L awrence J ournal -W orld
Thursday, January 28, 2016
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Dems introduce proposal to reverse campus carry
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group of five democratic state senators — including two from Douglas County — is trying to reverse the portion of a law requiring public colleges to allow concealed carry of guns on their campuses starting in July 2017. Under current law, the personal and family protection act, postsecondary educational institutions are among a handful of entities allowed a fouryear exemption before they must allow guns, like other state and municipal buildings have been required to do for the past few years. That exemption runs out in July 2017. (Side note: Other entities with the same four-year exemption are medical care facilities, adult care homes, community mental health centers and indigent health care clinics.) Senate Bill No. 348, introduced Jan. 21, would scratch colleges from the exemption list and, instead, state that the law does not apply at all to postsecondary educational institution buildings, or buildings leased by them. (Another note: Buildings on the grounds of the Kansas state school for the
Heard on the Hill
Sara Shepherd sshepherd@ljworld.com
deaf or the Kansas state school for the blind are currently the only place the concealed carry law doesn’t apply, according to the legislation.) The bill was referred Friday to the Committee on Federal and State Affairs. You can track its progress via kslegislature.org. The bill was introduced by senators Tom Hawk, D-Manhattan; Oletha Faust-Goudeau, DWichita; Marci Francisco, D-Lawrence; Tom Holland, D-Baldwin City; Pat Pettey, D-Kansas City. Holland said universities should be able to decide whether they want to prohibit guns and not have that decision “forced upon them” by the state.
“Honestly, the schools won’t have enough money to put the proper security machines in place to rectify if they want to keep guns off campus,” he said. “Once again the state has overreached.” Francisco said she agreed prohibiting weapons should be an institutional decision. She added that since only people 21 and older are allowed by law to carry concealed, practically half the people on college campuses would not be allowed to, which she called inconsistent and “disconcerting.” The Kansas Board of Regents and state university administrators in the meantime aren’t counting on any changes in the law and continue to plan for the arrival of guns on campus beginning in July 2017. The Regents last week passed a statewide policy directing individual schools to create their own, more specific policies, about how the law will be implemented on their respective campuses. — This is an excerpt from Sara Shepherd’s Heard on the Hill column, which appears on LJWorld.com.
Amendment would make hunting a constitutional right
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proposed constitutional amendment is pending in the Kansas House that would guarantee the public’s right to engage in hunting, fishing and trapping. But some officials are warning that it could have far-reaching consequences that could put all of the state’s hunting and fishing regulations under heightened scrutiny by the courts. The amendment would insert the following language into the Bill of Rights of the Kansas Constitution: “Right of public to hunt, fish and trap wildlife. The people have the right to hunt, fish and trap, including by the use of traditional methods, subject to laws and regulations that promote wildlife conservation and management and that preserve the future of hunting and fishing. Public hunting and fishing shall be a preferred means of managing and controlling wildlife. This section shall not be construed to modify any provision of law relating to trespass, property rights or water resources.” The resolution was sponsored last year by Reps. Adam Lusker, D-Frontenac, and Travis Couture-Lovelady, R-Palco, who is no longer in the Legislature after resigning last year to take a job as a lobbyist for the National
Statehouse Live
Peter Hancock phancock@ljworld.com
Rifle Association. The House Federal and State Affairs Committee heard two days of testimony on the amendment this week. Mike Murray, a lobbyist for the Kansas Rifle Association, said the amendment is needed because the right of people to hunt, fish and trap is currently threatened by “animal rights groups, off-road vehicle groups, urbanization and decreasing habitat.” But Rep. Annie Tietze, D-Topeka, who said she supports hunting and fishing rights, questioned whether the state should put language in its constitution taking sides on those issues. “This was to offset other groups who are anti-hunting,” she said. “Why should we protect their (hunters’) rights as opposed to rights of others who feel strongly
enough to come together to oppose hunting?” And while the Kansas Department of Wildlife Parks and Tourism did not oppose the amendment, its general counsel, Chris Tymeson, said there have been concerns about putting such a right into the constitution because it could subject any laws or regulations that restrict hunting, fishing and trapping rights to what the courts call “strict scrutiny.” In short, that means the government has to show it has a “compelling state interest” in taking any action that restricts the right, and that the policy is “narrowly tailored” to achieve the government’s objective. Rep. Dick Jones, RTopeka, said he had concerns about any amendment that would weaken the state’s authority to regulate hunting and manage wildlife. “The greatest threat to conservation worldwide is poaching,” Jones said. “We have laws to try and prevent that, but it’s extremely difficult. The prohibitions the state puts up have proven inadequate because of the overwhelming impact of poaching.” — This is an excerpt from Peter Hancock’s Statehouse Live column, which appears on LJWorld.com.
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BRIEFLY South Middle School’s assistant principal retiring Lawrence public schools Superintendent Rick Doll has announced the retirement of South Middle School Assistant Principal Lynn Harrod. Harrod, who was also a student in the district, will retire at the end of the current school year after 31 years of employment. Of his 31 years in the district, Harrod has served 20 years as assistant principal at South Middle Harrod School. Harrod joined Lawrence Public Schools in 1985 as a para-educator and coach. The Kansas Association of Middle School Administrators named Harrod its 2014-15 Exemplary Middle School Assistant Principal. In 2015, he earned the Douglas County Child Abuse Prevention Task Force’s Champion for Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention Award and the
Lawrence Police Department’s Citizen Meritorious Public Service Award. The district will immediately begin a search to fill the vacancy for the upcoming school year.
People’s State of the Union set for Sunday at library The Lawrence branch of the U.S. Department of Arts and Culture will host its second annual People’s State of the Union Sunday at the Lawrence Public Library, 707 Vermont St. Slated for 4 to 6 p.m. in the library’s auditorium, the event is an invitation for citizens to supplement the president’s State of the Union address with their own personal stories. The Department of Arts and Culture is not an official government agency, but “an act of collective imagination aimed at sparking creative change.” For more information, visit facebook. com/imagininglawrence.
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