County officials speak out against bills promoting removal of concealed pistol permits

Etowah County Commissioners held a special called meeting Tuesday alongside their regular work session to discuss three gun-related bills up for consideration in the Alabama Legislature this session.

They passed a single resolution opposing the bills or any “legislation which would weaken the Etowah County Sheriff’s ability to provide for the safety and welfare of all Etowah County Citizens.”

Their biggest fear: A reduction in funding for school resource officers in county schools.

More: Alabama's 2022 legislative session opens with potential record budgets, and a warning

The bills in question — House Bills 6 and 44 and Senate Bill 1 — would remove certain aspects from laws pertaining to firearms.

House Bill 6, introduced by Reps. Proncey Robertson, Mount Hope, and Shane Stringer, Citronelle, and "would authorize individuals to carry a pistol or other firearm concealed or in a vehicle without a permit and would delete the presumption of intent to commit a crime of violence solely for not possessing a permit."

House Bill 44, which has 38 co-sponsors, including local Reps. Gil Isbell, Gadsden, and Craig Lipscomb, Gadsden, proposes the elimination of “the need for a person to obtain a concealed carry permit in order to carry a pistol.”

Senate Bill 1, introduced by Sen. Gerald Allen, R-Tuscaloosa, "would repeal certain restrictions on the carrying or possession of a firearm on certain property or in a motor vehicle by persons with or without a concealed pistol permit," and also would "revise certain restrictions on the carrying or possession of 14 firearms at certain locations."

“There’s about 21 states that have repealed concealed carry permits,” Sheriff Jonathan Horton told commissioners. “In 2013, the Open Carry Bill was (passed), allowing people to open carry in certain areas and you could only conceal carry if you had a permit.”

Horton said these bills have a lot of support, but his office. along with the Etowah County Board of Education and the commission, took issue with them as pistol permit revenue funds school resource officers in the district.

“If we were to lose that funding, obviously we’d have to pull some strings somewhere,” said Dr. Alan Cosby, superintendent of Etowah County Schools, “My main concern is I don’t want anything to do with a bill that could jeopardize our school resource officers.”

Currently, the county, the school board and the sheriff's office fund SROs for all but seven schools within the county. They do so through contributions of $266,000 each, totaling $798,000. Schools that receive the funding:

  • Etowah County Refocus Center/Career Tech

  • Sardis Middle and High Schools

  • Whitesboro Elementary School

  • West End Elementary and High Schools

  • Gaston Elementary, Middle and High Schools

  • Hokes Bluff Elementary, Middle and High Schools

  • Highland Elementary School

  • Glencoe Elementary, Middle and High Schools

  • Ivalee Elementary School

  • Carlisle Elementary School

“These are just the schools that the county personally funds,” Commissioner Joey Statum explained, “Other local municipalities such as Southside and Rainbow City have their own separate funding for SROs.”

Cosby said he has had conversations with several legislators within the past few days, all of whom assure him that the current funding mechanism for SROs will remain intact moving forward. However, it is the potential of lost funding that is causing the most problems.

“We’re almost at a point where we can fund SROs in all of our schools, but we’re not quite there yet,” he said. “We lose this funding, we will never reach that point.”

Horton added, “The funding is the biggest thing of it. The funding is paramount to keeping SROs, as we’ve been able to add one to almost every campus.”

He added that the county averages 3,000 permits sold annually at a rate of $20 per year, which Etowah County residents have mostly had no issue with.

“We buy hunting and fishing licenses and I look at these permits in the same way,” Horton said, “The annual fee has gone into the $266,000 in SRO funding and additional equipment we’ve bought for these officers.”

Commissioners called on Isbell, Lipscomb and Sen. Andrew Jones, R-Centre, to “work with the Republican leadership and other state representatives to appropriate adequate and permanent replacement funding from the treasury of the State of Alabama” if the bills are passed.

In reality, Horton noted, the county will not see a huge cut in funding from pistol permits because concealed carry permits are still required to cross state lines.

“There are statistics that show that if you conceal carry across to other states, you will still need a permit to reciprocate this,” he said. “So maybe the funding won’t dip below a 20% cut, and if so, we can live with that.”

House Bill 44 also allows for several venues to be removed from the list of places firearms could be banned, such as athletic events and stadiums. Horton pointed out that this could cause a significant amount of issues when it comes to public safety and the safety of law enforcement.

“If you go to a high school football or basketball game, these 18- to 19-year-old kids (could) have a weapon in their pocket concealed without a permit legally,” he said. “When you talk about kids who have weapons they can draw, it can quickly turn into a shooting, so there’s a lot of concerns to be drawn from a public safety standpoint.”

Horton said that “upward of 90%” of people in the state who apply for a concealed carry permit receive it, but there are those who cannot because of mental health or criminal history.

“Even if the permits were free, the premise of having a background check is what helps determine who can carry and who can’t,” he said. “There’s a lot of mental health issues in the state and we check for these issues when handing out concealed carry permits.”

If the new legislation passes, the only way the sheriff's department would be able to determine who was not able to carry a firearm would be from the Forbidden Persons Database, which lists anyone who has been arrested and convicted of a violent crime.

However, it does not list those who cannot carry because of mental health, or those who have been convicted of low-level crimes.

“It means that if a person has committed a crime of a serious magnitude, that’s the only way you would not be allowed to carry a firearm,” the sheriff said.

However, this database of names has not been released for use yet. In fact, it now is set to be operational in January 2023, after it had originally was set to be implemented this month.

“It’s coming down to that database if we do away with that,” said Commissioner Jamie Grant, “which means that we are having to rely on a database that is not there.”

Both Horton and the commissioners say they support the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms, but the potential loss of funding and safety of the public and law enforcement is driving their position on the legislation.

“Personally, I have some opposition to it because of the safety of our law enforcement and the citizens,” Commission President Johnny Grant said.

“I’d rather have pistol permits be free for the public safety aspect of it,” said Horton, “So the right people can be vetted and the wrong people don’t end up with a firearm, but obviously the funding is important.”

This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: County officials speak out against removal of pistol permits