A residents’ handbook containing rules and regulations for everyone living in property operated by the Newark Housing Authority was “misleading,” according to Rob Detwiler, who chairs the authority’s Board of Commissioners.

A section in the handbook requiring that tenants must “not possess explosives, firearms or flammable material on NHA’s property,” will be removed, Detwiler told the Caesar Rodney Institute Wednesday morning.

Detwiler, who is nearing the end of his six-year term as commissioner, said NHA executive director Marene Jordan is “looking to change the pamphlet a soon as possible.”

Meanwhile, Detwiler said, NHA residents may possess firearms, “as long as they’re legal.”

“It should be an absolute moot issue in the near future,” Detwiler said. “The handbook was misleading. I think the previous executive director made up that policy. I do believe it is my constitutional right [to own firearms]. I support my Constitution.”

Jordan did not immediately return calls seeking comment Gun bans at the Newark Housing Authority, along with the Delaware State Housing Authority and those in Wilmington and Dover are the subject of an ongoing series by the Caesar Rodney Institute.

After the series was published, the National Rifle Association informed the housing authorities they would take legal action if the unconstitutional gun bans were not immediately withdrawn.

“It has been brought to our attention by members of the National Rifle Association and by the Caesar Rodney Institute that the Dover Housing Authority, Newark Housing Authority, and Wilmington Housing Authority contain lease provisions that prohibit a resident from possessing a firearm. Such a restriction is Unconstitutional,” NRA General Counsel Robert Dowlut said Monday in letters sent to the executive directors of the housing authorities that operate their own low-income housing in Delaware.

The Newark Housing Authority is the first to withdraw its ban, rather than face litigation from the NRA. Reaction to the NHA’s decision was swift.

“Obviously I am very pleased to learn that the Newark Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners has reconsidered its ban on the otherwise lawful ownership and possession of firearms within their public housing properties. They are to be congratulated for doing the right thing by lifting their ban and restoring their residents to full citizenship,” said Dover attorney John Sigler, a CRI board member and former NRA president.

John Thompson, president of the Delaware State Sportsmen’s Association, the state NRA affiliate, said that the DSSA is “very pleased the Newark Housing Authority responded in a positive fashion to the information that was presented.”

“We look forward to the other agencies cooperating as well,” Thompson said.

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