This is Iowa's news leader. This is K C C. I eight news close up. Good morning and thank you for joining us. Several new laws went into effect this week. One of the more controversial laws is a new measure that bans divisive concepts like critical race theory from being taught in Iowa schools and government training. The law prohibits teaching that the U. S. Or Iowa are systemically racist or sexist the back. The blue law increases protections for police and increases penalties for rioters. Lawmakers passed the legislation after racial justice protests last summer. Another new law removes the statute of limitations for criminal sex abuse charges. Anyone born after 1986 can now file a criminal case at any time. Iowans older than 21 can now buy a gun and carry guns without a permit. It comes after the state Health Department says Iowa saw a record number of gun related deaths last year. K. C. C. I. S. Chief political reporter. Cynthia folder takes a close up look at the new law with Iowa moms demand action. What are your concerns with this new law? Well, what this new law does is it repeals the need for a permit to buy a handgun from unlicensed dealers. And what that's going to do is allow people like felons and domestic abusers to obtain a handgun when they shouldn't be legally permitted to have one. It is also going to repeal the need to have a permit to conceal and carry. So we will have theoretically a domestic abuser who is able to obtain a handgun without a permit and we'll be able to carry that weapon loaded in public. And part of this, of getting the permit was having prior safety training to write. So that eliminates that training process. It is important to have training before you carry a firearm. I am a veteran and I know when I was in the service training, safety and accountability were a big part of the military culture. I think it's surprising for myself and other veterans to see that culture not carried over to the civilian side when we're talking about maintaining and carrying loaded weapons in public. And when you say in public, I mean this means anyone in the grocery store in a restaurant now, um even if a police officer sees they have a gun, they don't have to ask them for permit. That is correct. You will be able to legally carry your handgun without a permit and without being able to check if you have a permit or not. That will make it more difficult for the officials trying to keep us safe to determine if that person was even legally permitted to be carrying that weapon in the first place. And there is some confusion over background checks in this, I've heard, um, even Democratic lawmakers saying this no longer requires background checks, it does still require them. If you buy a gun from a federally licensed dealer, correct? It's only the concern is in private sales. Yes. So the way this bill was written and the way it was messaged really belies the fact that this is unpopular. Two thirds of islands in a recent poll said they do not approve of repealing the background check requirement. So what this does is it repeals the permitting portion of this and there is a background check required to obtain a permit. So if a buyer goes through a federally licensed dealer, you will still get the background check, but a prohibited buyer who wants to circumvent the background check will be able to go to unlicensed dealer and easily purchase a handgun. And that's the private sales aspect of this. For example, even on websites buying guns or craigslist or anything like that, correct? Yes. We already know from looking at states that have repealed the permitting requirement that websites like arms list become more popular and that there are more private sales that take place through those websites. So you expect that will happen. I am concerned it will happen. Um, I moved here from Missouri and when Missouri repealed their permitting Um, law, they saw 27% increase in gun violence. I moved here to Iowa in part because I did not feel comfortable with the levels of gun violence in Missouri and raising my Children there and now I fear I will be facing the same problems here in Iowa. I I just heard democrats say in a news conference that the state has seen an increase in gun violence even this year. What are you hearing about that? Um, yeah, I have seen, Um, some statistics. I know the Iowa Department of Public Health said that there was a 20% increase in gun violence in 2020. So what I know is that right now, gun violence in Iowa is an epidemic and it's getting worse. And instead of keeping laws intact that protect public safety and allow our local officials to address the problem, they are repealing the very laws that help keep us safe. And I fear that gun violence will get worse. And one thing that, uh, advocates were arguing is that they are going to make it a class d felony if somebody sells a gun knowingly to someone who is prohibited from owning that. Um, do you think that will be a deterrent at all to to illegal sales? I can't speak to that particular mechanism, But all I know is that every state that has repealed the background check and permitting requirement has seen an increase in gun violence. So whatever mechanisms may be going on in the background, it is not enough to prevent the increase in gun violence. And it's really, even if you're not a public health expert, it's not hard to understand that if you give prohibited buyers an easier avenue to obtain a handgun, gun violence will increase. And, and, uh, actually, I remember the house, uh, approved this the day after, um, there was a deadly shooting spree. I think it was Georgia. Um, and, and we've seen seemingly have seen an uptick in those kinds of sprees, haven't we? Yeah, I don't know the 2021 statistics, but yeah, we did see an increase in gun violence in 2020. Um, 2021 has obviously seen many tragic mass shootings. I think that the timing of signing this bill was callous and insensitive at the time. We have already had polling that said most islands did not support this bill. We have polling after the signing that says Iowans do not support this bill. So for me, all I can think is that our elected officials are putting the interests of the extreme gun lobby ahead of those of the public safety of Iowans. And you said you moved here because you felt like Iowa was safer. Um, Are you going to stay here now? I If I had a crystal ball of what I would be doing in the future, that would be very helpful for myself and my whole family. Um, right now I don't have any plans to move. I will keep on fighting to keep our communities safe and I have faith that in 2022, when Iowans are faced with the choice of keeping officials in who do not support public safety or voting officials in that will keep their families safe. Iowans all want to keep their families safe and I think we'll see election results that reflect that in 2022, after the break gun rights, advocates get their turn to explain why this law is important for Iowa's get the forecast from a weather expert. Welcome back supporters of the state's new gun laws say there are still benefits that will encourage Iowans to get a permit to carry. But this law is more about our Second Amendment rights. One of the Iowa firearms coalitions board of directors explained it to Cynthia voters. The big thing about the law changed today is not the practical applications because we don't think for most people that when we must change our reasons to continue to have a permit, but it changes the relationship between the state and the government, which we believe has been inverted for so very long for about 100 years. In Iowa, the state didn't really acknowledge that we have a fundamental natural right to keep and bear arms that's protected by the Second Amendment. But in Iowa, in most other places, you had to apply for, wait for be approved and pay for a permission slip from government in order to exercise that natural fundamental right. And that's what the Supreme Court says. It's a natural and fundamental right now, you're able to do that without permission slip. And the government needs to show cause why you should not be allowed to freely exercise your fundamental rights? Why did your group advocate for this if you're still urging people to get the permits, what was wrong with the system? We had in place? Well until 11 years ago or 10.5 years ago, the sheriff said absolute discretion on the issuing permits and could put restrictions on them and so on. There was no appeal to that. We changed that. The law passed in 2010 and immediately went to one affected 1011. We had a flood of people wanting to get a permit to carry. We went 201,000 the first year And now will be 400,000. So for the last decade, the members of the volunteers of Iowa firearms coalition have worked to strip away the in conferences that the state has placed on our free exercise of our right to keep their arms. This is the final stage and again, it's more of a philosophical a you know, victory than it is going to change things practically speaking. But it's very important that the relationship between the people and the and the government be a proper one, a constitutional one. And what about um, it was my understanding that to obtain a permit, you had to have some sort of training and some are concerned that people will now be able to carry. I've gone into public places without any safety training, our our group and were affiliated with the National Association, which is the largest trainer, firearms trainer in the world. Um we highly recommend people take initial training and then more advanced training later as they have the opportunity. Uh there's a great responsibility to carrying any weapons, including a firearm, but you really can't place that requirement on the exercise of a fundamental right. In actual fact, when the Sheriff's had discretion of the permits, it was up to each individual sheriff, what training he required. If he required any, most sheriffs did not require training, of course, some sheriffs in issue permits. Either the firearm safety training that's required, you could learn with three or four points bullet points on the back of a matchbook cover, Don't don't point your weapon. That's something you don't intend to harm. Keep your finger off the trigger and so on. That's what's required by the state law. There is no evidence in other states that do require training that it increases safety by the way. It it seems like it would, but there's no evidence of that. We hope people are responsible, We think islands are responsible and we think this gives them more opportunity to show that they're responsible and going back to um, where it drops the requirement for the background check check in private sales, um, but still requires that if you're buying from a licensed dealer, right? This federal law requires it. Federal law does not require for private transfers between individuals that are residents of the same state. Federal law governs interstate transfers and from life federally licensed dealers. Most people are probably a lot of people in Iowa didn't realize that to transfer a handgun even between relatives, required equipment to acquire pistols and revolvers issued by your sheriff or a permit to carry will serve the same purpose. They didn't know that. And no. And so they were violating the law inadvertently and probably know nothing bad was happening from there. The, so the dropping of that requirement isn't really important. The fact is that most people, most responsible gun owners don't want to sell. As I mentioned before, I don't want to sell to somebody that they don't know personally unless they can show they have a permit. And I've had a background check that's just a personal choice that they make. It is a felony and it has been a felony under federal law for a long, long time to and now understand lots of felony rather than previously serious misdemeanor to transfer a firearm to somebody that you know, or reasonably should know is prohibited from having it or somebody that's intoxicated. Uh huh. It won't be uh wouldn't it be difficult to prosecute someone uh for that felony? I mean, without having evidence that they knew they were selling a gun to someone who was bar, there's no intention to prosecute anybody where you can't show that they knew or reasonably should know. But if you're talking about somebody who's selling guns out of the trunk of their car, uh, you know, in the neighborhood and they're selling to people that are obviously underage for people that the seller can reasonably suspect or not, you know, good care of good character and can't go to a gun store and buy a gun because they couldn't pass a background check and that therefore they're willing to pay a big market. Those things would be prosecuted. There's there's there's evidence there. But if Aunt Edna is trying to get rid of the gun that her her late husband had to a relative or a neighbor, she probably didn't know before, there was requirement in the case of a handgun, not a long gun, but they have a permit. So they violated the law before and nothing bad happened. Now it won't be a violation unless they know or reasonably should know. So that's what the purpose of that that law was. And it was stricter than federal law, but only in the case of handguns and long guns and Richard, What do you say to those, uh, who are against this, who think it will lead to more gun violence? There are 18 states that did this before us. Two states have subsequently, plus Louisiana passed and the governor vetoed it. So this is, this is not breaking the ground. Um, and that that fear hasn't happened before in any other states that have gone to permit. Let's carry. It didn't happen when we went from May issue permits to government discretion to shell issue where they must issue you if you meet minimum requirements, it didn't happen when Illinois Became the 50th state to establish permits to carry. They were still saying there will be shootouts at every stoplight, uh, blood in the streets, Even though it hadn't happened in the 49 other states and it didn't happen in Illinois. So again, we don't expect any dramatic changes. It is going to require a bit of a mindset change of mindset for both the public law enforcement and our our elected officials, uh, uh, to adapt to this new relationship between the people and the government. From now on Iowa counties are required to have a plan for addressing Children's mental health. A close up look at polk county's new services. After the break, it's now Iowa law that counties need to have a mental health services for Children. Whole county created a new network of services through easter seals, Iowa, broad lawns and Lutheran services of Iowa Cynthia voter gets a close up look at how it works. How did this come about and what exactly won't involve? Sure, so a couple of years ago Iowa legislature passed a house file 6 90, which requires that children's mental health services be managed and provided for by all the regions. And so by July one, all the regions across the state are required to have certain services in place. And these are some of them. Oh okay. And Pokorny was kind of ahead of the game I guess from and this involves crisis services for kids. Yeah, so the house file 6 90 had a whole array of services. Some of them were required to be implemented last july but beginning this july 1st 2021 crisis services for Children are what are required. And so these are services that include mobile crisis. So mobile crisis services are used when imminent danger is a concern so harm to yourself or somebody else. And in Polk County you call 911 uh and a dispatch team would come to your home. Mobile crisis dispatch would come to your home and help support the child and the family in that time of mental health crisis. So mobile mobile crisis one of the services, the other two are called crisis response. So it's kind of confusing up mobile crisis use other crisis response services. So one of them is community based crisis response. Community based means that mental health team is coming to your home and spending at least one hour per day up to five days, building skill and support for the child and their parent or caregiver in their home. The other is a residential-based crisis response where they're not in a hospital, but they're not at home some intermediate space. So residential crisis services, the 24 hour support up to five days and it is intended to stabilize a child in their family in a mental health crisis. Will that be the one that camps on each side? Yes, that is yes, easter seals, it will be beginning to contract with us, beginning july 1st to provide those services at camp sunny side. So is that also five days? Yes, correct. It is limited to five days for that residential. It's limited to five days for that community based or in home crisis services. So those are the two new, the other, yep. So those are the two new crisis supports. And you can think about those could be services instead of going to a hospital, but they could be services a family might need for their child coming out of hospitalization. So you can think about, you know, if there's been an attempted suicide or some very acute mental health crisis and your child has been hospitalized and now they're being released. What would you as a parent need or a guardian need to support the ongoing health and recovery of your child. Or what additional services might that child needed? It might mean an intermediate, maybe it's they're not ready to go home yet. Or you as a family are needing extra support before they can come home. So those services can be step down or step up into hospitalization. Okay. And how great is the need right now? I mean, the need was great before Covid, but Covid has certainly added to it. So we don't know. I mean, the real answer is, we don't know. We're starting to know what Children need coming out of Covid. We know that there is an increased frequency and uh engagement at urgent care clinics for mental health services. We know there's been an increase in attempted suicides in our state among youth right here in polk County. So we know that there's an increase in need for those really acute services. But these specific services, this crisis stabilization services, they we've needed these for a long time. We know you have questions. Do you want to know when you're telling catholic grad kayla Schweitzer will be representing the Hawkeye state in the olympic games this summer. K. C. C. I. S. Bow Bowman caught up with her over zoom for a closer look at her Iowa roots. Well, it's just like when I crossed the finish line, I just I can't even believe it. I've been working so hard for this. Super fortunate to be able to compete at dowling just because um they have such a good cross country um program and and um just having that rich history and to be able to build that kind of team environment right away. Um I think just really helps me mentally with the sport. We always have such a great um community. Whenever, even if I'm in a different state, I always have something to be like I'm from Iowa and I've been following you for so long. So I think that's really cool and to be at the olympics and to be doing my victory lap and seeing people that are just like we followed you from Iowa like I guess just like really special and I'm always proud to say that I'm from Iowa. Thank you for joining us for K C. C. I eight news close up. We'll see you back here. Same time next sunday. Okay. What? Yeah. Yeah.