From today's Keene Sentinel, the major news source for southwest New Hampshire:
Measure seeks to allow weapons on college campuses
Measure seeks to allow weapons on campuses
Posted: Tuesday, January 3, 2012 12:15 pm | Updated: 11:50 am, Tue Jan 3, 2012.
By Abby Spegman Sentinel Staff | 5 comments
College essentials: textbooks, extra-long twin sheets, mini fridge.
Gun?
With state lawmakers set to vote on a bill that would allow guns on college campuses, members of the Keene State College community interviewed this week said they are mostly against the idea, with many warning someone is bound to get hurt.
“You’re with kids that get way too drunk and don’t understand the rules. It’s an accident waiting to happen,” senior Neil Brewster said.
“People are a little too confrontational to have guns at this point (in life).”
House Bill 334 would give sole authority to the Legislature to regulate guns on any public land or in publicly owned or financed buildings, meaning public colleges or universities — because they receive state funding — could not prohibit guns in classrooms, dorms or anywhere else on campus.
Currently, guns are banned from all University System of New Hampshire campuses, which include Keene State, University of New Hampshire, Plymouth State University and Granite State College. The bill would also affect the state’s community college campuses, including River Valley Community College in Claremont and Keene.
The House could vote on the bill as early as Wednesday, when lawmakers reconvene for the 2012 legislative session.
Sponsors of the bill have said the goal is to protect citizens’ constitutional right to bear arms, which they say should not be restricted on any public property. Similar thinking led to the repeal last year of the ban on carrying guns in the Statehouse in Concord.
But college is a sort of training ground for adulthood, argued Keene State senior Emily A. Lehet. Having a gun may be too much responsibility for someone “in control of (themselves) for the first time.”
And she shuddered at the thought of being placed to live in a dorm with a gun-toting roommate.
“It’s uncomfortable anyway, but that’s a whole new level — terror,” she said.
Lawrence Welkowitz, a psychology professor at Keene State, started an online petition last month against the bill with signatures nationally and as far away as South Africa, Australia and Poland.
In an email, Welkowitz raised similar concerns as students interviewed that mixing young people’s tendency for impulsive behavior with guns would be a “recipe for disaster.” He also worried about the economic effects of allowing guns on campus, arguing parents may be wary of sending their students to New Hampshire schools, particularly out-of-state families who pay higher tuition.
“It’s economic suicide,” he wrote, adding he would never let his child attend such a school.
Guns on campus would be a new element for campus safety officers. That department has been planning how it would respond since the bill was introduced last year.
It would mean arming campus security officers and training them in how to respond to situations where guns may be present, according to Amanda Warman, director of campus safety at Keene State.
“It would change how we do our jobs,” she said.
Still, some students suggested that in New Hampshire, guns are a part of life that doesn’t have to end when you get to college.
“Growing up in New Hampshire, for me, I don’t see guns as an issue,” said senior Charlie B. Allen of Tamworth.
“There’s always an exception to the rule … but I think we do grow up with a different mentality.”
In a letter last month to lawmakers, University System of New Hampshire Chancellor Edward MacKay wrote he was not against HB 334, but asked that the university system’s campuses and the state’s community colleges be exempt.
And in Concord, Gov. John H. Lynch planned a press conference for this morning at the Statehouse with police and higher education officials calling on the House to vote down the bill.
Keene State senior Kevin L. Sandler said while he doesn’t like the idea of guns on campus, he wouldn’t be surprised if the bill passed.
“I’d rather not see it, but it is New Hampshire — Live Free or Die.”
Abby Spegman can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1409, or aspegman@keenesentinel.com
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