Mixed response to governor’s gun plan
MIAMI Florida’s governor has announced plans to put more armed guards in schools and to make it harder for young adults and some people with mental illness to buy guns, responding to days of intense lobbying from survivors of last week’s shooting at a Florida high school.
Rick Scott unveiled his school safety proposals as teachers returned for the first time to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School since the shooting nine days ago that killed 17 people.
The shooting has sparked an intense push to restrict access to assault rifles, fuelled by student activists who swarmed the state capitol demanding concrete gun control measures.
US President Donald Trump said repeatedly yesterday that he favoured arming teachers to protect students, an idea many educators rejected out of hand.
‘‘I am totally against arming teachers,’’ said Broward County schools superintendent Robert Runcie, whose area includes Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. ‘‘They have a challenging job as it is.’’
In addition to banning firearm sales to anyone under 21, Scott called for a trained law enforcement officer for every school.
Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, which has more than 3000 students, had one armed resource officer who never entered the building under attack while a gunman was shooting people inside, officials said.
A woman close to Cruz warned the FBI on January 5 that he had rifles and said, ‘‘I know he is going to explode,’’ according to a transcript of the tip to the FBI’s call centre, obtained yesterday by The Associated Press. The FBI has acknowledged that it failed to investigate the tip.
Among other things, Scott’s US$500 million (NZ$685m) plan would create a ‘‘violent threat restraining order’’ that would let a court prohibit a violent or mentally ill person from purchasing or possessing a firearm or any other weapon under certain circumstances.
The proposal would also strengthen gun purchase and possession restrictions for mentally ill people. Scott is seeking US$50m (NZ$68m) for initiatives that include expanding mental health services.
Talia Rumsky, a 16-year-old Stoneman Douglas High student who was at the school during the shooting, was among those who travelled to Tallahassee on Thursday to lobby lawmakers about gun control.
She said Scott’s plan to make it illegal for anyone under 21 to purchase a gun was a start but did not go far enough. AP
After days of funerals for those killed in the attack, teachers began the emotionally fraught process of returning to the school yesterday to collect belongings from classrooms that had been off limits since the slayings. Classes will resume on Thursday.
Broward teachers union president Anna Fusco met with the teachers as they returned, hailing them as ‘‘incredibly brave and strong’’. AP GETTY IMAGES