This regulation, and others like it, only serve to raise the risk to those working in, around, and needing services from those areas where the gun ban is in effect.  As the only people who will obey the gun ban are the law abiding citizens to begin with, this creates an area where those seeking to harm the public good can conduct their activities with impunity.

The overwhelming majority of mass shooting events since 1950 have occurred in gun free zones, conducted by people with evil intent.  All of the laws already on the books against mass shootings did not, and will not prevent those criminals from conducting crime...after all, breaking the law is what makes them a criminal in the first place.  As a result, all this regulation will do is disenfranchise the law abiding from exercising their rights.  Further, if parking lots and rest stops become subject to these restrictions, it would result in law abiding citizens being forced to leave their firearms at home and being disarmed to and from their residences and everywhere in between, which may include lengthy trips.  

This regulation is a solution to a non-existent problem.  It creates new risks for Government employees and law abiding citizens who need to use state offices, for example driver's license renewals, while not addressing any of the security concerns that the Governor's public statements have indicated.  Disarming good citizens (who are the only ones likely to obey the prohibition) does not make them safer. 

Importantly the Governor has no authority for this regulation.  If the General Assembly wanted the Governor to have such power, they would have granted it to him explicitly, as is required constitutionally.

 I recommend that this regulation not be approved and the state of emergency withdrawn.

Respectfully,

John Seel