Concealed Carry in Maine

Kennebec Journal

If you want a concealed-weapons permit from the Maine State Police, be ready to wait three or four months. There’s a 2,500-application backlog.

As gun sales nationwide and in Maine have skyrocketed in recent years, so has permit demand, said Lt. Scott Ireland, who runs the state police’s licensing division, which handles permit applications for more than 300 small, rural municipalities, along with unorganized territories and townships. Larger cities and towns handle their own.

With 100 to 150 applications coming to Ireland’s office daily, the four employees tasked with handling them — only one working on it full time — are stretched.

In 2008, Barack Obama was elected president. The Maine State Police issued 3,912 permits that year, Ireland said. In 2009, Obama took office. it issued 5,706 — nearly a 46 percent increase. And in 2012, the year of the president’s re-election, it issued 7,574. With that backlog, Ireland said, 2013 will be another record year.