Bill letting trained teachers carry guns passes West Virginia House

• A invoice that will permit trained teachers and different college staff to carry firearms in Ok-12 public faculties has cleared the West Virginia House of Delegates.
• The initiative, proponents declare, will profit poorer college districts unable to rent college useful resource officers.
• “Evil is a problem. Hate is a problem. I would like to be able to combat hate with love, but unfortunately, it will take a firearm if someone else has one,” Republican Del. Dave Foggin mentioned of the proposal.

West Virginia’s Republican-controlled House of Delegates voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to permit teachers and different college workers who bear coaching to carry guns in Ok-12 public faculties.

The invoice, which now heads to the Senate, would permit teachers, directors and assist personnel with hid carry permits to volunteer to convey a firearm into college with the intention of utilizing it to defend the varsity in case of an lively shooter occasion. Designated a “school protection officer,” the staffer wouldn’t obtain any further compensation for doing so.

Supporters say not each college system in West Virginia can afford to rent a full-time college useful resource officer. This program would supply an alternative choice.

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Before the vote, Republican Del. Dave Foggin of Wood County, a physics instructor, mentioned he cannot consider something worse than capturing somebody in his classroom. But he mentioned if that individual got here into his college attempting to harm his college students, he would do it.

“Evil is a problem. Hate is a problem. I would like to be able to combat hate with love, but unfortunately, it will take a firearm if someone else has one,” Foggin mentioned, earlier than lawmakers greenlit the invoice 89-11. Only Democrats voted “no.”

The Senate handed a distinct piece of laws, now within the House, final month that will permit county schooling boards to contract with navy veterans and retired legislation enforcement officers to supply armed safety at faculties. It’s unclear what probability both invoice has of passing in every chamber.

The invoice handed by the House is much like a proposal final 12 months that was permitted by one House committee however by no means made it to the ground. It allowed college districts to decide into the safety officer program after a public listening to the place native residents might weigh in.

This 12 months’s invoice additionally made this system non-obligatory till lawmakers permitted a last-minute change throughout debate Wednesday requiring college districts to take part if a staffer desires to tackle the safety officer position and completes coaching — one thing that rankled Democrats and a handful of Republicans who anxious native management was being threatened.

Democratic Del. Joey Garcia mentioned college board members ought to have the ability to make up their very own minds as an alternative of getting the Legislature “force-feeding a solution to them.” Republican Del. Dana Ferrell of Kanawha County, an skilled educator, additionally urged warning: “If people aren’t happy, they can vote them out,” Ferrell mentioned, of college board members.

Seen right here is West Virginia’s Capitol dome in Charleston, West Virginia. (AP Photo/Jeff Gentner, File)

Republican Del. Todd Kirby mentioned if the Legislature permits this system to be non-obligatory, college boards would not implement it.

Lawmakers voted down a proposed modification from a Democrat that will have given college safety officers a one-time cost of $25,000 after finishing coaching. Although no cash has been designated for this system — that will come when lawmakers finalize the finances earlier than the session’s shut in March, if the Senate approves the invoice — it incorporates a fiscal word estimating a value of $275,000 for coaching.

The invoice requires that firearms be hid on campus and that educators have a hid carry allow. Staffers might additionally select to carry a stun gun or a Taser as an alternative of a gun.

The invoice requires that workers carrying weapons at college bear annual behavioral well being assessments and coaching designed by the West Virginia Department of Homeland Security. The invoice lays out an inventory of not less than 15 completely different matters that must be addressed within the coaching, together with disaster intervention, trauma and first assist.

It states that any instructor permitted to carry firearms who lets a gun or ammunition out of their “personal control” whereas on college property could also be “removed immediately from the classroom and subject to employment termination proceedings.” The designation of college safety officer might be revoked by the varsity at any time, in response to the invoice. Appeals might be made to the director of the state Department of Homeland Security.

The identities of workers members permitted to carry a gun can be saved personal — and that info can be exempt from public information requests for scholar security causes, in response to the invoice. The info can be shared with the homeland safety division and native legislation enforcement businesses, nonetheless.

Democratic Del. Kayla Young spoke towards the invoice, saying it scares her to assume there could also be guns in her kids’s college and that she would not know the place they’re and who has them.

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,” Young mentioned, citing an argument utilized by the invoice’s supporters.

“I’m not sure if I agree with that specifically because if that were the case, the United States would probably be the safest place on earth,” she mentioned. “But we have more gun violence than anywhere else.”

Lead Sponsor Republican Del. Doug Smith of Mercer County mentioned lawmakers have labored laborious to craft a fastidiously thought-out program with safeguards in order that solely teachers with the expertise and coaching will likely be carrying weapons at college.

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“It’s crucial that we understand that this bill doesn’t advocate for arming every teacher,” he mentioned. “It’s not the single answer, it’s one important tool.”