Growing bipartisan support for more guns in school?

Growing agreement across the spectrum that schools
need more armed officers.

I have been working with some other pastors of the Tennessee Conference of the United Methodist Church on what we can do to prevent school shootings. Our small group's members range from conservative to liberal, but we have covenanted to stay non-partisan, and so far, we have.

One of the items on our agenda to consider and possibly offer for this June's annual conference is to call for increased armed security presence at beginning and end of school day. We at least tentatively agreed they should be either or both police or military veterans with additional training by local police.

This morning I learned that a bill with bipartisan sponsorship is making its way in the Tennessee House to the floor. The bill authorizes school districts in the state to hire off-duty, active-duty police officers to serve as armed security officers at schools. See news story here.

As long as they’re certified by the Peace Officer Standards Training Commission, city police, county sheriff’s office personnel, constables, metro police officers, highway patrol troopers and Tennessee Bureau of Investigation agents would be eligible to provide security to schools while off duty.

Van Huss said he originally wanted military veterans to be eligible to provide security, but that presented additional challenges, like liability coverage and psychological evaluations.

Two certified law enforcement officers could be hired per school regardless of how many school resource officers the school already employs. Each officer providing security would be required to carry a loaded handgun.

The participating school systems would be able to regulate whether the hired law enforcement officers wear uniforms while providing security. Schools could also determine whether the hired officers carry their firearms openly or concealed, as well as regulate the use of carrying rifles.

As of today, I would have to agree that the "additional challenges" of enabling military veterans the same authority are too high to overcome without substantial resources and a lot more time for training.

I very much agree that in addition to what this bill authorizes, former law-enforcement officers and military veterans should volunteer to be unarmed "lookouts," preferably equipped with two-way, handheld radios, to observe and detect persons who could be intending harm to students. They would supplement, not replace, any armed police officers already on duty. Actually, that can be done now, in coordination with school's principals.

I think that both sides of the aisle are endorsing such measures because today, a student who shot two other students at Great Mills High School, Maryland was himself shot and killed by an on-duty police officer serving as the SRO, as reported by CNN.

Relevance to our prospective resolution: this happened in a hallway just before classes began.

A male student, 14, is in stable condition and a female student, 16, is in critical condition. There is no word yet on how many lives the officer saved by his quick response.

Update: Well, this is true.