Anchorage Assembly to consider letting licensed wildlife operators use air guns in city limits

Anchorage already has a rule most people probably never think about until a squirrel gets into the wrong attic.

City code makes it unlawful to shoot, discharge or flourish a firearm, air rifle or air pistol inside the municipality, except in limited places such as lawful hunting areas, shooting ranges and certain gunsmith premises.

Now Assembly member Zac Johnson has introduced a narrow change: let state-licensed nuisance-wildlife operators use an air rifle or air pistol inside city limits while doing work allowed under that license.

That is the legal version. The neighborhood version is simpler.

If a wild animal is damaging property or creating a health or safety problem, should a licensed operator be able to handle it with an air gun in Anchorage, or should city law keep that off-limits unless the person fits one of the existing exceptions?

The proposal does not appear to create a new airsoft or air-gun ban. It points the other direction. It would add an exception to an existing municipal prohibition.

Air rifles and air pistols sit in an odd place in public life. They are not ordinary firearms. They are also not toys when used to kill animals. In a city with moose in driveways, bears in trash, rabbits in gardens and a strong gun culture around the edges of daily life, that distinction matters.

State nuisance-wildlife rules are not a free-for-all. Alaska regulations allow the Department of Fish and Game to license operators who meet age, training, violation-history and reporting requirements. The animal generally must be invading a dwelling, damaging property or posing an immediate threat to health, safety or property. Other practical means must be exhausted first.

That gives supporters an argument: Anchorage should not make licensed nuisance-wildlife work harder than state law already makes it.

Whether this is the kind of small alignment between state licensing and city code that quietly clears a public hearing, or the kind that draws unexpected pushback, is something the next two weeks will answer.

The public hearing is expected in two weeks.