(Syndicated to Kansas newspapers July 22, 2013)
We have a few months before the single biggest trickle-down law in recent memory hits Kansans.
You know trickle-down. It’s when the Legislature passes and the governor signs into law a bill that will have negligible effect on how the state does business, but requires local units of government and schools to take action.
The trickle-down now is that state government has decided that any of the thousands of Kansans who have concealed-carry licenses can pack their guns wherever they go in the state—into county courthouses, city halls, libraries, rural water district and township buildings—just about any building built with taxpayer dollars. That means that those local units of government, which probably in the past month have downloaded and printed an official state no-guns poster, have until the end of the year to decide whether they are going to allow guns in their buildings or provide enough security that they can reasonably assure the public that nobody but law enforcement will have guns in the building.