by Jacob Rueda
Advocates for gun violence prevention in Utah experienced setbacks during this year's legislative session. Bills that held gun owners responsible for safe storage and closed loopholes in private gun sales failed while bills that hid the association of retailers to the gun industry and expanded on arming teachers in the classroom passed.
The Gun Violence Prevention Center of Utah (GVPC) lobbied against the last two bills. They are now asking Governor Spencer Cox to veto HB119, the bill that expands on arming teachers in the classroom.
“This bill was rushed through the process at the end of the session with barely any discussion,” Nancy Halden with the Gun Violence Prevention Center of Utah told KSL-TV.
In an interview with TheLine.Info, Halden said that Utah already armed teachers. What HB119 does is that, among other things, removes liability from teachers if they shoot someone. It also takes money from the state's education fund to arm teachers.
"Initially [it] had $3,000,000 out of the education budget, which was just unconscionable," Halden said. But since then, she said that the "fiscal note has gone way. way down."
Not everything about the bill was bad, at least in the beginning.
"Initially there [were] gun safes in this bill, which is not a bad idea," Halden said. However, the overall effectiveness of arming teachers is something that she said is not documented, let alone proven or supported.
"There are a lot of people who think that arming teachers is a very bad idea," Halden said, adding that parents, students, and teachers alike disagree with the notion.
Despite the passing of this and other bills, the GVPC intends to continue working with those legislators who want to pass bills that address gun safety, while also educating the public on gun safety and what's behind legislation.
Watch the full interview with Nancy Halden from the Gun Violence Prevention Center of Utah here:
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