Several new state gun laws have gone or will soon go into effect.
Most notably, concealed handgun license holders can openly carry firearms as of Jan. 1, and concealed carry will be allowed on university campuses starting Aug. 1. Also, seven new laws, including one that potentially allows guns inside city hall buildings in Austin and Georgetown, are already official.
The laws were passed during the 2015 legislative session in what state Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, called “an effort to show how pro-gun you can be.”
“I don’t think it’s just about gun rights. I just think the argument gets cloaked in that,” said Watson, a concealed handgun license holder who opposes open carry. “We want to make sure everybody’s rights are protected, but we want to do it in a way that’s reasonable, rational and takes into account public safety.”
Watson anticipates receiving complaints early this year in response to the new open-carry handgun laws, which he said were not overwhelmingly requested by constituents.
Efforts to educate
In Georgetown, Assistant Police Chief Cory Tchida spoke before business owners and members of the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce on Jan. 27 to answer any questions about open carry and inform the community about the new laws.
“We want to, as law enforcement, respect the rights of individuals to be concerned, while at the same time respect the rights of those individuals that are exercising the right guaranteed to them by law,” he said.
Tchida said GPD staff members had been trained to ask specific questions of someone reporting a person openly carrying a gun. He also said he expects open carriers to respect business owners who do not want guns in their stores.
According to the Texas Department of Public Safety, there are 825,957 license holders as of Dec. 31, 2014. Since Texas’ population is close to 28 million, roughly 3 percent of the state population holds a valid license to carry, Tchida said.
“Of that 3 percent, I don’t want to put a number to it because I don’t know, but there is only some percentage of that that is actually going to open-carry,” he said.
In terms of customer service, Tchida said business owners should aim to avoid treating customers who open carry differently.
“However you treated that customer in December is how you should treat them in January,” he said. “When they came into the store in December, they very well may have been a concealed handgun license holder, and you didn’t know it. Don’t let the fact that you can see a handgun change the dynamic of how you deal with them.”
Know the rules
Some specifics of the new law have been called into question, including whether open carry is permitted on the parking lots, driveways, sidewalks and walkways of public school district property. State Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, sought clarification from Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who responded Dec. 21 by confirming handguns are not allowed on “any grounds or building on which an activity sponsored by a school … is being conducted.”
Outside of schools, most establishments are required to post signs if they do not wish to allow concealed carry, open carry or both, according to Michael Cargill, owner and instructor of Central Texas Gun Works.
Tchida said if a person chooses to open-carry in an area where it is legally allowed, the handgun must be in a holster attached to a belt or a shoulder holster. However, the Texas Legislature did not define what constitutes a holster, so Tchida said there will have to be clarifications coming to define those pieces of the legislation.
Texas Restaurant Association spokesperson Wendy Woodland said more than 100 restaurant owners attended a November webinar detailing open-carry laws. Any establishment that draws more than half its on-site business from alcohol sales must automatically ban firearms, Woodland said.
H-E-B already permits concealed carry, but the Texas- based grocer is not permitting open handgun carry, spokesperson Leslie Lockett said.
Policing public property
Cargill also argues the city of Austin is disobeying a new state law that allows concealed carry—and as of Jan. 1, open carry—inside portions of Austin City Hall. An Oct. 9 memo from Abbott’s legal team essentially sides with Cargill, who filed one of 25 related complaints to the state.
Attorney General Ken Paxton in December issued a response to the complaints that sided with Abbott’s opinion. However, Austin officials continue to argue City Hall should be exempt from the new law.
In Georgetown, Tchida said City Hall and other city government buildings previously allowed concealed weapons and will now allow open carrying of firearms. However, the City Council chambers also serves as the municipal court, and guns are not permitted in court buildings. Although concealed carry will be permitted during City Council meetings, guns will not be permitted in the building when court is in session.
“So we now have these signs, so when it’s City Council chambers, the sign [allowing concealed carry] goes up outside the door to council chambers, and the next morning then we put the sign up for municipal court that says, ‘Okay, now you can’t have any kind of gun in here,’” he said. “So there’s a lot of dynamics in there that’s not as simple as it seems to be on its face.”
Starting in August, The University of Texas must begin allowing concealed carry, but in December, Southwestern University announced its campus was to remain gun-free. Although public universities are able to designate some parts of campuses as gun-free zones, private institutions are allowed to opt out of the law entirely. Southwestern upheld its current weapons ban, which prohibits the possession of firearms, ammunition and explosives on campus, and cited campus safety and student well-being as the main reason for opting out of the law.
Additional reporting by Caitlin Perrone
