The Demorest City Council Tuesday unanimously approved a measure that will allow legally permitted employees to carry concealed weapons on the job.
The measure, which was introduced by Mayor Rick Austin, goes into effect immediately. However, that doesn’t mean employees will be able to bring their guns to work right away. The policy change to the employee handbook requires a number of steps that must be taken before employees can carry their firearms to work.
First, they must notify their supervisor in writing. Second, they must be pass all state requirements for carrying and, in addition, obtain special training from the Demorest City Police Chief who will determine their proficiency and ultimate ability to carry a weapon on the job.
Mayor Austin says he pushed for the change to existing policy that prevented employees from carrying concealed weapons because, in his view, it violated their Second Amendment Right.
“Our previous policy prevented city employees from carrying weapons on city property or in a city vehicle,” Austin explains. “What we were doing was preventing our employees from enjoying the same freedoms that others do under state law. It was a discrepancy that I felt needed to be addressed.” He continues, “I believe unarmed zones create situations for people to get hurt. If you make guns off limit, only law abiding citizens are going to leave their guns at home. Every terrorist attack that has happened on U.S. soil has happened to a government entity or a place of business.”
Austin says in his research he found no instance in which a person carrying a concealed weapon permit in Georgia has committed a crime against others with that weapon. “That was significant to me,” he says. “We’re not asking employees to carry or not carry. We’re affording them the opportunity to do so.”
It’s a groundbreaking opportunity.
Austin says the attorneys who researched the measure for the City of Demorest could only find three other instances in the nation where local governments have passed similar policies – two in North Carolina and one in Wisconsin. According to Austin, no such policy exists anywhere else in the state of Georgia.
“I think it’s a win for the city. I think it’s a win for our employees who choose to exercise their Second Amendment right,” he says. The mayor adds, “It lines up with the 14th Amendment that insures equal protection under the law.”
Austin says the city assumes no liability in allowing its employees to carry concealed weapons and there are grounds for dismissal built into the measure, including, if employees fail to keep the weapon concealed and/or use their firearm in a threatening gesture.
Although he says no particular situation prompted the change, Austin does point to two instances in which he says Demorest Water Department employees had shotguns pulled on them when they cut off customers’ water. “If an individual pulls a gun and begins to fire, my employee or any citizen should have the ability to defend themselves.”
