Alright as this thread is being revisited I will throw in a few comments addressing some of the posts here. Starting with the most recent.

Zim i am suprised at you and your suggestion to go hunting with an expired FOID in a New York minute. I can tell you that I know quite a few ISP CPOs and if they catch you w/o or expired you will find yourself in some real deep trouble. And it is exactly the kind of trouble that would prevent you from ever getting an FOID at anytime in the future. W/o an FOID you are subject to IUW and I have never personally seen anyone charged IUW as a misdemeanor so it would be a felony charge. And that would cut any future FOID right out.....

(430 ILCS 65/8) (from Ch. 38, par. 83-8)
Sec. 8. The Department of State Police has authority to deny an application for or to revoke and seize a Firearm Owner's Identification Card previously issued under this Act only if the Department finds that the applicant or the person to whom such card was issued is or was at the time of issuance:
(a) A person under 21 years of age who has been convicted of a misdemeanor other than a traffic offense or adjudged delinquent;
(b) A person under 21 years of age who does not have the written consent of his parent or guardian to acquire and possess firearms and firearm ammunition, or whose parent or guardian has revoked such written consent, or where such parent or guardian does not qualify to have a Firearm Owner's Identification Card;
(c) A person convicted of a felony under the laws of this or any other jurisdiction;



Matt in IL. You said..... "Not trying to be the bad guy here, but it's your own fault. You should have known you card was going to expire close to hunting. You should have done the renewal long ago. Yeah the system sucks, but you waited till the last minute and now blame them...."

Well it is my belief that we are pretty much responsible for knowing when things are going to expire. And that would be all fine and dandy in a simple sense except these days there is just so darn much stuff expiring it is hard to keep tabs on it all!

Actually a good bit of the blame does fall right on ISPs FOID section......
(430 ILCS 65/13.2)
Sec. 13.2. The Department of State Police shall, 60 days prior to the expiration of a Firearm Owner's Identification Card, forward by first class mail to each person whose card is to expire a notification of the expiration of the card and an application which may be used to apply for renewal of the card. It is the obligation of the holder of a Firearm Owner's Identification Card to notify the Department of State Police of any address change since the issuance of the Firearm Owner's Identification Card.
(Source: P.A. 91-690, eff. 4-13-00.)

I don't know of anyone who has received a 60 day notification in I would say like 10 years. So ISP FOID sec has been in violation of the statute for a long, long time. Do they have some culpability and are they somewhat responsible for people not being able to get their FOIDs renewed in a reasonable time frame? Heck yeah they have! It has an undeniable pattern and ISP has known this for a long time and had done nothing to remedy the situation until recently. That knowledge of not complying, not moving to correct it and essentially goes to conspiracy. But to get to the point (i.e. Zim) I certainly wouldn't want to argue that point myself with a CPO in the field or thru an attorney in front of a judge.

ISPs reaction at this point has been to basically and finally admit that with the staffing of the FOID section they obviously have not been able to keep up with renewals and new applications and for no reason would anyone believe that they would be able to in the future. The re will be no increase in the budget to increase manpower so they went to what seems like the right solution for the situation by going to a 10 year card. Mine is good for another 7 years and I will be by then the fee will be ALOT more.

Final word: Before they went to a 10 year card FOIDs did not expire on your birthday. But for crying out loud when they went to a 10 year card they should have had expiration on your birthday.