Gov. Kay Ivey convened a committee to study school security in the wake of the massacre at Marjory Douglas High School and the committee found that we need more school resource officers and buildings that are harder to get into.
These no-brainer solutions require funding and planning, two things no government is good at. Bottom line: there is no way these things get implemented anytime soon. But Alabama already has a model in place for allowing trained teachers to carry in classrooms, it just needs an approval from the Legislature and a signature from the governor.
State Representative Will Ainsworth isn’t holding back his criticism of Gov. Ivey’s handling of this:
“The reason I called for [a special session] Friday after the shooting, and really it’s too late, we should have done it last session when we actually had legislation and we had the opportunity. And so, we got an opportunity with the Legislature, the governor has an opportunity to fix the problem. She’s got the study back, and I want to be real clear on this, if the Legislature and specifically Governor Kay Ivey does not do anything before school starts back in the fall and there ends up being an incident or accident, the blood is on her hands.”
Why this matters: Ainsworth is completely correct. There has been a complete lack of action on this issue in the state of Alabama and elsewhere. Florida acted after the shooting in Parkland, and Texas will do SOMETHING after the shooting in Sante Fe. To say that the outcomes of these responses are appropriate is debatable. But we are not required to wait until after we have our own funerals because of a mass shooting event at an Alabama school before we do something.
Listen to the interview here:
Don’t miss out! Subscribe today to have Alabama’s leading headlines delivered to your inbox.