Since Texans can now carry handguns openly with a permit as of Jan. 1, the new law has Katy residents concerned, others scratching their heads and a few embracing their new rights.
As of yet, Katy residents have not reported any incidents related to open carry to police in the city, law enforcement officials said.
“We haven’t had one call yet about anybody open carrying,” Katy Assistant Police Chief Tim Tyler said.[polldaddy poll=9322317]
Thousands of people have carry licenses in the Katy area. In 2015, the Texas Department of Public Safety reported 2,680 people were issued their licenses in the Katy area.
What was formerly known as a concealed handgun license, or CHL, is now the Texas license to carry a handgun, also known as an LTC.
House Bill 910 legalized permit holders to carry handguns openly so long as they are in a holster. Prior to that, permit holders could carry a handgun as long as it was concealed.
“Nobody knew what to expect,” Cane Island Outfitters owner Cris Martinez said. “But now that it’s in effect, we just don’t see it that often.”
Provisions of the law
Texas is the 45th state to allow the open carrying of handguns. As of Dec. 31, DPS reported 937,419 active handgun carry licenses, a 14 percent increase from 2014.
California, Illinois, South Carolina, Florida, New York and Washington, D.C., prohibit carrying handguns openly.
The law sets restrictions on where a person with an LTC can carry but allows for permit holders with LTCs to carry handguns in government buildings excluding courtrooms.
Katy Mayor Fabol Hughes said City Hall previously had signs that informed visitors handguns were not allowed on the premises.
The City Council allowed concealed carry of handguns in its meetings, which are held in an a separate chamber of the City Hall complex.
“We didn’t rule them out if they came in with concealed [weapons], but we didn’t allow open [carry],” Hughes said of concealed carrying during City Council meetings.
Senate Bill 273 details the options city councils have in allowing concealed and open carry or banning guns altogether during meetings that are governed by the Texas Open Meetings Act, such as City Council or Planning and Zoning Commission meetings.
After Jan. 1, the signs prohibiting handguns at City Hall were taken down because it is a government building where carrying is allowed now—whether openly or concealed, Hughes said.
“We reserve that right [to ask if someone has a license], and if we ever get a meeting we think might be controversial or whatever, we may put up a temporary sign, ‘No guns,’” Hughes said.
Business bans
Private businesses, including restaurants and retailers, can ban concealed or open carry on their premises under a provision of the new law. To ban handguns, a business can either have a sign stating the language of Texas Penal Code sections 30.06 and 30.07 or verbally tell a person that handguns are not allowed.
Both methods are deemed to be effective notice under the law. The Section 30.06 sign bans concealed handguns and the 30.07 sign bans openly carried handguns.
Businesses can choose to post one or the other, but the signs must be in English and Spanish.
At LaCenterra at Cinco Ranch, there are few signs posted in storefronts. Trader Joe’s and Bernie’s Burger Bus both have the 30.07 sign banning the open carrying of handguns.
“We haven’t had any incidents,” Traders Joe’s store Manager Josh Hammond said. “All of our complex is in the same boat.”
Hammond said the store received notices from LaCenterra detailing the shopping center’s policies on open carry of handguns as well as from Trader Joe’s corporate office about its preference that customers do not bring weapons into the store.
Katy Mills General Manager Don Massey said the mall will continue to enforce its existing policy which prohibits weapons on its property, regardless of whether they are displayed openly or concealed.
“Any shopper in possession of a weapon will be individually notified of [Katy Mills] existing policy by a member of the security or management team and asked to comply,” Massey said.
Jim Hoots, Cane Island Outfitters instructional coordinator, who is a Texas DPS and National Rifle Association-certified LTC teacher, said he did not see any reason to prevent people from concealed carrying of a handgun.
“My advice to store owners is to do a little research and find out what the statistics really are,” Hoots said. “I think a lot of license holders, when they see those signs, they are going to go somewhere else.”
School grounds
Another law, Senate Bill 11, has provisions concerning the implementation of concealed carry at higher education institutions.
Effective Aug. 1, 2016, concealed carry will be allowed at four-year public, private and independent college campuses. On Aug. 1, 2017, concealed carry will be allowed at junior colleges.
For public grade schools, there are still specific details on where and when carrying of handguns, whether open or concealed, is allowed.
“A lot of people get confused with [the] schools [provision],” Martinez said.
Although LTC holders cannot carry handguns into a school, they can carry a handgun in a parking lot as long as there is no school-sponsored activity.
For officials at Katy ISD, that means anytime children are regularly present during school hours, arrival and dismissal times, school board meetings and any other hours determined by campus officials.
“Is dismissal at the end of the day a student activity?” asked KISD emergency management coordinator John Bremer. “We tend to say that, yes, it is. We don’t want people to be misled and misunderstand, ‘OK, I can bring my weapon out at dismissal.’ We would see that as a student activity because there [are] students present at that time.”
KISD released a statement to parents and community members about the new law Jan. 26 along with a page of frequently asked questions.
“The law went into effect, and we knew parents were going to have questions about that,” KISD Communications Director Denisse Cantu Coffman said.
Community reaction
Under the new law, Tyler said police do not have the right to question someone who is openly carrying a gun.
“For us, they’d have to be violating some type of law, a breach of peace, a disturbance, something like that. Unless they were carrying in a building that had the 30.06 sign up or the 30.07 sign up,” he said.
Tyler said he personally likes the law for convenience.
He said prior to HB 910, he would be violating the law if his weapon happened to be in view accidentally, but most of the people he has talked to are going to continue to conceal carry, which he said is safer.
“The reason you carry is to defend yourself or others against the bad elements, and they don’t want the bad guy to even know they have a gun because that takes your element of surprise away,” he said.
Hoots said that he has openly carried one time—when he went into a convenience store to buy a lottery ticket—and said he was not used to carrying his weapon in open view.
“I felt very self-conscious,” Hoots said.
Hoots said if he was in a rural area he would feel more comfortable carrying openly for convenience more than around Houston.
“In the Houston area, most people are not going to carry openly,” he said.
He said prior to HB 910, he would be violating the law if his weapon happened to be in view accidentally, but most of the people he has talked to are going to continue to conceal carry, which he said is safer.
“The reason you carry is to defend yourself or others against the bad elements, and they don’t want the bad guy to even know they have a gun because that takes your element of surprise away,” he said.
Hoots said that he has openly carried one time—when he went into a convenience store to buy a lottery ticket—and said he was not used to carrying his weapon in open view.
“I felt very self-conscious,” Hoots said.
Hoots said if he was in a rural area he would feel more comfortable carrying openly for convenience more than around Houston.
“In the Houston area, most people are not going to carry openly,” he said.
