 I am Madhu Sridhar, I am the president of the League of Women Voters of San Antonio, and on behalf of the League, I welcome you all this evening for a very good program on gun violence, what can be done. For those of you who are not familiar with the League, I just want to mention that the League of Women Voters is a non-partisan organization, which essentially means that we neither support nor oppose any political party or any political candidate. The mission of the League is to increase informed and active participation of citizens in government. It is to increase the knowledge of people on major public policy issues and influence public policy through education and advocacy. And that is precisely the reason we hold these forums because we want the community members to be engaged and to be informed and to get their answers to any questions that they have on major public policy issues. And as I said, this evening we have gathered regarding gun violence, what can be done. There are those who believe that this is a complex problem and the solution is also very complex. And then there are those who feel that it is not such a complex problem and the solution is really blindingly simple. So you know, there are extremes responses to the can this problem be solved. And we have gathered an expert panel with expertise in different areas. Of course, we could not cover all the areas, but we have tried to limit ourselves to the, you know, five panelists and we will try to find out from them based on their experience and expertise, what are the possible solutions. And as the title says, we want to focus more on the solutions than on the problem. What is it that we can do? Now in the League tradition, there will be plenty of opportunity for all of you to ask questions because we believe, as I said, in getting the answers for you. So there are index cards available for you to write your questions down. You could have either picked up the index cards before the program started or if you didn't, there are index card, you just raise your hand. A volunteer will come and give you the index card and the pens and you can write your question. Someone will come take it from you and there are two league members who are from the program committee who are sitting here. They will screen the questions only to consolidate similar questions or to rephrase the questions so that the question, you know, makes sense. Now the only criteria for a question is that it has to be brief, succinct, and it should end with a question mark. We are not looking for comments or remarks or anything like that. You know, we just want the question so that they can be answered. And if they are short questions, we can entertain more questions rather than long questions. The bios of the panelists, they are included in your program as an insert. So we are not going to take the time to introduce the panelists and give their bios. Of course, the moderator will be introducing the panelists, but we are not going to go through the bios. I will invite Evelyn Bonavita, who is the Vice President for Programs and also is the Chair for the Program Committee. And the Program Committee is the one that has organized this panel discussion. And I'm really thankful to them for getting these expert panels on this such important topic. So Evelyn will introduce the moderator and then we will start with the program. Thank you very much. Charlie Gonzales, who is our moderator tonight, was elected seven times to Congress by the voters of District 20, which was the district of his father. And I'm sure he has his father mentioned at every turn. A legendary Henry B. Gonzales. However, Charlie's serving as congressman was only the culmination of a career devoted to public service in Bear County. Charlie has been a teacher, a lawyer, and served as a Bear County judge, as well as a district judge. He earned his law degree from St. Mary's School of Law. And when his father retired in 1997, Charlie resigned his judgeship to campaign for his father's seat. He faced a crowded field in the Democratic primary, won the nomination in a runoff, and went on to capture the congressional seat by nearly 30%. He had little competition from then on in succeeding elections. He is now in private practice as an attorney. Welcome, Charlie, and thank you for being our moderator. Evelyn, thank you very much. Every time they say seven elections and such, I go, what was I thinking? But anyway, it was a great honor. It was incredible. And kind of a point of personal privilege. Anyone that runs for office assumes such a responsibility. And yet, it's worth running for office, otherwise you wouldn't do it. I'd like to introduce a couple of elected officials or former elected, one former elected official and one present. And the first is Judge Rosie Gonzalez, former city councilman Ray Lopez. And if I miss anyone else as time goes on, these become more and more important, but either I can read or I can't see from a distance. It's a great honor tonight to moderate and the work of the league is just so greatly appreciated by this city and should be for the obvious reasons. Tonight, of course, we're looking for solutions, even though we know getting there is not the easiest thing in the world. And this is about gun violence, of course. And we've become accustomed to the reaction by government officials, civic and religious leaders, and the general public following a mass or high profile shooting. The refrain will always be, we must do something. But reaching a consensus as to what to do seems to elude us and continues to elude us as I speak. Now, we would all be hard pressed to find anyone that would disagree that gun violence is a major health and safety threat to our communities. Well, what is it that we must do? Tonight, the League of Women Voters of the San Antonio area has assembled a panel of individuals who come from professions from which key people in these professions have to take a very active role if we're ever gonna find those solutions and will be playing key roles. Allow me to introduce the panelists quickly, and it's already been instructed that their full bios are in the programs, I believe, and so if you wanna know more about them, read about them and talk to them after the presentation. To my right, we have Al Kaufman, who is a professor of law at St. Mary's School of Law. We have, let's go, it's Dr. Steven Plesky, who is professor and chair of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. And then we have the Reverend Anna Gordy, pastor of a Biding Presence Lutheran Church. And then we have the Honorable Jose Menendez, who is our state senator from District 26. And of course, we have our Bericani Sheriff, Javier Salazar. Each panelist will be given ten minutes for an opening statement, which will cover their suggested solutions to this major challenge. Taking into account, of course, their particular expertise and experience in their chosen field. Now, we do have a timekeeper, and this is for the benefit of the panelists, and yours truly. We have a timekeeper to help us keep on schedule. Where do we have our timekeeper? And so you've got the signs. It's always wonderful. So we're gonna go start off to my right. Let's go ahead and start with Al Kauffman, professor of law. Boring law professor, so I'll try to somehow keep you awake anyway. My major point is to talk about the law in this area, the Second Amendment law. When the Supreme Court, US Supreme Court, found in a case in 2008 that there was an individual right to bear arms, guaranteed in the United States Constitution. It was the first time the Supreme Court had ever found it. So this right was apparently in the Constitution. It was in, excuse me, I apologize. It was in the Constitution, but it was not discovered until 2008. Now, that opinion was a 5-4 decision. So what I really want to share with you is just talking about how far that decision went and what it did not say. I think it has been misstated and abused, really, by saying that there are, because the US Supreme Court supported the Second Amendment, that the Second Amendment gives me a right to carry any arm that I wanted, any place at any time. And it's very clear the Supreme Court did not say that. And they limited it many ways. And I just want to point that out as far as sort of the legal limits on what we can do and what we can't do. The Supreme Court said that clearly Congress or state legislatures or local legislatures can control who can obtain guns. They can make sure that people with mental illness or people with spousal abuse orders against them cannot obtain guns. And that is certainly within the constitutional rights. In other words, those persons do not have a Second Amendment right to have a gun to overrule what a public body has said. Also, the Supreme Court said there are limits on what sorts of guns can be carried. Now, you know, you get into funny things about the Constitution. You know, the Second Amendment was passed in 1791. And needless to say, there were not Uzis at the time or Saturday night specials. But they said the Second Amendment was passed only to allow someone to have guns for self-defense of the home. That was the limitation on the Second Amendment, the way they classified it. So specifically, the Second Amendment does not give someone the right to carry a submachine gun, a machine gun, a bazooka, a high 100-clip attached to their regular gun. There are limits on what can be done. Now, I want to make it clear that the Supreme Court and the law has not said the exact what is the proper way to pass a bill or what is the proper way for us to try to come up with some solution. I just want to make sure that when people discuss these issues, they don't say, you can't do that because you're violating my Second Amendment rights. Or my Second Amendment right allows me to do anything I want with the guns. So I just want to make sure that's clear. So that's my major point is to talk about what the Supreme Court has said and what it has. Now, these issues have also come up with courts of appeals. You know, there's 11 courts of appeals in the United States. We're in the Fifth Circuit. They're all over the country. And every one of the courts of appeals has limited the use of guns. In other words, they have supported local and state efforts to control guns. Now, there are some limits. One state said that you can't carry a stun gun. And the Supreme Court said, well, you know, the Second Amendment really doesn't allow that sort of bill. So if people want to carry stun guns, they're not regular guns, we'll allow that. But the other, quite a few of the courts of appeals have gone into great detail talking about the dangers of AR-15s, the dangers of bump stocks, the dangers of clips that carry 20, 50, or 100 rounds. So the courts have upheld state and local efforts to control that sort of gun and that sort of ammunition. So that's my major point. And I look forward to having the rest of the discussion. I really feel wonderful. It's a great group of co-panelists. I look forward to hearing them. Dr. Pleski? So I'm chair of the Psychology Department at UT Health Science Center. And we are affiliated with a lot of agencies in town that deal with mental health, particularly University Hospital through instrumentation. Oh, sorry. Particularly through, can you hear me? Is that it? So we're affiliated with numerous agencies throughout San Antonio and Bear County, University Hospital. We have a lot of seriously mentally ill people come into our emergency room. We work with the Center for Health Care Services that operates the crisis unit downtown. There's also been in Bear County over the last several years a major initiative with both emergency medical services and law enforcement. So when the police come in contact with someone who's very disturbed, who may present a danger, they are taken to a local psychiatric facility or a emergency room to be evaluated. And I might now can comment on this as if I get it wrong, but there's a very specific set of laws that deal with involuntary commitment for psychiatric services. So if a peace officer, a law enforcement officer comes in contact with somebody they believe to be mentally ill or that is exhibiting mental illness, they can do what's called an emergency detention where they can bring them to a facility to be evaluated. And that generally is 24 to 48 hours. And then a physician, although it's usually a psychiatrist, evaluates that individual at that point. And then a decision is made as to whether the person needs involuntary commitment. And that in Texas is called an order of protective custody. So that is filed, that goes to the judge, and then there's a hearing held and the judge decides, yes, the person needs to stay in the hospital versus no, they can leave. And then subsequent to that, there's a second hearing if the patient is then refusing treatment, refusing medication. The judge, we go back, the psychiatrist will go back to the court and say, you know, this individual's not taking their medicine, they're not getting better. And then the judge can order what's called a compel medication order that then the person is given medication, usually anti-psychotic medication. Gee, so it's a practically eating of it. The judge can order the medication. And typically, this is anti-psychotic medication. In typical cases, it will take several days to a couple of weeks to reach its full effect. When the patient becomes stabilized, then the psychiatrist go back to the court and say, okay, this person's ready to leave, the order can be dropped and then they can leave. Now, there is, I think among the general population, a huge misconception about psychiatric hospitalization. I think many people still believe we're back in the days of the 19th century or the early 20th century. Then when people were committed, they quote, you know, go to SASH or they go to South Presa and they stay there for a very extended period of time. Well, San Antonio State Hospital obviously still exists. It today has about 300 beds. For example, back in the 1960s, it had 3,500 beds. So that gives you an idea of the difference between the way we treat mental illness now and the way it was done back then. Once people get to SASH, it's the same rule, basically. Once a patient is stable and is no longer a danger to themselves or others, they can be discharged. Now, there are patients at SASH that are so severe that they never recover to that point. They may be there for years and years. And as a result, there's an extreme shortage of these beds or they can be a long waiting list to get into them. As a result, most patients with chronic mental illness tend to be on a cycle where there's an ED, they're committed to a short-term hospital like Laurel Ridge or NICS or University Hospital. They'll stay there for two weeks or so and then they're discharged. While they're referred for outpatient treatment, they don't go to that outpatient treatment. So invariably, they go off their medication, if they have a substance abuse problem, they'll begin to use drugs again and they then have another crisis and it's not unusual to see patients who may have five to 10 hospitalizations a year. So this is really the core of the problem in terms of dealing with violence among the mentally ill. Now, it's always important to bear in mind that only a small proportion of people with mental illness are violent to the point that they're dangerous to others. For most part, seriously mentally ill people are mainly a danger to themselves. So a man who's psychotic and believes that the CIA is injecting him with something says, I'm not gonna go live at the Haven for Hope or I'm not gonna stay in my apartment because the CIA is trying to get me. He's gonna go out and live on the street or he's gonna be wandering up and down the street saying nonsensical things that frighten people around him. But some, a subset will become violent. Most of those people tragically usually are violent toward their family members with whom they live. So it's parents and spouses that are calling the police and saying, my uncle's off his meds, he's beaten up my aunt and the police have to come and do the ED and the whole cycle begins again. Now, we get to these major tragedies where there are mass shootings, becomes a very difficult situation. If we look at some of the recent events, let's take the shooting in Aurora, Colorado by James Holm or the Sandy Hook shooting by Adam Lanza. These two individuals were clearly identified now or we believe that they had severe mental illness. So Holmes was definitely had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and appeared to be psychotic. In fact, you can look at pictures of him in his trial and I think even the layman would say, boy, there's really something wrong there. Lanza himself too had a long history of mental illness although he was out of treatment for a very extended period of time and just living at home with his mother and he clearly seemed to have been in a psychotic state when he did what he did. Now, in other cases, such as the recent problem in our recent event in Sutherland Springs, you have another kind of profile of an individual who's likely to do this. This generally a male, usually either single or a relationship is broken down, very angry at the world around them, sometimes has a substance abuse problem, has always had a history of being very impulsive and easily angered and then something snaps and they take a weapon and then commit some grievous act. Other people like Dylan Roof who did the church shooting in South Carolina seems to fall in the gray area. Some experts who examined him said, well, he might've had some autism, he might've had some Asperger's but really violence is not a feature necessarily of autism or Asperger's so that really doesn't fit together and curiously Dylan Roof himself went through a lot of trouble to refuse to be evaluated by experts or plead insanity because he saw what he did as an ideological act. And then finally we have the fellow in Las Vegas who did that terrible shooting. He appeared to fit none of the profiles we have. He was in a relationship, he was financially successful, he didn't have any history of posting strange things on the internet. Studies that have been done go that acts of violence committed by people with serious mental illness perhaps account for about 4% of the violent crimes. So that means if we could cure bipolar and schizophrenia tomorrow that certainly would obviously that'd be a great thing for the victims of those diseases and we would maybe reduce violent crime by about 4% which would mean a lot to those people but wouldn't necessarily cut down the broad range of violence that occurs in our society. So I think the, some of the, it's also important to note that mental health professionals do not have any reliable way to predict what individual patient is going to commit one of these grievous acts in the future. So over the years I've treated many patients with violent tendencies. And these people I've worried about, thought to myself, oh this person's gonna end up on the news. Really, I'm very pessimistic about the outcome but very few of those people ever actually committed a violent act. So the role, I think where the role of mental health comes in is looking at the chronically mentally ill and optimizing their treatment so that a whole range of negative outcomes are avoided. And in that we will prevent some violent tragedies but we can't look to the mental health system to be a method that can prevent all of these tragedies. Reverend Gordy. So I'm a pastor and I brought a sermon. I'm only kind of kidding. I went to undergrad school at Texas Lutheran University and in December of 1994 I was held at gunpoint and later shot. That was just a few months after my denominational body had issued a statement about gun violence and all these years later, I am so sorry, so all of these years later things have still not changed. I read an article when I was preparing for this event by Sean Gregory and Chris Wilson of Time Magazine. It's a thoughtful piece on March of last year entitled Six Real Ways We Can Reduce Gun Violence in America. They state that any sensible discussion about America's gun violence problem must acknowledge that guns are not going away and clearly that's true. No matter one's personal emotional response to guns, they are coded into our laws. They are written into our constitution and with the diversity of thought about them, they're not going away anytime soon. The authors go on to advocate practical solutions that intervene in a variety of areas of public life from effective gun laws to smart gun technology, the inclusion of the expertise and reach of the medical community. Again, I encourage you to read it. Their ideas do have merit. And also, I think that we have to have a real hard honest conversation in our society about rage and hate and race and religion. I'm a pastor in the evangelical Lutheran church in America. According to a Pew Research study in 2015, my denomination is the second whitest denomination in the United States. Our congregations have presided over the religious education of Dylan Klebold who co-orchestrated the mass murder at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. Over the education, the religious education of Dylan Roof who murdered nine at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. And Devin Patrick who murdered 26 at First Baptist Church just down the road in Sutherland Springs, Texas. I would be remiss as a pastor in my denomination if I did not draw a clear line between the whiteness of those men, the hatred in their hearts and the horror that they manufactured and our culpability as religious leaders, the lives that they wasted, the fear that they generated. See, I think that gun violence is an indicator and an evil symptom of a much larger national problem. Now it's true that religion is declining in this country, particularly among mainline Christian denominations. And I don't think that's necessarily a problem, although it does affect my job security. It's still largely a nation where folks are members of religious institutions or are served by religious organizations. And I think that religious leaders are missing an opportunity to help heal this nation by not talking explicitly about race and gun violence in our religious studies and in our worship services. Because at the heart of each episode of intentional gun violence is hate. From suicide to domestic violence to gang violence to mass murders, we've become a nation that's so grounded in fear and hatred that we can't see how to solve problems without some kind of violence. Our public discourse and embarrassingly to me our religious discourse focuses on who's in and who's out, who are the haves and who are the have nots. The divisions among us are no surprise. The nation was founded on a bedrock of racism and genocide and slavery. And religion, particularly white Christianity has perverted scripture to uphold that system. From the doctrine of discovery to the American Indian reservation system, from slavery to Jim Crow laws and racially biased drug laws we have soldered into the structure of our society ways to keep one group of people in power and we've underscored it with a name of God. We have not yet reckoned with that reality. I'm willing to bet that there are folks who will argue with me that that's not the reality and I will thank them for proving my point. In 1963 Martin Luther King Jr said that we must face the fact that in America, the church is still the most segregated major institution in America. At 11 o'clock on Sunday morning when we stand and sing in Christ has no east or west, we stand at the most segregated hour in this nation. This is tragic and it is tragic but even beyond Christianity in 2019 we still segregate ourselves by gender, by sexuality, by race, by religion, by socioeconomic status. And then we resent one another and we fear one another and then we hate one another and if a gun is handy then we kill one another or if the loathing is turned inward we kill ourselves. Not a single major world religion calls for violence against one another. Not even the Satanic temple y'all but every single major world religion has some form of what Christians and others call the golden rule. Treat others as you would like to be treated. Laws and restrictions and practical interventions on the ownership and usage of guns is critical but they only treat the symptom. We must begin from early childhood, from infancy even to educate our children about the diversity and goodness of God's good creation. We have to begin to help one another see that each person is valuable, not because they are our brother or sister or neighbor as though we have a claim over them but because they are their own uniquely embodied self made in the shadow of God's image made with a spark of the divine. Mother Teresa said that if we have no peace it's because we've forgotten that we belong to one another. Our job as religious leaders, as community leaders and as citizens is to remind one another of that and to teach our children. If we were in church I'd say amen. Thank you. Seder Menendez. Reverend Gordy, I need to find out where your church is. I was very impressed by that and it's rare that I'm surprised or impressed or that I hear such truth, such plain spoken truth. Thank you for doing that. I wanna say thank you to all of you for taking time out of your schedules to be here tonight. I wanna say thank you to the League of Women Voters for doing this. Today's been an interesting day. This week's been an interesting week. We're into our third week of the legislative session. 86 legislative session, can you can't hear in the back? These things are, let me use the other one. Yeah, you have to hold it real close. I'm not a fan of these things, is that better? Okay. So, good evening, my name is Paul Simon in this. I have the honor and privilege of being the Senator for District 26 here in San Antonio. We're in our third week of the 86 legislative session. And so, what that means is that, I can't tell you what day this is of my four hour commute up and back. But it's okay. It allows me an opportunity to take my children to school and walk the dog and get grounded every day as I leave for Austin, Texas before I get to meet with all of the folks from around the state on the issues we wanna talk about. You know, I was doing a little research and the sad fact is that the Washington Post reported in 2017 that through a Gallup poll, they found that there are 393 million guns distributed through 50 million households across the United States. So, there is absolutely no way that, as you said, that we're just going to find a way to just get rid of them, okay? So then, I think what you've said is absolutely right. And for those of you who don't know, Dr. Steven Plisca is a foremost authority in behavioral and psychological issues with juveniles and others. I mean, he is an expert and we're fortunate to have him here. So, taking this very sad situation into consideration that we're facing as a nation, knowing the tragedies that we've experienced, whether you think about Sutherland Springs in 2017 where 26 adults and children were killed and wounded while they were in church. Yesterday, we honored the hero who stopped the shooter who happened to be in his boxer shorts in his house across the street from the church when he heard the firing and threw on some jeans and went out barefoot and yelled. And he just yelled and the shooter came out of the church and they started having a gunfight in the middle of the street as he leaned over his pickup truck. For those of you who don't know, he's a plumber. He's a plumber at University Hospital. He's a very humble man who didn't want any of this attention but thank God, he was where he was. You know, our schools and I hope many of you would agree should be places where our future leaders are taught and nurtured. I think we shouldn't have to fear that our children are gonna have to experience what the kids did in Santa Fe where that 17 year old killed 10 and injured 13 others. And then last week, we had a 12 year old shoot a 24 year old when he was taken in. You know, obviously we're all here because we believe the bloodshed must stop. So we have to figure out some workable solutions to try to prevent the senseless damage and the loss of life. As we learn from a brilliant law professor, Al Kaufman, people have a right to arm themselves but that same principle that founded our nation also declared that we had certain inalienable rights that are among those are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And I believe that my rights end when I start to infringe on your rights. And so I think we need to take that into consideration. I think controlling the problem does not mean that we deprive anyone of their right to lawfully own a firearm. And so this is why I'm reaching out to those of you and my other constituents who are tired of being confronted by what seems to be a series of injustices. I believe there are many of us who wish to stand together rather than stand against one another. And to those of us who understand the value of love to be used as a tool for growth. Therefore, I believe it's imperative that we come together in order to ensure that the safety and the prosperity of all human beings. I believe the expectation of safety from gun violence is not and should ever be considered a partisan issue. These are not partisan issues and unfortunately it's become that. I think this is an issue of protecting human rights and more importantly, the protection of human lives. Gun violence has affected every part of our country and today unlike when we, many of us were children, parents and families have to worry whether their kids and loved ones will come back home from school, the grocery store, public events, and even prayer services. And I don't know about you, but I actually think a little bit more about when I go to large public events and it saddens me to worry about, and I had a friend who, when we went to the, I thought of all places, we were at the MLK march just recently and I went to Pat him and I felt, it wasn't you, but I felt the bulletproof vest. I expect you to wear it. Yeah, I know, I was a little surprised that you're not wearing it, but I'm just like, wow. He felt like he had to wear the bulletproof vest and I'm like, this is sad. So rather than be crippled by fear, I think we need to be proactive and that's what was so exciting about your sermon, which made me wanna go hear more. After the Santa Fe shooting, the Senate had a select committee and the governor gathered people to have forums in Austin. I heard what happened and therefore I decided to have our own school safety forum in September at UTSA. I feel that on the issue of gun violence, we can all share our personal ideas and experiences. I think that we have school systems here in San Antonio, parents, administrators that have a good idea on what will and won't work. I for one don't think that arming teachers and putting more guns into the schools is a good solution. You know, I just, I understand that for many Texans, we value the right to own a gun, you know, and possess it lawfully. But we, and we know we're not gonna change the culture and we're not trying to change the culture. You know, that's the thing that we all have to talk about. But I think it's important that we also believe that gun ownership is a responsibility. Just like any responsibility that allows for driving a car, for example, it's a vehicle that can be used as a weapon. Therefore we make people take a license, take a test, show proficiency and obey certain laws. We should have the same exact situation when it comes to owning our guns. Our goal needs to be able to pass common sense legislation that reduces harm, injury and death. It's good to see my friend Ray Lopez and his beautiful wife Evelyn. With the fact that you're running for the state, you could be at many other places. Thank you for being here, learning about this important issue. If the Second Amendment advocates are concerned with the mixing of mental health and firearms, then they should support measures that keep the firearms out of the hands of the people who are not stable. If that's the issue, if they wanna say you're trying to take the guns, then support us, work with us. I have other bills that make sense to me that says if you are too dangerous to fly, we have a federal list of people that they suspect they shouldn't, that we can't sell them a plane ticket. Well then I think you shouldn't be able to buy a gun. And I still can't get that bill passed. I think we must resist the rights or the decision of many people trying to box us into either your pro-second amendment or your against-second amendment. No, we don't have to be in that box. We can be smarter than this. And so there's a third way. Let's protect Texans in a balanced fashion. And so I think that the gun politics is obviously a divisive issue, but we have to get people to cross that divide. So as a senator, I look for ways to get my constituents input and to find out how we can shape an agenda that works well and tries to reduce the tension and the divisiveness, but instead we need to invest the energy to come together to resolve the fears and the uncertainties through shared ideas and solutions. 30 seconds, I got it. So that's why it's a priority for me. Let's stop the drawing divisive lines and let's look for the ways to get the most interest to protect our most vulnerable. I look forward to listening to all of you. I want you to know that you all are welcome to come and listen to us. We have plenty of time in this legislative session. I'd love to see you, many of you here in Austin, testifying if we get the ability to present bills, because I think we do need to have bills like the red flag bills that say, if you're a danger to yourself or others, then you shouldn't have access to your gun. And I think that's important. So well, I'm gonna respect the time and let's see what we can do to learn tonight how we can make things better. Sheriff, it's all you. Thank you all so much. I'm Sheriff Javier Salazar and as you may know, my family in blue was just recently touched by gun violence in a very, very personal way. I lead an agency of 1500 deputies, sworn deputies, about 300 civilians, six horses and nine dogs that I'm responsible for all of them. And one of our dogs, Canine Chucky, lost his life the other night. To a person who absolutely is the poster child for somebody that should not own a weapon. Thank you, thank you. Very recently, a resident of Huntsville and a long rap sheet that includes family violence, aggravated assault, evading arrest, just totally the poster child for somebody that should not have a gun and yet he did. And that night, he saw fit to endanger thousands of people on the highways, dozens of first responders and ultimately took the life of one of my deputies in a very, very harsh way. I can tell you, I've had many friends die over the years from gun violence as a first responder. I've been a first responder for going on 27 years and this was my first deputy under my command that I lost and it certainly doesn't make it any easier that that deputy had four legs. So look, my perspective on gun violence and what we should all be doing is everything within each one of our power is what we need to be doing, everything. If you're a parent, you have something that you have a role to play. If you're a teacher, a member of the clergy, a business owner, you have a responsibility to do everything in your power to keep the guns out of the hands of people that just flat out do not, should not have them. So my role in law enforcement goes well beyond enforcing the law. I have other responsibilities that I take equally as important, educating the public. We spend quite a bit of time educating the public and I'll tell you about how. Also preventing crime from happening in the first place is one of the things we spend quite a bit of time on but also studying. I spend quite a bit of time and I have officers whose sole purpose it is is to go study incidents that happen in other parts of the country and bring that knowledge back and dissect it to see how better we can protect our county here by preventing atrocities like what happened in other parts of the country or even the world here in Bear County. So let me tell you about some of the things that we're doing at the Sheriff's office and many of them are new programs that we just started since taking office about two years ago. So one of the first things that we do, one of the most important things that we do is we do quite a bit of public training. We do a lot of active shooter training for the community. It's free training that we offer to churches, neighborhood associations, places of business. Our deputies will come out and teach a class for you free of charge and it's great information. They keep it entertaining. I've got some great deputies that are very good instructors. They keep the class engaged and they keep the plan simple. Look at any one of these active shooter situations that we've seen in the country, the weapon of choice of these guys is almost secondary. It could be a rifle, a shotgun, a handgun, a truck full of fertilizer, a rental pickup. That's almost secondary to the number one tool that they seek to use against us and that's our mind. If they can create a sense of panic in our mind, then they've got us. They've got us and they put us into a blind panic and then they can walk around picking their targets at leisure. So through information that like we provide it at through our active shooter training, we keep our plan simple, avoid denied defend. And we give you the information that you'll need to react calmly and coolly in a situation and to keep yourself and others alive until such time as we get there or even better yet and the threat before we get there. One of the other things that we're doing is from the enforcement perspective. We are involved in the violent crimes task force with the San Antonio Police Department, the DPS. Those were the three main agencies that started this. When I took office, I got a call from a friend of mine named Bill McManus that called me and says, hey, you wanna partner up? Now that you're the sheriff, I worked for him for many years. So we partnered up on the violent crimes task force. We partnered my street crimes deputies with his street crimes officers and a couple of undercovers. And we just set about going to the spots on the map that are red and working them aggressively and arresting violent felons until the map wasn't red anymore. It was green. And then we move on to the next red spot. So look, we've succeeded in that endeavor so much so that it's taken, it's a snowball effect. DPS has jumped in and DPS just added another 50 troopers to the mix. But all of the alphabet soup federal agencies have jumped on board, the FBI, the DEA. Everybody's got some skin in the game. And so we're working together very hard to get guns off the street. One of the other things that we've done recently, it's a pretty innovative program I think. So I have a group of deputies at my agency that are reservists. Reserve deputies have a 40 hour job somewhere else. They're real estate agents, lawyers, doctors, educators, but they hold a peace officer license. And in order for me to hold their reserve license, they have to donate 16 hours of law enforcement time every month to the taxpayers of Bear County. Now traditionally they have done that on patrol. But we recently started using them. I said, why not put them in a school? And so we started a pilot program with Southside ISD, no, Southwest ISD and East Central ISD where we put reserve deputies in the schools. Truth be told, some of the deputies are doing more than their 16 hours a month because they truly enjoy interacting with the kids. And it gives the schools a peace of mind to have a deputy free of charge, no charge to the taxpayers, hanging out with the kids and providing that extra layer of security. We're very soon gonna open that up to churches, Pastor. And private schools, because it did go so well. So some of the other things that we're doing here recently, well not so recently anymore, I partnered with an organization called Mom's Demand Action. And when I say I partnered, they came to my office and bullied me into doing something. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. They came to my office and simply asked if I would be willing to revise my policy with regard to disarming family violence suspects. It was a compelling argument. I didn't even let them get the question out before I answered yes. And so I think that next day we changed our policy. And so what we do, and it's really quite simple, other agencies are doing it across the country. We just came along with it. If on a family violence incident, we tell the officers if you are able to get a search warrant to seize those guns, then do so. If you can't get a warrant, if the circumstance is just starting there, simply ask, can we take these guns with us? And a lot of the times you'd be surprised. They'll give their guns up and they'll have to come down and get them from the property room later on down the road, but that's one less gun that's out there for that night at least, or until they come down to get it. And so I certainly thank the Mom's Demand Action for coming down and seeing to it that they held my feet to the fire and I did it. I mean, I'm married to a demanding mom, so of course I'd have been a sucker not to do that. But let me see, some of the other things that we're doing, of course, is we stay very involved in the legislature. I've got an Intergovernmental Relations Specialist that we just brought onto the Sheriff's Office, and his job is to, well, among many other jobs that I have him doing, is he monitors what's going on in the legislature. He monitors bills for us, and certainly keeps me in touch with my legislators, and so if they do need me to come down and testify on anything, I'm a phone call away. And we certainly, I can be there in 45 minutes in Austin, the way I drive, 40 minutes for certain. But look, it's one of the things that we're proud to do, everything that we can here in San Antonio, and I can tell you, since we've been concentrating so much on not just law enforcement, but public education, crime overall is down about eight and a half percent in Bear County over last year. So I think that we're doing a great job, and I certainly realize that we can always do more. So I'm always looking to do more. If any of y'all have an organization that we can partner with to do something to positively affect crime, again, I'm a phone call away, and we'll be here after this forum for sure. Thank you. Well, thank you to each member of the panel. I'm hoping that the audience is filling out those cards with questions. I don't know if we have any at this time, but I get to ask the first one, and members of the panel, you only have two minutes. And so my question to you, to each of you, the statements that you've made are pretty much obviously come from your own experience, your livelihood, what you do. So from your respective positions and such, if you could do just one act, one change, one law to reduce gun violence, what would it be? And you're gonna get it, by the way. I mean, this is not just a wish list, but Senator Menendez is gonna go back to Austin and get it for us. So it doesn't have to be a law. I'm talking because I know the Reverend had something that was outside the scope of the law. Al, what would you wish for? I would definitely want to limit any sort of high-capacity magazines and semi-automatic and automatic rifle sales. Dr. Peska? From a mental health perspective, I think the red flag law is very critical. Right now, people who actually... If you have to hold it real close, almost to... From a mental health perspective, the red flag laws or expanded red flag laws are very critical. So people who've been committed formally to a state hospital go on the list where they can't have weapons, but probably people who have had an emergency detention for some kind of mental health issue. There could be a system where the mental health professionals in the hospital, even if that person doesn't go forward to commitment, that they also could be put on such a list. I think the other thing I would look at, again, it would indirectly prevent violence, not just gun violence, but a range of different violence if we could keep people who come out of the hospital in active treatment. Texas has a legal procedure called assisted outpatient treatment that when people leave the hospital, they can be committed to stay in outpatient treatment, but they can't be compelled to stay on their medication, which is often the most critical component, and often the infrastructure to support the outpatient component is not always there. So a person has an order to go to their clinic, but if they don't show up, there have to be enough case workers and people to be able to respond to go find that individual and bring them in. I think I told you my wish list already, but to be super clear about it, I would wish that every religious institution and the people who are responsible for it would take time to educate one another about people of other faiths and people of other backgrounds and cultures so that we have a clear understanding of who one another are and in that way can call each other beloved, eradicate hate and eliminate the need for violence. You know, some faiths call for the elimination of prejudice and they talk about that humanity is only gonna work when men and women are like the two wings of a bird and they're equal, that that's the only way we're gonna be able to work and so there's a lot of truth to what you're saying. I would like to hear or feel that if, you know, it's funny, Charlie, he's always been a very funny guy, but it would be great if when I went to Austin, we wouldn't have defensive positions on where we were and maybe if we could somehow eliminate all of the special interest groups that are hovering over people, causing them to fear taking a vote for something that might be common sense legislation. Then this red flag laws, everybody would say, oh, heck, that makes a lot of sense. And let's go ahead and push that, let's go ahead and do something because I think that like in the case where you're talking about domestic violence, my understanding is that from my friends in law enforcement that a domestic violence call is one of the ones that you fear the most because you know it's a charged environment, you know there might be weapons and you don't know what's gonna happen. So you fear that the law enforcement officers fear for their own lives and the lives of the people in that situation. So, you know it's, I will tell you this and I'll end with this, last November, the elections that occurred last November created a situation where in Austin, Texas, people lost seats in areas they weren't supposed to lose and people are sitting in serious, so what I've seen at the very top in certain places in that pink building, there are people who are taking note and I'll be, I'll finish up, taking note of the elections and I think they're worried about what's gonna happen in two years and so I think they're more open. So if we all show up again in the same numbers or more in a year and a half next November, I think you're gonna find that we can actually move Texas towards a more centrist position, if not. So I'm a big fan of the red flag laws as well if we could come up with a way to do it. I'm not anti-gun, I'm anti-gun in the wrong hands, for sure. And certainly, look, I think that family violence, we've seen an upsurge, an uptick in family violence gun violence, gun murders. We had several last year, I know at least two of the officer-involved shootings that my officers were involved in were in family violence situations that thankfully my officers prevailed. In one of those, the victim was killed prior to their arrival and in the other, she certainly would have been killed had they not gotten there and taken the swift action that they did. So I can tell you, I would also having been the first boots on the ground from Bear County at Southern Springs, I was actually there that day, again, was a family violence situation that just went way, way, way beyond anything that any of us could have imagined. So I think one of the biggest ways, and so I'll turn from the law enforcement criminal side to the civil side. And look, by no stretch of the imagination am I a extremely litigious, sue everybody type person. But I can tell you, that's how these businesses are probably gonna catch on and start taking control of who gets ahold of their guns. Right now is a friend of mine, Stanley Bernstein, a very talented attorney that's involved in a lawsuit against one of the very big retail outlets in connection with Southern Springs. He is taking that fight to them because of the way that gun was purchased, sold to somebody who again, absolutely should not have had it and ended up taking so many lives and affecting all of our daily lives on a daily basis. And I think that's the only way these folks are gonna catch on is if we hit them in the pocket book and make it sting every time they make a stupid decision for the sake of the almighty dollar, that's how we're gonna get the results we need. Thank you very much. This is a question from the audience. And I think it goes to what Professor Kaufman alluded to as far as the Supreme Court decisions. And that is, if protect the home is the crux of why you have weapons or you're allowed to have firearms, why are we allowing open carry in public domain? Define home. Well again, what I'm just talking about is that the Supreme Court says you have a constitutional right to have an handgun in your home. Beyond that, it's all politics. So the Supreme Court has not said that Texas could not limit open carry. Supreme Court has not said that Texas could limit guns in schools or churches or even on the street. All of those are possible laws that the state of Texas or its localities could pass and under general Supreme Court precedent would be upheld. So it's politics. Anyone wanna, if anyone else has an opinion on this? Real quick, I will say Professor Kaufman because I looked it up, I hadn't seen it in so long but when I was in Congress, the assault weapons ban expired. It was a 10 year ban. Couldn't get it going again. So I started just reading a little bit, of course, not real research. You would flunk, he would give me an F on my research but it was never challenged on Second Amendment grounds. That's what I read. Is that true? Do you know? I think that's right. That's pretty amazing, isn't it? That those things were, the Brady bill was upheld, other bills were upheld until 2008 when the Supreme Court discovered the Second Amendment rights. But even then, those rights would not have prevented what was in the Brady bill. The only thing in the Brady bill that would have been prevented by the Supreme Court would be if you could not have possession of any handgun in your home. Anyone else? All right, this second question here. How do you counteract the negative effect of the Dickey amendment on the research efforts, gun violence by CDC? And real quick, what I know about the Dickey amendment because I served with him and he has since changed his mind, I believe. And that was a prohibition from the CDC collecting statistics regarding gun related violence. There really is out there. That's what members of Congress do. They just restrict the use of funds for programs that they don't believe in. I mean, there are many other things too, as you know. But Dr. Pliska, what if the CDC kept this information, the statistics? Would it be helpful? How is it helpful? I think it'd be very, very helpful, particularly in this era of big data. So it could be correlated with other health statistics to kind of better understand the roots of violence. So I think repealing that amendment would be, I mean, we look at all kinds of, we look at cars. We track car accidents, plane accidents. There's all kinds of other infectious agents, all kinds of other adverse events that we research its prevalence in society. It often leads to a lot of fruitful hypotheses in terms of treatment. So repealing that amendment would be very helpful. We already have information being collected, of course, as the doctor references, regarding other causes, whether it's diseases, accidents, prevention and such. And all that information that we glean is, we use it, but not when it comes to gun violence, which is pretty amazing. But like I said, I think former representative Dickey actually changed his mind. He said it wasn't such a great idea after all. Of course, he's no longer in Congress, so what does it matter? What do the panel members think about the glamorization of violence, firearm violence in the media that affects our youth directly? I think I'll start with Reverend Gordy. I think that's something that you can address. I have five children, four that came with me into my new marriage and one that I got as a happy aside. And I think about them and the violence that they witness regularly. And so there's no real way to shield them from it, because if they aren't exposed to it by me, then they're going to see it somewhere else. And so my position has been to intentionally expose them to violence in ways that I know what's coming next, I've seen this movie before, and then to really talk about it and talk about what the ramifications of that might have been beyond the screen, right? What might have happened in these people's stories beyond the screen? In my home, there are no first person shooter games, and there won't be. Because I think that it distorts the perception of reality. My former spouse served in the United States Navy and was a backseater in F-14. And so he spent all of his training in simulators and would later go on to say, you know, at some point when you're in action and it's real, it's still not real because it's a computer screen. And so that really stuck with me. And so that's the reason why that doesn't happen in my home. I don't want my children to ever walk into a situation and not understand clearly that the person in front of them is a real person with a real story and real life experiences. Anyone else? Now we know that there's always an opinion and someone has a different opinion and this question goes to where is there gonna be common ground? But we know that we have law professors that might disagree with Professor Kaufman. We know we have people from the medical community that believe it's not the business of the medical profession. We even have members of religious institutions that will argue for arming individuals. And of course, Senator Menendez every day goes on the floor of the Senate and there are definitely people with different opinions about that. And Sheriff Salazar's opinions may not be shared by other sheriffs throughout this state. You know, you've seen the chief of police in Houston very strongly calling for laws and then of course then you'll see dozen other police chiefs throughout the nation saying that's the wrong thing to do. But the audience members say, where do we start? What do gun control and gun advocates agree on, if anything? Who wants to take it? Jose? So it's the only things that I find that we have very quick, easy agreement is that obviously we want our schools to be safe. We have different ways of thinking about how we get there. But I completely think that in Austin there are a few things that are just common sense. Our schools need to be safe places. Some folks think that that's just a matter of fortifying the buildings, the entrances, the abilities making them the way where you can lock people in or certain parts. A lot of our schools have already done that. But I think the thing that what I'm trying to get, where I'm trying to get some common agreement to is that many of our shooters, if we already can also agree that the guns are out there, they're prevalent. They're easily accessible. I think we could probably agree to that. Then the question is, how can we keep the guns out of the hands of the people who shouldn't have? What can we do? And that's even sometimes hard. If that's where we start having disagreement. But then the question is, what can we do to try to get to the root cause of all of those shooters, whether it be Santa Fe or Sullivan or you name it, that something snaps that they just decide that life is just not worth living within the boundaries that we all live in and that I don't care. I'm gonna go kill those people that made me feel so badly about myself and then I don't care if I die myself. And I think that's where we need to figure out how do we address that. And so one of the positive outcomes of this debate has been that there has been a stronger focus on mental health in the state of Texas that I had not seen. I started in the Texas legislature in 2001 and when I first got there, we didn't talk much about mental health. And in the years since we've had these issues come up, mental health has come to the forefront and we are doing more. And this session, I believe you're gonna see a mental health bill, unlike many, where it's going to try to ask, it's gonna try to give resources to the schools when there's that first sign of a student doing something that they can identify. And so we're working hard in that regard and that is something we can all agree on. Now, there'll be differences in the details of what we agree. But I think that wherever we can find some common ground, we need to hold on to that and defend it. And one of the things I think I also like about Mom's Demand Action is that they're very upfront about saying, we're not here to take anybody's guns. We believe in the Second Amendment. And that helps because it seems like everyone's trying to say, you're either for guns or you're against guns. And there's scorecards and if you're, we're gonna give you a score and that's how you're gonna get, you know, everyone that we associate with and that we, we're gonna tell them how you should be seen as a elected official. That's not a good thing because we need elected officials that can help reach out and find common ground. And I think that's what we need to be nurturing. We need to stop trying to put people into little convenient boxes. You're a, you're a this label, you're a Democrat, you're a Republican, you're a liberal, you're a conservative, you're the, hey, hey, hey, can I be a Texan? Can I be an American? Can I be a human being? Can I be someone that thinks and independent? You know, can I think for myself? And, and you know, I'm, I'm proud to be a Democrat. I've been a Democrat, but, but I, I don't want to put people in such a tight box that that doesn't let me get like y'all were in Washington where y'all couldn't even hang out with the other people. You know, you couldn't talk to them. And, and I don't know when it happened. I think it was that guy, the exterminator guy from Houston that caused all that stuff. That turned congressman delay. But, but before that, before that, you know, Reagan and Tip O'Neill used to get together for dinner and they talk about what they could get agreement on. I will tell you right now, some of the best work that we can get done in Austin is when we get in after a long tiresome drive or something and we sit down for a cup of coffee at a table and it could be three or four colleagues from around the state. They may not be the same party, but we can talk about the family, the kids, the school, how things are going, get to know each other and then find common ground. And that's the only way it's gonna work. And, and, and so I can't give you a laundry list of things that we agree on, but I can tell you that we just have to, we need help from the electorate to let people be, you know, how many of y'all can remember that they went after Joe Strauss because he was too moderate? Okay. Let him represent his district, you know? And he wants to be a Republican because he believes certain things, but he wants to be moderate on certain things. Let him be who he is. But the problem is the electorate is pushing on both sides and I think it's because special interests are pushing us to the edges, to the end, the fringes. If you're a Democrat, they're trying to purify. You gotta be as liberal as you can. If you're a Republican, you gotta be as, you know, conservative as you can. We need common sense voters to say, solve problems. Go out there and work with people to make things work better. Professor Kaufman, I thank you. Professor Kaufman. The mental health issue is very important. I was very impressed by what Dr. Bliscoe said about the percentage though of the violent crime created by those persons. So I think it is important. I also think it's an excuse for trying to avoid actually controlling the number of guns created, sold in the United States. We're ahead of the whole world on that. So I do think there's some agreement, not everyone, of course, but some agreement that military weapons were clearly military weapons, machine guns, submachine guns, greater guns should not be sold to the public and they should not be allowed to be held by the public. People disagree with that, but I think that's something that many people would agree. Anyone else on common ground? Let me ask Reverend Gordy. I was Reverend Gordy. Is there any movement in just San Antonio, let's say in San Antonio, ecumenical, I don't wanna say, it would take all our religious leaders to come together and give us some direction. It would have to be a specific policy, but that our elected leaders, civic, elected and so on, have to start taking stands on just something that would be common sense. We just said there are some things that we probably could agree on, the safety of our children in the schools, how we go about doing that, mental health and such. Is there anything that the churches are doing here in San Antonio? I am not aware of a church-led group on gun violence. I'm not aware of one either, but I will tell you that the mayor appointed Anne Helmke as the liaison to the faith-based initiative and I am a member of that working group as the leader for the religious diversity team. We work on issue of religious discrimination and on loving one another. And some of the things that we talk about are violence and intergenerational poverty and mental health. And so we are starting to have those conversations and connect with one another across religious lines and across ecumenical lines. And so I have great hope. If gun violence is something that you're particularly passionate about and you'd like to see the faith-based initiative address that, please do talk with me afterwards and I'd love to connect you with someone who can pull you into their working group. That would be great, thank you very much. The next question from the audience. Domestic abuse calls seem to be the most dangerous calls for prospective gun violence for law enforcement and domestic abuse victims. What enhancements to Texas law would help law enforcement confiscate guns from felons and domestic abusers? So I think I'll start with the sheriff back. I think give us a little more teeth in the law that would allow us to just automatically take the guns without having to get a warrant and just not have to even ask. If we're there for a family violence call, we're taking the guns. They may just be for tonight or a week or two until you can come down to the property room. But I think if nothing else, that's an easy start. That's low hanging fruit right there. But I don't think it's gonna be an easy fight for the Bear County delegation. Senator? We will, I love when I get common sense suggestions and we will push them. We'll go through them. But I can tell you, unfortunately, how many of you think that not texting and driving makes common sense? Raise your hand if you'd like. That took about 10 years to get passed. And so all I'm saying is we will do it, but it's gonna be hard and there's gonna be a lot of people say that we're just trying to grab people's guns, take their guns. And I think we need to have statistics and facts. I think you need to show that the number of homicides that occur because of domestic violence, I think that the people who perish in those situations, I would guess anecdotally the majority are women and children. And then, unfortunately, sometimes what I've seen and read, it's homicide, suicide. Then the shooter takes their own life. And so we need to prevent this situation. And in order to prevent it, why wouldn't you, if you have a domestic violence situation, say, hey, hey, time out. We're gonna do a temporary, just present us with your guns. We can go get a warrant. Why don't you do it voluntarily? When everything's fine and you've found your apartment, you can come back and get your guns and you're out of the house. Or whatever the situation you guys come to an agreement with, we need to figure this out. But it won't be easy, but we will work on that. I think it's just common sense. And so, unfortunately, it should be easier than it is. Anyone else? All right. This should be thought provoking. Do you think requiring gun owners to register and ensure their guns similar to vehicles will help reduce gun violence? Who wants to take a stab at that? Professor, you have a thought on that? Yes. Ah, ha, ha, ha, ha. Yes. Doctor? I mean, it would make sense in terms of, just like car insurance or your house insurance. I mean, so I think that would have a lot of, it certainly would allow victims to be able to pay for medical care or emotional damages or other kinds of things that might occur. So, and I don't see, again, it doesn't take anyone, the amount of insurance to charges could be modest so that it doesn't greatly overwhelm people's inability to get a firearm. But I think it would definitely give a layer, it would definitely give a layer of protection. Reverend, you have a thought on that? Or Jose, or Javier? Look, as cool as it sounds, I think it's a bit of a pipe dream. I just don't see that ever happening because let's be honest, let's take this suspect that killed my canine deputy the other night. That guy's never gonna pay his insurance premiums. He's never gonna do things legally. Chances are he stole that gun anyway. We haven't found that out yet. But I just think that you're gonna have, criminals are gonna continue to be criminals and circumvent the laws and that'll just be another law that they thumb their nose at, to be honest with you. I think it's unrealistic expectation. Evidence of what he just said, how many people drive without insurance? How many people drive without insurance? How many people are out driving their car with no insurance? Thousands. So this is gonna be hard to get that to do. I honestly really, what I'd love to see is Dr. Plisca help us with what are the root causes, where do kids start getting their heads screwed up at what age and how can we prevent that? Because the sooner we help the kids get on the right track, the less work we're gonna have to do on the back end of these things. You know what I'm saying? And so what can we do? Is it the foster care system? Is it drugs and alcohol? Is it rehabilitation? How can we help the kids in the household not be so disconnected from reality? Look, when the issue of suicide rate, the teen suicide rate is tripled in Bear County in the last probably five or six years. And I went to talk to my teenagers about this. Hey, hey, this is kind of scary. What do you know about this? Oh yeah, dad, I know tons of people who've tried to commit suicide. What? Like nothing. Like I was saying nothing. Like it was no big deal. Yeah. I mean in sixth grade little girls are cutting themselves. You know, and I don't understand it. And they're all sharing it on social media. So we have a lot of work to do. I think, look, gun violence is real, but I think it's symptomatic of a larger problem. I think you're right Al, that there are weapons of mass destruction that should not be in the hands of everyday citizens. Obviously they realize that with the pressure on the bump stock situation. But no one needs a magazine with 50 rounds in it to defend their house. There are just certain things that need to be common sense. I think the school-based mental health services is a really good place to start. One of the big barriers that keeps, particularly working families from seeking mental health care. You get a call from the school. Your child has said he wanted to hurt himself or he got in that, you know, he's been depressed while the parent has to go to their insurance panel, call somebody, make multiple calls, finally get an appointment, take off work. Boss says, no, you can't take off work. It just delays the whole process a lot of people give up. And if those services were directly in the school, child could be served, else the family could come and get family therapy. I think that would really be a core preventative measure. I think at the other end of the severity spectrum, for those kids with serious mental illness, we probably need to invest a little bit more in intensive treatment and residential treatment. Really, Texas, we have Waco Center for Youth. We have Waco Center for Youth who is the only long-term residential facility that the state runs. We have other residential treatment facilities, but for those kids that really need an intensive long-term care, that's a definite gap in the system. And that's where we could really prevent kids from going into a lifelong course of substance abuse, mental illness or criminal behavior. To show you, there are many things that we would have to undo to get to where some of you might be thinking we need to be going in that particular direction, such as identifying the gun owners and registering and so on. So I had old notes from years ago, but this is really amazing. The Bureau of Alcohol, Farms and Explosives is forbidden by law from having a database that could quickly be searched to identify who has purchased rifles and guns. Your outlaw, they can't collect that kind of information. This is a better one. Now, I believe this is true, Doctor, I'm not real sure, but we do have an opioid epidemic and they try to keep track of the pharmacists and where all this is coming from. And there are red flags if maybe there's somebody dispensing more than they should. We have records for that, but what about this? Congress barred government in 2003 from publishing records of how many guns are sold by stores used by criminals. What if there was a store that's selling all these guns and probably taking them to Mexico and everything else? You can't, I mean, this is really a huge, huge issue. And we need to, we're probably gonna have to take the baby steps, but I think we're identifying some steps that we'll be able to take. Senator Menendez and others after Jose, what is the role of the NRA in preventing gun legislation? Charlie, really? You wrote that question, I mean, I expected more from you, Charlie, but oh, come on, guys, look. Austin, whether it's Austin, whether it's Washington, not so much at City Hall, but there are special interest groups everywhere and wherever there's a special interest, you know, I remember growing up with my father who was born in 1922, who grew up in rural, riding a horse for 37 years of his life, hunted and fished and outdoorsman. I remember back then the NRA being sort of like where you'd learn the safety programs and these different things, it was a different thing. And now it seems like the manufacturers have taken over and they use it as the ability to protect their rights to sell whatever they wanna sell, you know? And yes, the NRA has an arm in Austin and there's others and in Washington and they have the ability to keep track of who's doing what and they go advocate and they worry and they express those concerns that when we're trying to do things that sometimes we think of as common sense, it's just an excuse to take people's guns. And the biggest thing they say, Charlie, their biggest thing is if you take their guns as you're just taking them from law-abiding citizen, the criminals are always gonna have them. Okay, I'll grant you that, but maybe it's a law-abiding citizen who is happy to having a mental crisis or is happening to go through a bad divorce or just lost their job and they're not in a mental state to own that gun right now. And it's not like, you know, hey, we're saying you can never own it again in most cases, but can't we be common sense in some approach? So yeah, they're there, Charlie, but that's kinda where I was saying that's where mom's demand action seems to have filled a void. There wasn't anybody on the other side saying, hey, time out, there's some of us sensible voters out here and we also want attention because it almost seems like in Austin or Washington, it's like the loudest and squeakiest wheels get the attention. Now, lots of these special interest groups too, they put together political action committees and they raise a lot of money and they invest money in campaigns and where groups like mom's demand action can have, I've seen them be effective, it's not that they're writing checks, but they're doing just as good with people power, with volunteering, with doing things, with helping the people that are running saying we support this candidate and we're behind them and that brings along a lot of other people. And so all of these groups can be offset, but it takes work. And the problem that I see for years, what I've seen groups when there's us versus them, it's when one group is not actively engaged, they're gonna be on the losing side. But when we're actively engaged in terms of supporting your candidates who think and represent you the way you think, you're gonna be on the right side, you're gonna have more success. So yes, no, there's very actively involved involvement. And look, Texas has been a place where they've been very comfortable for a long time where even this, they still have two thirds of control of both chambers and they have the governorship. So it's why it's so hard to get something changed. So it's why honestly, rather than try to demonize folks, I have to work hard to try to build bridges. That's the only way I'm gonna get anything done is to build bridges. Because if I'm going in there trying to throw on my fighting gear, the numbers just aren't there for me. You know, the numbers in the Senate, the numbers in the house, and so we have to be smart about how we get things done. Anyone else an opinion on the influence of the NRA? On gun legislation? The odd thing is that I know many NRA members that really believe that, and this is what they strive for, is responsible gun ownership. It's not all what you always hear there. I mean, they have members and I think the thing is we ought to be joining the NRA. I own a firearm, I should join and be a voice heard in these organizations. Because I think there are a lot of reasonable people that just are never ever heard. One thing that was pointed out, I think the Senator was talking about, well, law abiding citizens and such, getting a gun at a time when, as the doctors pointed out, they may not be mentally stable there in an emotional state when they might harm someone else. But what about harming yourself? And this was a startling statistic, but nine out of 10 suicide attempts by guns are lethal. And half of all suicides are by guns. And you always hear about a young person who takes the gun and there is. So I think there are different ways of approaching it, not just that people are victims of violence, but what happens when people that aren't stable in an emotional state where they harm themselves? Because firearms are so lethal unlike anything else. Let's see, how dangerous are 3D printed guns? Would banning them be a violation of the Second Amendment, Professor Kaufman? Whether 3D guns violate a prohibition of... It was an important point I just made. Whether prohibiting 3D guns would be prohibited by the Second Amendment, I don't think it would. I think that there are certainly arguments made that persons have a First Amendment right to speak and to share plans, to use their 3D printers for whatever purpose they wish. But I think the interest and safety are so great that they would outweigh it. Anyone else? This is on 3D. I just, you know, I don't think, I don't really consider them a serious threat. I think that it's just as easy seriously, if I'm a criminal, to go break into a car and chances are it's gonna have a gun under the front seat. Especially when so many of us that are gun owners love to plaster those stickers on the back of our car that just paint a target. Come on and get my gun while I'm asleep. Come on and break my window. So I just don't see them as that big of a threat. I think the bigger threat is stolen guns that fall into the wrong hands because many gun owners are quite careless with their guns, to be honest with you. And that's my biggest issue is parents who lawfully own guns but don't keep them locked up. And just keep them easily accessible. And how many senseless, needless deaths of little kids do we need to have before someone, I think we should hold adults responsible just like if a kid comes to your house and your child has a party and they get drunk, you're responsible for what happens to that. So why shouldn't we be responsible for what these kids do with your guns if you didn't have them locked up or held in a safe place, safe way? Why aren't gun owners made responsible for crimes committed by others with guns they own? Well, let's say I have a gun, I have it in the car under the seat, someone breaks in, they steal the gun, they shoot somebody. Can you sue that? Can you sue me for keeping the gun under the seat? Leaving the door open to the car or whatever. Anyone have an opinion on that? I think, you know, I know there've been lawsuits out there that have not been very successful. I mean, I know of a couple of them right now where it's someone saying that they did not train adequately for a licensed, for a security officer who has to get a license. He left the gun exposed there on the bed and someone's child got hold of it. It discharged and killed another child. So that's an ongoing lawsuit, chances of it succeeding are pretty slim. Yeah, I do believe that civil remedies would be one way of instilling responsibility. I've always believed this and the professor and others here would probably agree. If there's no liability, generally there's no accountability. So what makes people responsible is that there's some liability out there for some behavior. As an aside real quick, I have a 38 special. It's a little pistol, I mean, it's a 38. And it was a gift from my bailiff and my staff when I was in court. The only condition was that I not bring it to court because they didn't trust the way I would handle it. He said, the only gun in the courtroom is mine. That was the previous two sheriffs or three sheriffs ago. He said, this is for your protection at home. So that's just universally understood that you're gonna have a gun in your house. But just maybe keep it in a safe place, learn to use it. No one is gonna be taking anyone's gun away. And Senator Menendez is pointing something out that is so important because as soon as you start talking about gun safety, that means gun control. Gun control means gun confiscation and you lose. You'll never get anywhere. This is, I expect an answer from all of you on this one because this should get you in a lot of trouble but it's almost self-evident. Is gun violence a male issue? Do we need a male solution? What about the role of fathers? Short answer to that is yes. Aggressive behavior, problems with aggressive behavior are more common among males. And that's been true since the issue's been solved. You're gonna have to hold it real close, Dr. I mean it's just almost touching your lips. That, let me start over. So the aggressive behavior and problems with aggressive behavior has been predominantly a problem among males since the issue has been studied for hundreds of years. We are seeing that changing though. So with all the other changes in society, the number of girls who get into trouble with aggressive behavior is in fact increasing. And in fact through social media, there's a different kind of aggression, the kind of social aggression, excluding people, saying mean things and such that sometimes can be as damaging as the boys punching each other in the nose on the playground. And we've had a over the last half century or so an increase in boys who grow up without any significant male influence in their life and that probably does have an impact as well. These deep social trends are really difficult to get a handle on and prescribe a social policy that would reverse them. Anyone else on whether gun violence is really a male issue and if it is, how we would address that? Sher? Well I mean I think it's everybody's issue to start off with. Now I can say pretty definitively that most of the perpetrators in gun violence be it active shooter situations or family violence situations, most of the perpetrators are male, but was the second part seriously part of the question that should it be a male solution? Sir? Was that true? Was that okay? If it's a male problem, should there be something tailored to address the male actor? Okay, I don't think it's a male solution. I think it's again, it's all of our solution to it. I don't think that there, for example, I think there's groups that do great work and we keep giving you guys shout outs, but the moms demand action. I don't think there are any male moms, are there? Any male moms? Okay, well there you go. But again, that's a group that's very strong, but you all are probably mostly female? Mostly? I think it's everybody's solution. I mean look, males, we've been running government for a long, long time. How's that working out? I think that it's all of our solution together. So Charlie, you know what it reminds me of? The issue of illiteracy. The issue of illiteracy has two ends, two spectrums. You have to treat, make sure the children read on grade level by third grade or you're gonna lose them, right? But do you give up on the adults who don't read? No. So the issue with gun violence is I think you have to treat mental health and illness. Look, we focus for years on the President's Council on Health. How many sit-ups can your kid do? How many push-ups? How fast can they run? Well what the heck? What about their mental health, their emotional health? You know, what about the whole kid? The kid, I think that's even more important. The emotional and mental health of the children is more important as important, but it can't be less important than their physical health. Our kids today are suffering more from anxiety, from depression, from a lot of things. They're living in these stupid things. You've seen me addicted looking at this stupid thing the whole time. I'm just as addicted. I'm staring at this damn thing and I can't put it down. And I'm watching my kids and there's one thing I wanna strangle whoever invented Snapchat. Taking their picture and doing this and I ask my kids, what are you doing? I'm talking to my friends. What do you mean you're talking? All they do is take pictures and then they take a picture of what they do and they have a string and they have to keep it going. And then they'll tell you, a beautiful child will tell you, why am I so ugly? What? What do you mean why are you so? Why am I not pretty? Why am I not that? And they're sitting there staring and trying to understand why they don't compare to someone else and they never stop doing this. And so I think they're not getting enough sleep. I don't think they're stopping to recharge their batteries. Stopping to just to read, to eat, to have some exercise. They're just focused on these things. So do men tend to use more violent behavior to commit suicide? Yes. Do they do it to solve problems? Yes. Do they use more aggressive ways? Yes. But does that mean that we ignore the mental health of women? No. I think this is a solution, a problem that we're just seeing men use the guns, manifest the violence through the guns more often than women, but the problem is just as serious for boys and girls. Anyone else? This is gonna be the last question and it's really a great one because most of y'all are thinking, well, I better start talking to my member of Congress about doing something at the federal level. Others are saying, I'm gonna go up there and talk to Senator Nendis in Austin. But what about acting locally? Remember, all politics is local. There's a reason for that. And this is the question, and if I can make this out real clearly here, would it make sense to Parley San Antonio's Charter as a compassionate city to help promote, A, more civic dialogue, B, compassion education for our children, C, sensible laws and regulations to help reduce harm from gun violence. Our city would be a model city for other cities, municipalities, states, et cetera. In other words, can something be done locally? I know that there are cities throughout the nation that are. I was talking to someone the other day about Boulder, Colorado. Very aggressive law. I don't know if it's gonna withstand scrutiny when the courts get it, but what about doing something locally? In one case, back to the legal stuff that the Supreme Court's agreed to hear, it's from New York City. And New York City has a law that you cannot carry a gun from place to place. You can have a gun, a handgun in your home, but you cannot carry it anywhere in the city, except if you have a license, you can carry it to a licensed, what are they called? You practice gun, practice shooting range. And that's it. And you can't take the guns out of the city and you can't take them anywhere in the city except to a city licensed shooting range. And that's pushing it. But that would make it much easier, although you're right, the criminals might still have guns, but Sheriff would know if somebody's carrying a gun, that it's an illegal gun, unless they're a member of the Sheriff of the Police Department and they would know that. People would make it much clearer when you could carry a gun and when you couldn't. So I think that's something cities can do, it's within city powers. Again, you have politics working at all levels. But it is something a city could do. Doctor, you need any help, let's say from city leaders, city council, thinking in terms of the UT Health Science Center in San Antonio. I think the more there are community programs where kids can go and get mentored, that can kind of prevent the development of the aggressive behavior that ultimately is gonna culminate in the gun violence. So that's the main thing I could think of doing locally citizens, volunteering per CASA or at your local school, taking some time to mentor some kids that really can have a very direct input. I mean, I get letters from families that I treated 20 years ago, and I didn't see them that intensively in therapy. These weren't people that were in therapy, they weren't in therapy for years, I might have seen them four or five times, and they'll say, oh, well, it really had a big impact and it made a difference. So you think, well, if I just go to the local elementary school and I tutor a few times a week, that's not gonna have a big impact. Absolutely not, it can have a potentially huge impact. Reverend, you already pointed out maybe some sort of ecumenical initiative. What about locally and having city government help you? Well, again, I think we're starting to do that. And there are a couple of other interfaith organizations that are working on some of these issues in San Antonio. And so I do see some progress being made, I have a lot of hope for more progress being made, if that makes sense, and so I'm super happy to funnel any ideas that you all have about the way that churches and mosques and temples and other institutions can help politicians understand the bigger picture. Senator, what would be the role for local government? What do you think? So you alluded to it a second ago. So in North Texas, those of us down here, we're familiar with the Eagleford shale down south of us. In North Texas, they had a different shale play that was causing people to have wells in their backyards. So Tarrant and some other Arlington, I forget what cities, there was a city that Denton that made it illegal to have oil wells in the city. And then the city of Austin decided, well, we're gonna protect X number of trees. And then all of a sudden in the next session, we're like, well, we're gonna make a law that cities can't pass laws to infringe on what we sell. I think the best thing that we can do as a city is to support the mental health initiatives and how can we get down at the core level, number one, on the youth side, and on this side of the equation, what can we do to help address the issues of domestic violence, of issues where there is preventable gun violence? Folks, we all know in this room, just like we're not gonna eliminate all drunk driving, we still have laws, but what I like to do is focus on the areas where we can prevent the most. And I think domestic violence is one of the areas we can prevent the most. One of the things that we have a distinction that I hate is that we're one of the cities that has the highest per capita consumption of alcohol, of beer. A lot of this leads to other issues, health issues, violence issues, domestic violence, so, you know, stupid things. So I think there's a lot of things that we can work on as a city to look at the overall health of our citizens. And I think that's something that we could do as a city that would not be prevented by the state. I don't wanna do any more sort of, you know, magic wand wishful thinking. I wanna work on stuff that I think we could actually do. Now, if you wanna do more, then every election cycle, make sure you and everybody that you agree with that believes like you do, goes out to vote for people and make changes in areas where people don't agree with you. You know, that's the only way that's gonna happen. But that's gonna take time. And so in the short front is, but I think you also, you know, if you're talking to, you have to talk to health professionals, talk to the city, talk to schools. What is schools doing? For years, schools have not wanted to talk about mental health or anything like this. And school districts, we're not funding them off to give them the counselors that they need. In high schools, when you talk about a counselor, it's all academic advisement. I was trying to pass the cyber bullying bill and they were telling me, well, we don't have emotional, mental health was brought in because nobody was talking to the kids about mental health and they're emotional. So there's a lot, there's huge gaps on stuff that we can do, but it needs to be a community wide effort. It has to be a comprehensive effort. Sheriff Salazar, is there a role for local government? Let's say county or city commissioners court, city council, as far as anything to reduce gun violence, taking the initiative. I think there is. I think we can, certainly from a county official perspective, anytime one of the legislators needs me to come up and support something, I'm there. And so yeah, certainly myself or any of the other county officials can do that. I don't believe there's anything prohibiting a city official from doing that. But from a citizen's perspective, shoe leather and elbow grease, get involved in anything that you can. Come out and volunteer for one of the nonprofits that works in furtherance of one of the causes you believe in. Volunteer for one of our law enforcement agencies. I have a volunteer corps at the sheriff's office and we'd love to have folks that are experts in a variety of fields. Pat Castillo, I'd love to have her hoping us out with family violence stuff and I know she will if I ask. But come out and volunteer. Volunteer for the campaign of a candidate that you support for whatever cause. Get out there and put some sweat equity into it and that's how we're gonna change this thing. So Charlie, but also the thing I was thinking about, we have a lot of children who don't have mentors at home. Look, I don't know if y'all know this, one in four kids doesn't eat at home. They only eat at school. We have a backpack program that the food bank sends kids with backpacks on the weekends full of stuff so that they can fix food for themselves and their siblings. So we have a lot of absentee parents in people's homes. These kids are raising themselves and they're looking for other family role models and those family role models tend to be, sometimes people don't have their best interests, gang members and others. And so we have a lot of work in going into the schools and volunteering and reading to these kids and taking an interest and letting them hope, find that there maybe there's hope because a lot of these kids don't think they're gonna be 25 or 30. So when you don't have hope to see a good life, then what do you care? It doesn't matter. Oh, take the gun, go do a drive-by, go be a lookout. Do this, don't you see that every day? And so we have a great need that we can address by going into the poverty that we have as a city. And we need to address that. I think if we address that, we also can hit the impact of alcohol, dependency, drug and alcohol dependency and mental health. So there's a lot of root cause issues that we need to get to. Well, I wanna thank the, I'm sorry. Of course. I think all the things that troubles you and your family and the third one was nutrition and a very close support was violence, overall violence. And so the city is gonna be focusing on those three issues, holding in violence into the adverse childhood experiences stuff. And that's what we're gonna be focusing on for the next four years. So you really need to get a hold of your city's household person and tell them, you know, that we want good stuff to come out of those efforts because they now pay the priority tax. Well, I know that many of you were hoping that we would have just these grand-scale plans that would take care of the issues. But remember what we entitled the presentation. Gun violence, what can capitalize be done? What realistically can we do to get it started again? Because it's really at a standstill. Each of you should leave tonight with an idea that came from this panel as to what you can do starting tomorrow if not tonight. And I wanna thank the panel and I wanna hand it back over to the president. And again, it was good to see y'all. Thank you very much for the privilege. Well, thank you all for joining us. You know, won't you agree? It was a great discussion and a great panel that we had. You know, I think you all did. I want to thank Professor Kaufman. I want to thank Senator Jose Menendez, Dr. Steven Plisca, Reverend Anna Gordy, and Sheriff Salazar. And last but not least, I want to thank our moderator because no discussion is complete without a good moderator. I also want to mention that this program was live streamed by Nowcast. And I want to thank Charlotte Ann for doing that. And you can view it later on our website or on the website of Nowcast. And thank you all for joining us and keep joining us for these wonderful programs that we put together. It's mainly for the, you know, community members to come and get educated about it. Thank you all. Thank you.