Oklahoma Self Defense Act License's

On November 1st of this year (2012), a fundamental change will begin concerning the ability to “Open Carry” a firearm.  Over the past few months, law enforcement has been receiving training about the new law and proper responses to various issues which may arise.  Under the Open Carry provisions, generally persons with a valid Oklahoma Self Defense Act (SDA) license can now legally carry an unconcealed firearm.  The Oklahoma Legislature also allowed for any person to lawfully carry a firearm on their own property.  One issue I was curious about was the number of SDA licenses issued and below is my findings based in part on information from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI): 

Canadian County Licenses

According to the 2010 Census, Canadian County had a population of 115,541 people with a land area of approximately 897 square miles. The OSBI prior to 2007 did not  indicate the number of applications received from the county. A rough estimate on the number of licenses considering the approved numbers minus the revoked and suspended licenses shows approximately 6,335 active licenses. Related to the Sheriff's Office, the Oklahoma SDA statute allows for the County Sheriff to charge up to $25.00 (twenty-five) for fingerprints and up to $10.00 (ten) dollars for two passport type photographs per applicant.   

 

State of Oklahoma Licenses 

According to the 2010 Census, the State of Oklahoma had a population of 3,751,351 people. The OSBI prior to 2007 did not indicate the number of applications received by the state. A rough estimate on the number of licenses considering the approved numbers minus the revoked and suspended licenses shows approximately 176,033 active licenses.  



CLEET Licensed Personnel

The below graph shows data from the Oklahoma Council on Law Enforcement Education and Training (CLEET). The data shows the number of peace officers (full-time and reserve) as well as private security personnel licensed for 2011 (the last year of data). 



Therefore, based on the estimate of 176,033 active SDA licenses, CLEET certified peace officers and armed security licenses, we have approximately 194,730 lawfully licensed people in the state which accounts for 5.19% of the population of 3,751,351 people (2010 census). When considering just Canadian County and only the approved SDA licenses, we have approximately 5.48% of the population licensed (does not include peace officers or armed security licenses). Interesting trivia,lol.