With Difficulty, Local Citizens Present Anti-Gun Violence Petitions To Toomey's Office

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- Local representatives of Mayors Against Illegal Guns tried to deliver petitions to U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey's Pittsburgh office Friday morning, but it turned out to be more difficult than expected.

Citizen: "I would like to go visit my senator in the taxpayer's office."

Guard: "Just hold on a minute. He's coming right down."

Citizen: "I'm allowed to visit his office. I'm a taxpayer."

Guard: "He's supposed to be here."

Toomey was not there, but local citizens wanted to present his staff with petitions signed by 59,000 Pennsylvanians who support background checks.

The presence of media apparently didn't help the petitioners.

"Marvin, would you come over here and escort the press out of here, Channel 2 News or whatever they are," the guard called someone. "Sen. Toomey is granting no interviews, and they're here, and they're filming everything right now."

"They were aware that we were coming," said Rob Conroy, a spokesman for the group.

Conroy says a Toomey staffer eventually met with them in the lobby on the other side of a locked door.

Unlike the Senate offices in Washington where any citizen, after passing through metal detectors, can visit a senator's office, Toomey's office in Pittsburgh in the Landmarks Building, Station Square, is not easily accessible.

Toomey's office is up elevators behind a locked door. To get to his office a citizen has to go through security and then get admitted by the staff.

The staff says they're happy to see any Pennsylvanian who shows up.

While it wasn't as easy as they thought it would be, Conroy noted, "The venue was not as important to me as what we actually did accomplish, which is we did deliver the petitions."

RELATED LINKS:
More Political News
More Reports from Jon Delano