.jpg;w=960)
Residents may be greeted by metal detectors in the city library and other prohibitions against guns when they enter city buildings after a proposed review of Longmont’s firearm safety measures.
The bid for a probe of gun control measures at city buildings has not been formally put on the city council agenda for action. The idea still drew a sharp rebuke from Mayor Brian Bagley who said Wednesday it is a “knee-jerk reaction that puts further limitations and controls on law abiding citizens and it’s not going to prevent a catastrophe that happened at the King Soopers in Boulder.”
Councilmember Marcia Martin, Tuesday night, said she will ask for a review of gun safety rules at city facilities at a later meeting, as a way to protect residents and city employees. She did not mention the March 22 mass shooting at the King Soopers on Table Mesa.
Council members voted 5-2 to put Martin’s request on a future agenda with Councilwoman Polly Christensen and Bagley voting no.
Bagley said the world and the country are suffering through a pandemic of gun violence and people are blaming others for the tragedies. “Like eight billion other people in the world, I have no idea what the solution is,” Bagley said.
Putting metal detectors in the city’s recreation center and the library, however, is not the answer. “It will increase our budget and it’s not going to prevent someone from walking into a public parking lot or private parking lot and killing people with a gun,” Bagley said.
Martin said using metal detectors should not be the only measure considered to boost safety. She said the city review should include, at minimum, the updating of signs informing the public about open carry rules that apply to each building.
The city should also look at amending city codes and the cost of building modifications, increasing staff and adding equipment, Martin told the council.
She said written notices that ban open carry firearms in city-leased buildings are small compared to other postings, faded and sometimes defaced. Martin said she is asking for broader protections for the public and city staff members.
City staff should address “the feasibility of extending broad weapons prohibitions and protections to more city buildings, especially those where large groups of people gather regularly, such as the library, museum, Senior Center and recreation facilities,” Martin said.
Her proposal came after she reviewed Longmont’s public buildings over the weekend to look at signage on open carry restrictions and assess whether entry restrictions were feasible, Martin said in an email.
She also interviewed both City Manager Harold Dominguez and Interim Public Safety Chief Rob Spendlow.
“Both thought that my proposed exercise was valuable and that some good improvements could come of it,” Martin said. “If either of them had put forward harmful consequences of my motion I would not have made it. But they didn’t.”
Martin said she did not offer a specific solution to make the city’s public buildings safer. Incremental concrete measures to make people safer are something that can be achieved locally, while broad sweeping changes to reduce gun violence should come at the federal level, she said.
“...I believe our model ought to be our years of experience making automobiles safer,” Martin said. “There’s been a vast cultural change since the 1960s about cars. Guns aren’t different. There’s also a Constitutional right to freedom of movement,” she said. “That doesn’t give everyone a right to a jetpack.”
CORRECTION: The original story misidentified the couniclwoman who voted against the putting the item on a future council agenda. Councilwoman Polly Christensen voted with Brian Bagley against the putting the item on the future agenda
