On a 9-8 vote, the House Judiciary Committee has killed Sen. Lee Heider’s bill to invalidate all local regulations on the use, carrying or manufacture of knives – including the rules at schools and jails. Heider, R-Twin Falls, said his bill would assert state primacy over knife regulations, to avoid a patchwork of different rules from city to city or from school district to school district. “We’re trying to get away from every school board in the state having to promulgate their own rule,” Heider told the representatives. “What we’re saying is primacy is important.” He declared, “It should be the state that has primacy over knives – not individual school districts, not individual cities or communities. I think that you’ll find that most people in the state are in favor of this. I know the sportsmen certainly are.”

The bill was opposed by the Idaho Association of School Administrators, the Idaho School Boards Association, the Idaho Education Association, and a school-safety consultant from eastern Idaho. The Idaho Sheriffs Association urgently demanded a lengthy amendment to clarify that carrying, using or manufacturing knives would be illegal at county jails, “except persons who may use a knife for cooking or eating purposes or used by detention deputies and peace officers.”

“I would hope I would not have to explain the danger of knives in the county jails,” Sheriffs Association lobbyist Mike Kane told the committee.

Rep. Ryan Kerby, R-New Plymouth, a school district superintendent, said, “I think schools recognize state primacy.” But he noted that the bill would have declared all existing local rules and regulations “null and void,” including those of all school districts, which now have their own local policies on knives. “We have ag classes, welding classes,” he said. “We have a variety of places where students can manufacture knives,” but schools currently forbid it. “Is this suggesting that we’re going to have to let kids manufacture knives, even though we don’t carry them on school property?” Heider said the decision would have to be made at the state level, perhaps by the state Board of Education. But his bill simply reversed all existing rules; it didn’t add new ones.

Rep. Luke Malek, R-Coeur d’Alene, proposed holding off on voting on the bill until later in the week, to allow various parties to work with Heider on amendments. But Rep. John McCrostie, D-Boise, proposed just killing the bill. “The state already has primacy,” he said, noting that state laws supersede local ordinances and rules. “Effectively what it does, in my opinion, is it wipes out everything at a local level. It’s not necessarily asserting primacy. It’s actually a usurping of local control, and that concerns me a great deal.”

Rep. Christy Perry, R-Nampa, said, “I have 15 different school districts in my district, they’re different, they’re unique. Some are urban and some are rural. I’m concerned about having one rule for everything.” The bill, SB 1092, had previously passed the Senate on a 25-10 vote.