ORONO, Maine — Higher education and public safety officials across the state say a bill aimed at making campuses safer by allowing people to carry concealed handguns on school grounds would have the opposite effect.
“Based on my 40 years in law enforcement, I know that when there are more guns allowed, there is more risk and less safety,” said Roland LaCroix, chief of campus police at the University of Maine in Orono.
The bill, LD 1370, would require Maine’s universities, community colleges and Maine Maritime Academy to allow people to carry concealed handguns on campus. The Legislature’s Committee on Education and Cultural Affairs held a public hearing on the bill this week, where it met widespread resistance from higher education and public safety officials.
“Policies making areas ‘gun free’ provide a sense of safety to those who engage in magical thinking, but in practice, of course, killers aren’t stopped by gun-free zones,” said Rep. Richard Cebra, R-Naples, the bill’s sponsor, in his testimony to the committee. “As always, it’s the honest people, the very ones you want to be armed who tend to obey the law.”
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