Ramsey Child Care Center Concerned Over Possible Gun Range Neighbor
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- A Ramsey childcare center says they will lose business if a gun training range opens up next door.
Little Me Childcare is located next to a vacant building now, but the city council is expected to give a shooting range the go-ahead to move in next door.
"There's no room for error when you are this close to children," co-owner Amber Brick said.
Brick and Jessica Bachman consider their childcare center a safe and welcoming place for kids. But they fear the addition of a new business next door could drive out their business.
"We did not think anybody would pass a gun range, even though it's indoors, right next to a childcare center," Bachman said.
A Ramsey company called Total Defense wants to put 10 shooting lanes inside the vacant building next door. Amber and Jessica have started a petition to try and stop it.
"I have a few letters that parents wrote in that they can't stay if the gun range goes in, that they will have to move their kids," said Brick.
They worry about noise coming from the range during naptime, but that's not all. The main concern is that the childcare center can have as many as 60 kids playing outside on any given day. And just 30 feet away on the other side of a concrete wall, would be a shooting range.
But the owners at Total Defense say they plan on adding an additional 8-inch thick wall inside of that one.
They wouldn't go on camera, but the owner told us that they've spent a year and a half planning. In the end, he said it will be, quote, "one of the quietest and safest ranges in the Twin Cities."
Ramsey police chief Jim Way agrees.
"It's an enclosed space. They are going the extra step to build a building inside a building here. It's much safer. It's going to keep the noise down. The noise mitigation will be much less in that regard," Way said.
The shooting range has already passed through the planning commission and an initial vote by the city council.
The final approval could come on Tuesday, and Amber Brick said workers and families at the childcare center plan on protesting outside of city hall that night.
