dead.
In May of this year, the federal government introduced new legislation on gun control, which announced the sale, purchase, transfer, and importation of handguns will be frozen.
In addition, there are currently 1.1-million registered handguns in Canada, a sharp increase over the past decade, and have become the weapon of choice in many gun-related crimes.
The legislation would also make it mandatory for owners of more than 15 hundred models of firearms, banned in 2020, to sell them back to the government.
Furthermore, the penalties for smuggling guns into Canada would also be increased, and it would become a criminal offense to increase the number of bullets a firearm can hold.
Then in July, Premack did not endorse the federal buyback program where the Trudeau government stated gun owners could receive over 13 hundred dollars for turning in an AR-15.
She then stood with the Alberta and Saskatchewan governments who both announced last month they will not be funding the initiative.
“I agree with Alberta and Saskatchewan completely. There is no reason to use provincial funds for a federal confiscation program when it’s going to do nothing to impact the safety of Canadians or violent crime involving firearms.”
“It’s really not going to be effective when you are asking Canadians to voluntarily give up their property without any reasoning behind it,” stated Premack in an earlier interview with MyPGNow.com.
Sheldon Clare, who is the past president of the Canadian National Firearms Association stated Ottawa has taken the hot topic of firearms and made it into a political football.
“What they have really done is declare war on Canadian firearms owners. Innocent people who own millions or billions of dollars worth of property and basically made an attack on a very lucrative industry.”
“They (Ottawa) is going to be putting businesses out of work, they are going to be stopping sports competitions and the ending of transferring handguns means inheritance and expensive collections will be worthless. They are making a lot of these decisions by order and council.”
Last month, he also sounded off on the handgun freeze calling it “part of a continuum of Liberal gun control that dates back to 1978.”
“I think this is an abomination. I think that no compensation makes up for the historical attachment to many of these items that people may have and I think that a government that does this cannot be trusted by the people that it purports to govern.”
“What I see in this is that it’s purely political and ideological and it has nothing to do with statistical analysis or the data on anything to do with firearms. All this does is target law-abiding people who have no inclination whatsoever to engage in criminal activity.”