College may allow weapons on campus in four years
By Stephen Cook
At the monthly Board of Trustees meeting on Nov. 21, trustees voted to unanimously approve a four-year exemption from House Bill 2052 at the college regarding concealed carry of weapons.
The board had voted to approve a resolution on June 20 to temporarily exempt all buildings at the college for a period of six months from the adequate security measure requirements of the new concealed carry legislation that became effective on July 1.
In order to proceed without the exemption, there would be certain expenses to prepare and properly secure the college’s buildings. The building cost estimate for three buildings on campus – the Carlsen Center, the CLB and the ATB was $4.4 million, not including additional staffing. An estimate for the entire campus, as well as off-site locations, is not available at this time.
Trustee Jon Stewart also brought up the point that there was an aspect of how the college’s insurer would respond to concealed carry and potential incidents in the future.
“The deciding factor for me was the fact that we would be uninsured and if there was an incident on this campus, you know what kind of multimillion dollar lawsuits could be brought against us,” Stewart said at the meeting. “If we cannot insure against that I think that’s just too high of a risk for us.”
The cost to prepare all of the buildings on campus under the unfunded mandate would cost the college dozens of millions of dollars, which is multiple mills on taxpayers, according to Trustee Stephanie Sharp.
“The argument will be made to just allow concealed weapons on campus,” Sharp said. “The reality of our campus is that we have 22,000 s t u d e n t s coming and going and how does our police department know who the shooter is – the original shooter, the perpetrator – and who the defender is and how many people get caught in the crosshairs, intentionally punned.”
However, it is not unconstitutional for the college to change the ability to bring weapons on campus, Trustee Greg Musil said.
“Our constitutional rights that people talk about in the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, the Fourth Amendment, they’re all limited, none of them are absolute,” Musil said. “This is not a constitutional issue, it’s a policy issue and it’s a political issue.”
Musil said if the college was to change their decision, he would want to know that the campus would be safer than it is now.
“We have 29 people who are trained 40 hours a year as professional certified law enforcement officers to keep us safe,” Musil said. “Our history has been very good, I would rather keep that solid professional law enforcement as our security – it’s never going to be perfect.”
I n t e r im police chief Gregory Russell said, at this point, although campus police is prepared and trained, concealed carry is not a good thing for the college.
“We will continue to do extensive training to prepare for the worst and hope for the best,” Russell said.
Sharp also encouraged the audience to contact their state legislators about changing this law.
“It’s our job to serve the public,” she said. “Are we doing that by allowing our students that come here to get an education, our adults who come here to get an education, those who come to our performing arts series, those who come to the museums, are we endangering them?”
Deb Williams, of the Faculty Association said it is important that the campus comes together to be a force for legislative change.
“I think if you ever would have an opportunity to achieve a one college one community one goal is to invite that kind of a communication collectively,” Williams said. “We certainly do not, on behalf of the faculty, I can state definitively that we do not want guns on this campus.”
Also, if concealed carry is hoped to be continued to be limited at the college, the law will have to be changed within the next four years as there’s no provision in the law for a second extension, according to Stewart.
“I think that the writing’s on the wall,” Stewart said. “That eventually, unless the legislation is changed over the next four years and I’m not confident that will happen – we will have concealed carry on the campus in four years.”
Contact Stephen Cook, editor-in-chief, at scook35@jccc.edu.