I hope the start of the new school year has gone well for kids, families and educators across the district!
As the new school year unfolds, I’ve been meeting with numerous local superintendents, board members and PTAs. In these meetings, in addition to hearing from community members and students directly, the question repeatedly raised is, “What are we doing to keep our schools safe from gun violence?”
Below includes a variety of ways we are working to specifically address school safety as well as to reduce gun violence more broadly.
Keeping our children and our schools safe is a top priority for our educators and students, parents and the broader community, and me personally.
What brings me hope is the young people, from Parkland to our own students locally, who have risen to take action and demand change. We must continue to act in the state legislature and heed these students‘ messages and pleas!
School Safety & Well-being: The Creation of Regional School Safety Centers
This year the legislature passed HB 1216 to make schools safer. This bill provides more resources, coordination, and support to help all schools improve training and safety measures. It requires each of our nine educational service districts to establish Regional School Safety Centers to better coordinate school safety plans and train teachers and staff.
The Regional School Safety Centers will be responsible for providing training in behavioral health coordination, suicide prevention, school-based threat assessment, as well as staff assistance in crisis situations, technical assistance, and partnership development and collaboration. The bill also enhances training mandates for school resource officers.
We know that students need more than academics in schools. Kids need to be safe in school and they need to feel safe in school. This bill is one important step in improving student safety. Huge thanks to our own Senator Lisa Wellman who was a key leader in the Senate to make this happen!
Gun Safety Bills Passed in 2019
This year, the legislature took important steps towards a safer future in Washington. We continued to use every tool at our disposal to promote responsible gun ownership and keep communities safe from gun violence. This builds on Initiative 1639, passed by 59% of people in Washington, which make it illegal for a person under 21 to buy a semiautomatic assault rifle, enhances background checks and waiting periods and increases requirements for safe storage of firearms.
This year, we passed into law:
Protecting domestic violence victims, families and law enforcement officers: HB 1225
Requires law enforcement to temporarily remove firearms they have probable cause to believe were used to threaten or harm someone at the time of a domestic violence call. Officers must also temporarily remove firearms in plain sight and request consent to remove any firearms the alleged abuser has access to until a court hearing is held.
Ensuring proper gun purchase background checks: HB 1465
The FBI is discontinuing courtesy National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) checks for concealed pistol license (CPL) holders in Washington state. These federal checks have allowed CPL holders to walk out of a gun shop with a pistol the day it is purchased rather than waiting the required five days for non-CPL holders. Without them, there is a public safety risk because a person could present a forged or duplicated CPL, or one that should be revoked because of a disqualifying conviction. This bill makes sure the state provides necessary background checks to protect Washingtonians.
Banning “ghost guns”: HB 1739
With 3D print technology becoming more widely used, this is an attempt to get out ahead of potential major public safety concerns regarding consumer production of 3D-printed guns. This bill makes it illegal to manufacture, buy, sell or possess an undetectable firearm in most circumstances.
Improving procedures for protection orders: HB 1786
Our standards for firearm removal due to a protective order, no contact order, restraining order, or extreme risk protection order have been inconsistent, making it confusing and difficult for victims, courts and law enforcement. This bill aligns the ways in which law enforcement serves and implements these orders with our approach to Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPOs). This makes sense since 70% of the voters in Washington voted for ERPOs.
Single point of contact background check system: HB 1949
Without the FBI’s courtesy NICS check (see HB 1465 above), there is an urgent need for a single point of contact firearm background check system in Washington state. This bill, which passed unanimously in both chambers, authorizes a feasibility study to examine and make recommendations about how to create such a system.
Extreme risk protection orders: SB 5027
Allows petitions for Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPOs) to be applied to people under the age of 18. If approved, an order would prohibit the minor from accessing, controlling, possessing or receiving a firearm. The minor’s parent or guardian would be notified of their legal obligation to safely secure any firearms. This bill will help keep firearms out of the hands of minors who are at a high risk of hurting themselves.
Closing a loophole for safer communities: SB 5205
A person who is incompetent to stand trial AND has a history of violence is NOT competent to have a firearm. This bill restricts people found incompetent by a court from possessing a firearm unless the court restores their firearm rights.
Reducing the risk of suicide and murder-suicide: SB 5181
Imposes a six-month suspension on a person’s right to possess a firearm when the person is detained for a 72-hour hold under the Involuntary Treatment Act.
Even with all the successful efforts in our state to ensure guns are kept away from people trying to do harm to themselves or others, we know that this is not enough.
Gun violence is an epidemic in our country. In 2019 there have been over 19 mass shootings in the United States. 19 acts of violence that could have been prevented. I feel the weight of it as I read the seemingly endless headlines reporting senseless shootings across our country, and I know I’m not alone.
I will continue to advocate for my bill to give the Washington State Patrol—just like every other law enforcement agency around the state already has— the option to dispose of forfeited arms that have been used in criminal activities. I’ve sponsored this bill because there is no reason that confiscated guns should end up back on the streets causing harm to our communities. I will continue to fight for it until it passes.
As a mom with kids who practice active shooter drills at school, as a member of the Jewish caucus who supported my community through the devastation of a hate-crime shooting in 2006, and as a legislator who has led on gun violence prevention bills, I will not stop fighting to protect our families and communities from harm—in schools and beyond.
Sincerely,
Tana Senn
P.S. Thank you to our constituent for requesting this topic for our newsletter. If you have topics you’d like to hear more about, please let us know!