Letter to the Editor: State legislature should consider Act No. 2013-268

Dear editor,

I find it shameful when people on both sides of the aisle play politics with tragedies. This is an exploitation tactic used almost exclusively by liberals, hotheads and children. I believe we need strong, measured leadership that puts our children and teachers first – not political pandering.

In 2013, spearheaded by Rep. Johnny Mack Morrow, the legislature passed a law for Franklin County that allows suitable teachers, school personnel and locals to be trained as reserve deputy sheriffs and carry firearms on school grounds.

I recently spoke with Franklin County Sheriff Shannon Oliver, along with the bill’s sponsor, and the bill seems to be working in Franklin County.

I would ask that the legislature look at this bill and see how well it has worked for Franklin County. This bill could be expanded to a statewide level on a bipartisan basis, as the 2013 bill passed without a single “nay” vote in both the House and the Senate.

This bill would allow local control of school safety, giving decision-making power to a county’s sheriff, principals and school board. Many counties do not have the funding for resource officers, leaving law enforcement with a long response time to schools in an active shooter situation. For example, in Franklin County, officials pushed for passage of HB 404 after the tragedy at Sandy Hook because the sheriff’s office realized their response time in a similar situation would be over 30 minutes to East Franklin.

Now is the time for action.  As a mom, grandmom and former teacher, my heart breaks for the victims, their families and the school community in Parkland, Fla. We owe it to our children and grandchildren to make sure we take common sense, level-headed approaches to safeguard against this type of tragedy happening in Alabama.

Let us come together in our families, neighborhoods, PTA meetings and churches to have real conversations about what we can do to protect our children. The best solutions to this issue will come from the local level. From the grassroots up, let’s keep our kids safe.

Sincerely,

Twinkle Andress Cavanaugh