Governor Urged To Kill Weapons Bill Educators Protest Measure Making It Easier To Bring Guns To School

They’ve written letters and flooded the state Capitol’s phone lines.

And on Thursday, several North Idaho school leaders cornered Gov. Dirk Kempthorne, urging him to veto a bill that would make it easier to bring weapons to school.

“I don’t think there’s anyone, even in the NRA, who could justify students bringing Uzis to school,” Coeur d’Alene School Board member John Goedde told Kempthorne.

The governor, who said there are positive aspects of the complex bill, said he likely will decide next week whether to sign it.

“It’s either going to be a law, or it’s not,” Kempthorne said. “It’s one of those situations where I imagine I’ll be criticized whatever decision I make.”

HB137, which was passed by the House ion a 64-3 vote earlier this month, started out with good intentions, educators and legislators agree.

The bill’s goal, Kempthorne said, was to prevent parents from bringing weapons into conferences with teachers.

He cited an instance in Idaho in which an irate parent had brought a Bowie knife to a conference. The teacher sued, but no law prevented the parent from having the weapon, Kempthorne said.

But lawmakers amended the bill days before the end of the session to take into account students who bring their guns to campus so they can hunt after school.

One amendment even allows adults with concealed weapons permits to bring guns to school, although they are not allowed in juvenile detention centers, jails or courthouses. The other amendment permits students and others to keep firearms in their cars as long as the guns and other weapons are “secured … in an unobtrusive, non-threatening manner.”

“What do you do when one portion of the bill you like and the other portion you don’t like?” asked Rep. Jim Clark, R-Hayden, who voted in favor of the gun legislation.

Educators and others point out that those amendments negate the bill’s original intent.

“It’s a very detailed bill,” Kempthorne said. “There’s lots of elements to it.”

The governor’s office has received 777 calls, faxes and e-mails urging a veto of the bill in recent days. Just 20 people have notified the office in support of the legislation.

Kempthorne was in Moscow and Coeur d’Alene on Thursday, signing bills sponsored by North Idaho legislators.

One of the new laws allows large facilities, like conference centers, to have trained personnel on hand to operate life-saving heart defibrillator units. Kempthorne estimated that the technology would save 200 lives a year.

But educators, who point to a string of deadly school shootings around the country in recent years, say the gun bill has the potential to do just the opposite.

“Statewide and in our district, we want our schools to be a safe place,” said Gretta Shay, a fourth-grade teacher at Hayden Meadows Elementary School and president of the North Idaho branch of the Idaho Education Association. “When you have guns on the premises, I would not feel very safe.

“Every teacher and every staff person I have talked to … is appalled that the governor would even consider signing this bill. What I hear them saying is we are demanding the governor veto this bill.”

Staff writer Betsy Z. Russell contributed to this report.